Twitter… What Are You Thinking?
The big announcement surprised some, angered others, and led many to conclude that the little bird isn’t bringing in enough cash.
The news: Twitter share counts will no longer appear alongside Tweet buttons AND third-party direct access to tweet share stats will be curtailed.
Update: Our team worked hard and were able to bring back Twitter share counts in version 1.4.1 of Social Warfare! Purchase your copy today!
Off the cuff, that may not sound like an earthshaking development – but the potential ramifications are huge. It could even signal the beginning of the end for social media metrics as we know them or it may signal a giant step towards a paywall-anchored internet.
Let’s take a look at what we know, what we can surmise, and what this change could mean to your business.
Twitter share counts will no longer appear alongside Tweet buttons. Is this for real?!!Click To TweetSo what IS Twitter thinking?
Greed? Corporate jealousy? Power mongering?
Or could it be that Twitter – a social media mainstay – is leading us towards better ways to assess social effectiveness?
It would be easy to run wild with speculation. Rather than do that, though, the Social Warfare team asked a bevy of online influencers for help understanding the situation.
If you care about the future of the internet – and especially if you do business online – don’t leave without reading, bookmarking, and sharing this article.
It’s that important.
15 Social media power influencers speculate why Twitter is cancelling share countsClick To TweetReasons why YOU should care about this issue
The impact Twitter’s decision (and its unavoidable consequences) will have on you and your business depends on how you function online.
Here are a few of the most likely situations and outcomes:
- If you’re a blogger, your Tweet button won’t show visitors how many times your latest post (or any post) has been shared – Could lead to fewer shares and less interaction?
- If you’re an online pro who gets paid big bucks for helping promote brands, you’ll lose a primary way of showing advertisers how popular you are with the online masses – Social Proof. That could put a dent in your bank account
- If you’re a third-party app developer, you may be in deep waters – without access to Tweet share counts, your app may lose a critical part of its functionality, and you may lose subscribers
Insight from the front lines
The Social Warfare team realized Twitter’s announcement foreshadowed the coming of something considerably more significant than a Tweet button design change.
After pondering the situation, we sent out a heads-up announcement to our subscribers – then we polled online influencers to see what insight they could bring to the discussion.
Our query focused on three things:
- Why would Twitter do this?
- How do you feel about the move?
- What impact will this have on social media and social proof?
Following is a synopsis of the responses we’ve received thus far. We’ll also consider the (unofficial) logic provided by a Twitter insider.
Afterwards, we’ll put those same three questions to YOU.
If Twitter cancels share counts, will it impact social proof? Click To TweetWhy would Twitter do this?
Speculations about motive ranged widely. Some were unique. Most pointed to an end game related to the primary motivation behind most business decisions – how to make more money.
Responses fell into these six fairly well-defined categories:
- Twitter wants to generate more revenue!
- Twitter wants to cut expenses by no longer playing (free) host to share count queries.
- Twitter hates that Facebook share counts generally make Twitter share counts seem paltry. Removing share counts may prompt other social platforms to do the same.
- Twitter knows the future of computing is predominantly mobile and wearable devices – where there’s not much room for share count displays
- The move makes no business sense whatsoever. Twitter is “throwing away dollars to make pennies.”
- Twitter wants to force users to login to Twitter.com, rather than use third-party apps as the primary access point. That will give Twitter more marketing capability. They can sell more ads and get more commissions.
You may recall that it was about two years ago that Twitter, Inc. became a publicly traded company. Share value moved from a $69 USD high in January of 2014 to a current close of $25.76 – and has been sinking steadily since last spring.
(Source: Google Finance on September 29, 2015 after close of trading)
That scenario adds real credence to the “desperate attempt to earn more money” theory. And while we can’t provide an OFFICIAL explanation for the move, here’s what we were told by a source inside Twitter:
- The Tweet counts alone did not accurately reflect the impact on Twitter of conversation about the content. They are often more misleading to customers than helpful.
