Here’s what we know about Threads so far…
The rivalry between Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk has stepped up a gear this month with the launch of Threads, a free new ‘text based conversation app’ from Meta. It comes as Elon Musk has caused controversy by announcing that Twitter would be limiting the amount of posts users can view: users with verified (paid for) accounts will be able to view 10,000 posts a day, while existing unverified (free) accounts will be able to see 1,000, and new unverified accounts only 500.
With what feels like an opportunity to win over angry Twitter users, Zuckerberg’s latest launch is destined to be direct competition to Musk’s Twitter. With over 30M downloads in 16 hours, the competition has most definitely started. So, what does it mean for beauty?
What is Threads?
Threads is a text-based conversation app that lets people compose and share those messages in real-time. The official blurb says, ‘Threads is where communities come together to discuss everything from the topics you care about today to what’ll be trending tomorrow.’
Similarly to Twitter, Threads enables users to share text updates (up to 500 characters) to a centralised feed, with links, photos and videos (up to 5 minutes long), and allowing them to interact with other users’ posts through liking, replying and sharing.
Currently you can only see posts which make it to the main feed and from people you follow, and at the moment you can only search for people, not topics, conversations and hashtags although it’s likely this will change if they want to remain in competition with Twitter.
However, a significant distinctive advantage for Threads is that, being part of Meta’s broader ecosystem means that users can keep the same username and follow the same accounts as they do on Instagram, making it seamless for the two billion Instagram users to migrate over to the platform.
Where has it launched?
Threads launched on the 5th July in the US and UK and has already generated significant noise and excitement as one of the most hyped launches this year. However, with concerns regarding how much data the app will be able to access, it will not be available in the EU just yet due to their stricter GDPR rules.
What are the opportunities for brands?
Whilst there are currently no monetisation or ad features on the platform yet, it’s likely that this will be rolled out soon through an integration with Meta Business Suite, allowing markets and brands to easily run the same ads across Facebook, Instagram and Threads.
In the meantime, it’s a great way for brands to share engaging organic content and join conversations to infiltrate communities who will be migrating over from Instagram. Beauty brands have already started activating their accounts on the platform and making their presence known, however there appears to be no clear social strategies in place just yet as they are still figuring out how best to use the platform.
This content was kindly provided by Seen Group, a Patron of the British Beauty Council. For more information email seenworks@seengroup.com.
You can follow the British Beauty Council on threads here.
