Associate Professor of Marketing at D'Amore-McKim School of Business at Northeastern University
Remember Threads? An update.
VP & Principal Analyst, Social Media & Creator Economy. On-air TV expert & Bloomberg TV regular.
A year after launch, we know what Threads isn't, but we don't know what it is. Here's the good and the bad from year 1, in reverse order: ✨ The lack of a unique identity is #Threads' biggest hurdle to achieving real staying power. Its primary identity is still Meta's Twitter rival. But Meta has been clear that Threads isn't a place for politics, so it's not X, both in terms of content and audience. I keep thinking about Zuckerberg calling out #TaylorSwift joining the platform on Meta's last earnings call. It was a way to position Threads as culturally relevant, more pop culture than politics, but she hasn't posted since April 28. And that appeared to be a cross-post from Instagram. Without a clear purpose and original content, Threads runs the risk of becoming another also-ran in the race for social user attention. It needs a breakout moment and #creators to drive conversations - whatever those may be. ✨ Threads still needs Instagram for engagement. Reaching 175 million monthly users in less than a year is impressive. But user growth has dropped off since its heyday. And Threads has struggled to maintain engagement after the novelty and excitement about a new #Twitter rival wore off. I also suspect that many of those users are accessing Threads through #Instagram, which bombards me with notifications to check out a "thread I might like" or suggests them in my main feed. EMARKETER estimates that 29.1% of US Instagram users use Threads monthly. ✨ Advertiser interest in Threads is high. "Everybody's asking about Threads," Alvin Bowles, Meta's VP - Global Business Group told me when I asked about his conversations with advertisers at Cannes Lions. That’s partly due to an overall desire to diversify and to be among the first to experiment with a shiny new toy. But it’s also because Threads could offer a safer, less cluttered option that’s tied to #Meta's powerful ad ecosystem. If and when Threads starts to monetize, that could be a big draw for advertisers, who are finding it harder than ever to break through the noise on social media. Thank you Will Oremus and Naomi Nix for including my thoughts in the The Washington Post.