- This was an undocumented, unsupported private API to this data. With Gnip, we provide a public and documented way to get similar information for developers and product companies.
- Ultimately, we encourage developers and product companies to demonstrate richer information about the audience impact of content shares on Twitter: including the influence, authority, and distribution shares give to content on our platform.
How do you feel about the move?
Remember: This is just the beginning of the discussion. Your input is valuable. We want to know what you think.
To get the discussion started, though, here’s how the responses we’ve received to date pan out.
- It’s a shame
- I hate it
- It’s a bummer and a bunch of B.S.
- I’m disappointed
- I doubt they’ll follow through and really do it
- I really don’t care
- I’m horrified
- I’m not surprised
- Maybe there’s a bright side!
All told, the general consensus was that the initial jolt won’t last more than a few months. Just as the SEO world found ways to deal with grossly diminished reporting of search data for analytics, the social media community will develop workarounds to meet the challenge.
We may need to pass through a period of ‘flying blind,’ but the online world is resilient, creative, and determined.
Give yourself some applause. You deserve it.
Said my buddy – and copywriter extraordinaire – Demian Farnworth, “Either the backlash will be so big Twitter retracts or someone else comes up with a better way to demonstrate social proof. I actually prefer the latter option.”
Ya gotta love it.
And that brings us to our final query…
Here's the initial reaction many had about Twitters announcement to cancel share countsClick To TweetWhat impact will this have on social media and social proof?
This is a tough, tough question. It’s tempting to get out the crystal ball and predict either mayhem or social media nirvana.
And it’s tempting to play the middle of the road and say much without saying anything really. Some of the probabilities seem self-evident and/or unavoidable, and our panel covered the bases well.
Time will give us a better picture of how things will pan out.
Some believe Twitter’s move will make a “huge impact” on the social media world. Some see no reason to panic and are content to wait and see.
Some think we would be wise to get proactive – FAST.
The range of responses stacked up like this:
- Twitter is losing ground and in danger of falling from its privileged position as a social media giant
- Access to “vanity metrics” will be sharply reduced – other social media platforms may follow suit and cut off easy access to their analytics data
- Many social media third-party app developers will be hit hard – some may shut down entirely for lack of affordable access to information
If you get quiet and listen closely. If you sniff the social wind a bit and let the news sink in… you’ll realize something is up.
Something is different.
Social media is about to change, and it may be considerably more drastic than just the color of your Tweet buttons.Click To TweetWhat’s the solution?
As a third-party provider of a WordPress social media plugin, Social Warfare is definitely concerned. Our team is working hard to keep Social Warfare reasonably priced and optimally effective.
Twitter’s recommendation (Gnip.com) is cost-prohibitive. Fees aren’t posted on the Gnip site, but developers will need to pony up thousands of dollars each month just to get on board.
By the way (surprise, surprise), Gnip was recently acquired by Twitter.
It is possible to access share counts via the Twitter REST API. This approach, however, requires individual permissions and is considerably more complex and cumbersome than the current, relatively simple, JSON endpoint access.
More likely, Twitter’s move will stir up launches of providers who pay the Gnip fees – then resell the data to others.
Let’s look at the writing on the wall, though: IF Twitter’s desire is to put access to their data behind a paywall – and Gnip is the chosen wall – chances are good we’ll never, ever see easy (read that “low-cost or free”) access to tweet counts again.
Is Twitter planning on hiding Tweet data behind a very pricey paywall?Click To TweetThe mom and pop buffet we’ve grown accustomed to online may be rapidly moving towards an RSVP. You may soon need to pay handsomely for services once easily affordable.
Maybe.
The giants have claimed their spots, they’ve set up shop, and they are ready to start claiming bigger pieces of the financial potential of internet marketing.
How does that idea set with you?
Have you become so internet-dependent that you have no choice but to pay whatever it takes to operate online?
Will the politicians protect you from online extortion?
Can a grassroots movement persuade the big wheels to back off and tread easily?
