Mele’s Musings

Twitter Vs. Facebook: Why Brands Miss the Mark on Facebook

I have long held a belief about Facebook and Twitter that I think is potentially bearing some fruit.  Most of this comes from observations about how everyday people use the two services, and the nature of the services themselves.  And, a recent article I came across on ClickZ seems to be pointing toward some validity to my beliefs. Namely, Facebook is for friends, and Twitter is for business.

Link to image

The observation in the article is that businesses are now generally using Twitter “handles” more than Facebook in their email signatures.  Sounds like a small deal, except that it points to a growing trend, and I think a rising realization that brands are having a hard time figuring out how to use Facebook well.  Twitter, due to its simplicity, is easier to get our hands around.

And, my latest conclusion is that the best way to think of these services is to think of them like search - but in reverse.  Search works because it draws on a user’s immediate, personal  interest, but it is a passive medium for brands - we have to wait for a consumer to generate a query before we can show up.  On the other hand, Twitter and Facebook are opportunities to pro-actively generate interest in users from brands.  Acting on this insight is central to using them correctly.

But, more on that later.  First, we need to break down the Facebook brand presence conundrum.

Over the past two years, businesses have stepped all over themselves figuring out how to have a presence on Facebook.  While some businesses have healthy memberships and “friends,” many have relatively few compared to the number of customers they have.  This has created a long simmering debate in the advertising world - how many friends do you need to be considered “doing well” in the social space?

There is also a healthy debate about what should end up on brand Facebook pages.  What most brands post are merely mirrors of, or links to, other initiatives that are already in the works.  Very little of it is dynamic or interesting - a lot of it sits there for a long time without being refreshed, and it feels like advertising.  Which makes it inherently challenging for consumers to find a good reason to friend or visits a brand.  What does it take, then, to generate interest?  Should brands even have Facebook pages?

My conclusion?  Brands are thinking too hard about what communication to post on Facebook and not enough on what it means to be worthy of being followed, or worthy to be included in a conversation.  Think of your own usage of Facebook.  How much time do you spend on brand or company sites?  Personally, I spend virtually no time on them, and I imagine most people are in the same boat.  The same can be said for the time I spend on any of my friend’s pages.  I watch their status updates, but I don’t spend a ton of time on their pages unless I have a very specific reason to head there.

But that doesn’t mean I don’t spend a lot of time observing my friend’s updates.  What gets me interested?  Seeing a fun, funny, interesting, engaging, mysterious, or meaningful status update.  When I see those, I am inclined to pay attention, to respond, or even visit their page.

This is closer to what happens on Twitter naturally for brands.  Twitter can at first feel redundant with Facebook.   My initial reaction to Twitter was that it felt like Facebook status updates, but less personal.  And I think that is closer to what the real nature and difference is between Facebook and Twitter.  In my personal use, I reserve Facebook for people I consider friends, and Twitter for more professional use.  This has evolved over time, of course, but it is, I think, a more natural use of the services.

Which is why, I think, brands are figuring out how to be successful on Twitter faster than on Facebook.  For brands, Facebook can feel like an opportunity to have a lot of communication or “ad space.”  On Twitter, there is no such luxury.   Brands are forced to convey a story or get an important message across in a very brief way.  They can’t get distracted by a brand page - pages which can cause no end of arguments in a lot of companies.

That doesn’t mean that we should abandon Facebook in favor of Twitter.  But it does mean we need to learn the key to success - to be followed or friended, you have to be interesting.

Which is why thinking of Facebook and Twitter as search in reverse  for brands is so important.  What I mean by this is that brands have to create reasons for consumers to pay attention.   Before anyone will friend or follow a brand, there has to be something compelling that drives them to do so.  And the opportunities are endless: special offers and deals, new release information, information on returns or recalls, local events, expert feedback, loyalty offers, etc.  Twitter and Facebook can then be used to update consumers on valuable information, and, subsequently as conduits to drive users to related experiences.

On Twitter, this conduit must lead to something outside of Twitter.  On Facebook, the opportunity is to lead users to a specific Facebook page which supports the things that the brand is posting or updating.  This means there is a huge opportunity on Facebook to do things differently than you do on the corporate website or the ecommerce site.   To act, dare I say it, like a “friend.”  (To illustrate this point, one of my colleagues has a quote tacked on his cube that I think says it all “If you talked to people the way advertising talks to people, they’d punch you in the face.“)

What this requires, however, is difficult for marketing groups to achieve.  It requires them to stop thinking about consumer communications as ad campaigns, and start thinking about how to actually have a dialogue with consumers, or support the dialogue that consumers are already having.  And my observation is that few marketing organizations are equipped to work that way.

Sparking interest that acts like the flip of search takes constant attention, rapid updating, and an organization ready to offer consumers something of real value outside of pre-ordained sales events.  It can be done, but it takes a shift in how organizations are formed and how they think of themselves.

And these are generally not activities that agencies can provide on their own for companies.  Companies need to restructure themselves to be really customer and communication focused, not just advertising focused.  And that’s hard to do.  Because it means breaking down comfortable and familiar structures.   The ones who can figure it out, however, will be the ones who win.

Please note, too, that this is not the only way to be successful in these social sites, or in Social Influence Marketing in general.  Sometimes, the best thing a brand can do is simply support individuals or communities that already exist instead of trying to create their own or new communities.   But that’s for another post.

Tweet This Post  Buzz This Post  Delicious This Post  Digg This Post  Reddit This Post  Stumble This Post