Crafting the perfect tweet consists of obtaining a sweet graphic or video from your designer, writing a creative 280 character description, having a Call-to-Action (CTA) link that is begging to be clicked on, and scheduling the tweet out on Twitter during an optimized time.
Each tweet takes time, and for your business, that’s company time and resources. Which is why it’s natural to hope for the best results from each tweet. However, if you’re looking at the analytics a day after a tweet is posted and you’re disappointed in the singular results of one tweet, then your Twitter strategy is missing something.
Your tweet didn’t fall short because of its content, but from Twitter’s algorithm not ranking your tweets high enough. Here’s what you need to know about Twitter’s algorithm, and the one change you can make to increase your tweets’ ranking.
The Twitter Algorithm
Twitter has been known for its reverse chronological order for years, however, in 2017 Twitter introduced its first feed algorithm with “while you were away” and “in case you missed it.” Twitter’s “new” algorithm was to help users see relevant content they missed when they were offline.
Twitter’s algorithm brings a mix of real-time content and content shown based on the algorithms’s ranking of past tweets to your Home feed (unless you turn off the Twitter algorithm on your account).
Twitter’s algorithm is constantly evolving, but when first released, Twitter publicly stated three characteristics the algorithm considers when ranking tweets. They are…
- The Tweet: recency, media usage, and interactions received
- The Author: past interaction with author, strength of connection, origin of relationship
- You: tweets you found engaging in the past, how often and heavily you use Twitter
Twitter Reposting Schedule
Every time you open your Twitter app or refresh your feed, Twitter is scoring every tweet from the people you follow to determine what tweets will be shown at the top of your Home feed. Changing the feed every second, in real time.
This is the same for your target audience’s Twitter. So when you post your tweet once, you leave too much up to the “fate” of Twitter’s algorithm. If you want your content in front of your followers regularly, you need to be repeating your tweets on a consistent basis.
At Katie L Smith & Company, we use a simple reposting schedule that sends out the exact same tweet, not once, but up to seven times during a 12 month period. This reposting strategy guarantees an increase in the reach of a single social media post.
For example:
Post #1 receives 40 impressions
Repeat Post #1 receives 30 impressions
= 70 impressions total
The reposting schedule we recommend for Twitter:
A Quick Note: When following the above reposting schedule, remember to consider the shelf-life of your content. Consider how far into the future the post will remain relevant to your target audience. Will it still be relevant in 24 hours? Next week? Next month?, etc. Once the content reaches its relevancy expiration date, remove it from your reposting schedule.
A reposting schedule is just one piece to a well-rounded Twitter strategy that touches on only a portion of the Twitter algorithm characteristics. If you are interested in learning how you can obtain a well-rounded Twitter strategy and have your tweets rank higher and get seen by your target audience, fill out the contact form below, and our social media strategist will be in touch with you!