It’s your turn to talk. Comments are open.
Let’s compare notes.
How much are you willing to pay for Twitter share counts and data? It's coming. Get ready...Click To TweetSome of my favorite quotes from participants
We’re indebted to our panel members. Even though our call for responses went out without warning – and we needed feedback quickly – they took time to answer. We learn from them daily, and you can too. Click on the names to find out more about the contributors and their work.
“I’ve long believed in Twitter’s potential– but now if they could only take care of the developers, customers, and agencies that need visibility into performance to justify an investment in Twitter, ad-driven or not.” –Dennis Yu
“Twitter is likely to expand functionality in this area where it provides curation of tweets based on most popular content for particular categories.” –Ian Cleary
“I hate anything that makes the web less transparent. While I agree with others that share count data isn’t the only metric that matters, and certainly not the most important, it does serve as at least a relative indicator of content that is resonating with an audience.” –Mark Traphagen
“Tweet counts, while a vanity metric, help authors and readers alike, better understand which content is connecting with readers. Everyone has a favorite plugin/analytics tool, but Tweet counts were a drive-by view of performance.” -Lori Friedrich
“Seems like it’s a done deal to me.” –Peg Fitzpatrick
“From a strategic perspective… this is just another in a long series of moves where Twitter is trying to corral all of their data and force people to use the Twitter-supplied analytics dashboard.” –Jay Baer
Why Twitter is killing tweet counts on all blogs and websites
Posted by Jay Baer on Monday, September 28, 2015
“I commend anyone for testing. But I don’t believe in a social media utopian society where everyone is equal.” –Marcus Sheridan
“This is one way to break me of my love affair for vanity metrics.” -Demian Farnworth
“It simply doesn’t make sense to me on any level… DISLIKE isn’t a strong enough word for how I feel about it.” –Kim Garst
“I feel this is yet another sad tale of Twitter turning their backs on the developers that helped it become great. Of all the social stats to remove access to, Twitter shares should be one of the last.” –Ian Anderson Gray
“It seems like a natural play for monetization… which will make Wall Street happy.” –Brian Fanzo
“[Share counts are] the main metric we use to measure how much traction our content is getting.” –Dan Norris
“Is there a good technical reason for this or is it more ‘We’re Twitter. We can screw developers anytime we want’ B.S.?” –Guy Kawasaki
Have you voiced your view yet?
We’d really love to hear from you and get your perspective on Twitter’s decision to kill tweet counts. You can sound off in the comments below or let us know how you feel on the social network of your choice. You know what to do!
P.S. If you’re not a fan of Twitter’s decision and want your tweet counts to remain, use the hashtag #SaveOurShareCounts and join the other folks petitioning against this change.
Great Article, thanks for sharing with us. such as good article, I have read your all blog & enjoyed alot.
Thanks Again
How come you still have twitter share count in your article?
Because we built our Social Warfare plugin to use a 3rd party app that counts Twitter shares 😀
How is it that your twitter count works but no one else’s does?
Hi, Canelo! There are a few reasons our Twitter counts are working:
1. Social Warfare was built to cache the counts for a social network in such a way so that if a network ever stops supporting counts, they would not be lost in Social Warfare
2. Social Warfare integrates with third-party tweet count services TwitCount and OpenShareCount
Now, these third-party services can be hit-or-miss with certain server/website configurations, but they’re the only ones that don’t charge users for their service.
Great article. Twitter hasn’t restored it. That was disappointing.
Nice and Informative post. Would follow all steps here.
Hope to get some decent traffic from twitter.
Nice post Don.
Thank you for the vote of confidence. The journey continues…
I’m shocked! Definitely not a wise move by Twitter!
I have a different take on this. Maybe companies are paying to boost up the social counts in many websites, just to get greater visibility on the web. Maybe this is a response to such efforts, so that share count, though will be calculated, will not be publicly displayed.
well it seems that the share counts are posted here below at 10400 shares on TWITTER? or 1.4k so you have to ask? how are you doning this https://warfareplugins.com a new plugin? or is this just FAKE?
