Are X/Twitter and Threads worth investing time in?

The social media landscape is constantly in flux.

With an ever-changing algorithm and the continual launching of new platforms, it can feel overwhelming to ensure that your organization is in all the places it needs to be.

Enter Elon Musk, and things just get more complicated. Musk purchased Twitter (now X) back in late 2022 and the app has not been the same since. Between gutting the organization’s security features, enabling problematic content, and having harmful rhetoric from Musk himself, many organizations are reconsidering their presence on the platform if not jumping ship entirely.

Seizing an opportunity, Meta launched Threads in 2023 as the primary competitor to X. With many of the same features that made X unique, Threads offers a similar user experience without the Musk drama.

Threads preserves much of the functionality that made X unique. As another example of a “microblogging” platform, Threads is built off of the sharing of short-form text and image content. A benefit to Threads is that it is closely integrated with Instagram, and this allows new users to immediately connect with their existing follower base.

Naturally, organizations are now wondering if they should make the migration themselves, or stay on X. Unfortunately, there isn’t one easy answer. Here at Pyramid, we weigh several factors as they relate to the unique needs and positions of organizations.

Some considerations include:

1. Ethical concerns
2. Current communications capacity
3. Platform metrics and realities

Ethical Concerns

Reasonably, many are appalled by Musk’s rhetoric. This has led organizations to leave X on principle.

However, it bears remembering that Meta is far from innocent, with its long history of data mismanagement and proliferation of misinformation.

Speaking of misinformation, Musk’s decision to “democratize” the verification process means that it is incredibly difficult to distinguish credible, authentic profiles from imposters or other bad actors.

Fundamentally, this is the question organizations must answer for themselves: “With no perfect options, can our organization still see value from communicating to our audiences on X despite its new positioning?”

Current Communications Capacity

The next consideration is the communications capacity of the organization itself, especially when weighing whether or not there is value in adding Threads to the organization’s existing social media channels.

Does your communications team have the capacity to manage a new platform? If you’re simply migrating from X to Threads and already accustomed to creating that type of content, maybe the answer is ‘yes.’

Smaller organizations with fewer existing channels should consider the capacity and strategy required to generate content specifically for Threads.

Platform Metrics and Realities

At this point, things come down to the raw numbers.

If your organization has already built a large and engaged following on X, it’s likely worth maintaining the platform to preserve that line of communication.

After all, your organization would likely be starting nearly from scratch on Threads and have to dedicate capacity to re-growing your audience.

An additional consideration is whether there is an overlap between your audiences on X, Threads, and other platforms. Currently, Threads leans young and male, with 68% of users identified as male and 28% of those users between 23 to 25 years old.

There are currently no paid advertising opportunities on Threads, so the majority of brands on the platform are using it for organic brand awareness. Many news publications and politicians have made the migration to Threads with varying degrees of success.

It is worth remembering that although reported X usage is down by 14% in 2023, millions of users remain active and engaged. Additionally, it is not the case that those lost to X migrated to Threads. Despite the reports of historic new users at launch (enabled by Threads’ integration with Instagram, which allows users to connect easily with their existing Instagram followers), actual daily usage lags behind X, dropping 79% a month after launch. It is also worth noting the average time spent on Threads also lags behind X, with the average user spending only 3 minutes on the platform, versus 31 daily minutes on X.

All is not lost on the Threads front, however! As reported by Business Insider, in the month of April, Threads averaged an estimated 28 million daily active users while X averaged 22 million. This indicates that despite its rough early start, Threads is starting to catch up.

Conclusion

Each organization must make the choice for themselves based on these considerations. Like most things on social media, it’s about what makes the most sense based on your organization’s mission, capacity, and social media goals.

What we can say is that if you don’t already have an active and engaged following on X, it probably doesn’t make sense to create an X account.

If you already have an engaged audience on X, it makes sense to maintain that line of communication.

If you have the capacity and an engaged audience on Instagram, it makes sense to experiment with Threads and discover whether your audience is equally engaged on that platform.

We hope this brief look at Threads and X offers some useful context as your organization navigates the shifting social media landscape.