Hungry for andanswer…
Steve
Hi Steve! If you read the big, bright-red message box at the top of this article you will see we had found a way around Twitter removing the API endpoint. 😀
I’m shocked! Definitely not a wise move by Twitter! Cut analytic data off and then resell it? I feel like goodbye twitter…
Well, not to worry though because… we’ve found a fix. 😀 Be on the lookout for our next blog post today.
Hi Don,
Great post. I may have missed something – how is it that this post is still showing 1.2k Twitter shares?
Good question Michel! See this post for the answer. 😉
I personally used to tweet way more than I do since removal of counts. I feel like I’m working (to show shares) for nothing when I do tweet. I used to post every hour and now at best once a day. My main traffic comes from FB and Google as top dogs so Twitter never really was high on my list to start with. I do believe this news is hard to take in for some though and that sux for them.
It’s awwesome to pay a quick visit this web page and reading the views
of all mates about this post, while I am also zealous of getting familiarity.
We didn’t know this until the counter doesn’t show up in our social buttons. This move of Twitter is a bad news for developers. So many plugins and scripts won’t work in their way.
Shame and sad.
Glad to see you talking about this. I, for one, miss seeing that little number next to my Tweet button. 🙂 Rarely do I go into my Twitter analytics. I always forget. I’m so angry about it, I’ve been contemplating leaving Twitter altogether! haha No, not really. You know I couldn’t do that. But some people really did enjoy having that count there. I just don’t understand the reasoning behind Twitter removing it. I say bad move but who am I?
Did it bother you? Hope you’re having a great day!
It looks as if Twitter is out to screw us all, instead of expanding. I have always been a strong supporter of Twitter, now I am re-examining how we will use it in the future. A Very bad move. I agree with Guy Kawasaki.
#3.
Well it appears the results are already in. Sharing to Twitter declines 11% after Twitter kills share counts:
https://blog.shareaholic.com/sharing-to-twitter-declines-11-after-twitter-kills-share-counts/
this is very annoying plus I am sure it affects shareability.
we found an alternative way to fix the share counts and we implemented a free tool for everyone that will actually give your counts back.
http://twitcount.com
looking forward for your feedback too 😉
This is a great way for Twitter to fade into obscurity. Sharing is the only reason I use Twitter, I will turn to Google+ for my future sharing if Twitter removes share counts. Already on my blog share counts aren’t showing up for Twitter.
You can try newsharecounts.com to get your share counts back to your site.
Funny all these opinions. The solution is super obvious, use the REST API. It’s free and everything is back to normal. If you can’t do it yourself, pay a dude 10 bucks.
There is a solution, but integrating that solution takes some time. It also requires users to give oAuth access to whichever app/service will be making that API connection. We are working on this type of integration and hope to have the details all worked out soon.
Nice post Don.
I just realize this as Twitter share count is not working anymore on my site since a week ago.
On other sites I’ve seen the counter is also 0. I just wonder now why on this page of your blog it is still counting..
Hi. It isn’t counting – it is only showing counts it already had when Twitter turned them off. But, they are working on a way to get them counting again and I am hopeful they will.
Don,
Thanks very much for covering this issue. I only learned about it myself yesterday, and have been grappling with it. I wrote a post as well, and have started a petition:
http://thesocialmediamonthly.com/hell-twitter-thinking/
Petition: http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/saveoursharecounts.html
Bob
It sucks that Twitter is destroying this function. Guess they’ll be gone from my URLs metric analysis.
Hey Don.. great stuff man.. Im a little late to the party.
Here is my tweet to Twitter on Saturday when the buttons were changed.
“Hey @twitter Thanks for dismissing the 8+ years of me busting my ass to prove my “Expert” and Promoting YOUR platform with one button change”
Pretty much sums up my feelings.
Let me add this… hoping people will pay for something that has been FREE from day one is BAD business.
I’m shocked!
Won’t Twitter lose a lot of traffic this way? I mean if you tot up all blogs and their sharing of posts on Twitter through the sharebars- this would amount to a huge daily volume of traffic.
I see that you’ve taken Twitter off your sharebar. If all bloggers do this it should be a significant loss for Twitter.
Is there a way we can tell Twitter about our dismay?
Yes, it’s very shocking Mary.
I don’t know why you can’t see the Twitter button on our page though– it’s definitely there.
And yes, you can voice your sentiment to Twitter using our recommendation in the final paragraph of the post above. 😀
I see that you’ve got your Tweet count working again. How did you do that??
Yes, Twitter will lose traffic and so will sites who are heavy users and influencers on Twitter. The reason this will happen – which apparently many who have commented on this page seem not to comprehend – is that seeing high tweet counts motivates the reader landing on a post to immediately share it before they even read it. It also motivates them to actually read the post.
Turn off Twitter counts and people used to deciding which posts to share and read based on those counts will no longer share or read. Sites where Twitter was their #1 traffic referrer will therefore see less traffic due to less tweets. They will also see reduced time on site and higher bounce rates which is likely to affect search engine traffic as well.
How can people who make a living doing marketing fail to understand the value of social proof? And what planet does that Google rep live on that he thinks no other social platforms have share numbers. Look at the buttons on this post – they ALL have share numbers.
So even though Twitter is my #1 traffic source and favorite social network, I immediately moved them in my sharing order from first to last and need to focus more time everywhere else and less on Twitter UNLESS Warfare plugins gets share counts working again.
So far I have only moved that sharing button and have not changed where I spend my time or my #1 place to share. I want to know to verify that Twitter traffic will drop, but if I could get Twitter shares back today I would put the button back in first place and keep doing what I do on Twitter while ramping up time spent everywhere else to grow influence elsewhere before their next stupid decision.
I noticed that the share count for the Twitter button on this page still seems to work, whereas the one on our site stopped working. Would you mind sharing which WordPress plugin you are using for your share buttons? Thanks!
Hi Jason! The plugin that we use is our own product, Social Warfare. 😉
How is it that your twitter count works but no one else’s does?
Jason, the counter isn’t incrementing, it is just preserving the counts they had before Twitter turned off tweet counts.
How come you still have twitter share count in your article?
Hi Lucky! In our follow-up article we talked about some of the things we’ve built into our social sharing plugin to “soften the blow” so-to-speak. We have actually found a workaround that will bring back share counting for Twitter, but are still working on perfecting it before releasing it to our users.
I am not sure if it was mentioned somewhere in the comment section. So what ‘solution’ are you using for this site as it continues to display tweet counts? Thanks in advance.
Hi Marc! Our plugin has a number of built-in protocols which we talked about in a follow-up article.
Thanks for this Dustin! I’d be checking on this as our sites are also affected of this Twitter change.
Considering that the vast amounts of tweets are moronic (and that’s being kind) who cares what Twitter does? The only thing I like about Twitter is that it forces your messages to be short.
So ap developers will be hit. What a tragedy! What will we EVER do without aps!
If you have been following all the changes and stock price, then you know there is a good change of takeover of Twitter at some point in the near future. They are having problems attracting new users, and the changes are not helping.
This is disheartening! Definitely not a wise move by Twitter!
I am the author and maintainer of Social Stats (https://www.drupal.org/project/social_stats) a Drupal module which collects stats for the web pages on a Drupal Site. Twitter is one of the service from which the module could be configured to collect the tweet count. The reported number of sites using this module generally vary between 500 – 600 (the real installation numbers might be higher).
Not sure how the (smaller) sites built using the open source software could afford to pay for the stats, or would even consider it. Definitely a loss to Twitter!
Thank you Don for the elaboration and the background.
We actually built a solution on top of the REST API search endpoint: Check out http://opensharecount.com, a drop-in replacement for the old, unofficial counter API… It should work with any third party twitter button in existence. Sign up so we can use your Twitter account to do searches for your website’s URLs and change one link in the source code of your Tweet button. That’s all there is to it.
Could we please get this integrated into Social Warfare? I thought about signing up and trying to do it myself, but I’m afraid I may not get it working and then if Social Warfare integrates with it I’ll be hosed up and it will take more time to get it fixed.
Our company uses twitter simply for social proof. It took us years to get a healthy amount of twitter shares to display on our homepage. We pay for ads to help build that social proof.
I don’t see us giving Twitter any more money as the company doesn’t offer our products or company any value other than social proof.
I might just build my sharing button to display my total follower count now or else I could just remove twitter completely and stick to instagram and facebook.
This is so wrong and lame especially after all the “HelloWorld” they started: https://blog.twitter.com/2015/hello-world
Quote: Last week, over 1,500 developers from over 39 countries attended Flight 2015 (@Flight) to learn more about using the Twitter platform to build the best apps and businesses. In his opening keynote, Jack promised to “reset” our relationship with developers going forward.
Great and this is just 2 weeks after the announcement!
Really, what are they thinking???
Or is this the case, when head doesn’t know what tail is doing?
Hey everyone ,I’m Charles. I want to apologize for causing this stir…
this decision is not twitters call.Its out of their hands, and that’s not fair either because contrary to popular belief there is such a thing as ” Internet eminent domain”, if it’s in the best interest of national security… that’s all I can say about that…
I will add this, when this temporary shift in the whole share count thing is over, if twitter tries to take advantage of it s., and twitter knows what I’m talking about…I promise you that instead of focusing on world peace and uplifting American economics, I will add a third endeavor…The reforment of Social Media…(trust me, twitter, you don’t want that…think very carefully before you make policy decisions that hardworking people all over the world use daily…I have blueprints already…That’s not a threat…It’s a promise…Keep the Internet free and accessible or face the wrath of competition that isn’t even there (yet)…
Don’t piss me off…
Charles
Oh no Don! Ego smack down LOL. I like the news and hate it. No I guess I like it. Because even though I love having social proof I also want to give my energy to building bonds and creating value, and all who bond with me and love my value will retweet my posts no matter what. Numbers mean little to them. What a fascinating development. Thanks so much for sharing with us.
Signing off from Nicaragua.
Ryan
Sometimes, Ryan, things change… and we can’t do a darned thing but learn and grow. I hear you, bro, it’s a bittersweet situation.
So Twitter has also tightened its belt to follow the footsteps of Facebook and Google and go commercial from head to toe.
I wonder how Klout would be evaluating the popularity of a Twitter influencer after this change.
I just shared a link to your article here along with the recent TechCrunch story of Twitter apologizing to developers on my Google Plus.
https://plus.google.com/u/0/+LindaSherman/posts/X1d6baFTnPE
I believe you missed Twitter’s “hard decisions for a sustainable platform” post – where they give their lame excuses for removing Twitter share counts – on their Twitter blog.
I would include that link here but for sure if I use 2 links my comment will never get through.
Thanks for a useful article!
Oh, we’re keeping a close eye on Twitter’s responses– I’m active in that community. We’ve linked to the “hard decisions” post here. 😀
Social counts are a shitty metric. Show me how many leads and how much money you’re making me then I’ll let you keep your job.
Most metrics in and of themselves are unhelpful. It’s within the proper context of KPIs and overall goals where a metric’s value lives or dies. Luckily, we make it super easy to track the results of sharing from our plugins and with a little Google Analytics savvy (blog post coming soon) you can easily track conversions or even revenue being driven by shocial shares.
Pinterest has also stopped showing shares, and some of the Facebook share numbers are no longer consistent. This is just not a good thing. Thanks for this great article.
Not this this is about me… but Facebook took significant swipes at the activist world by limiting reach without paying for viewshare. Some people say that activist activity on Facebook is throttled down. I’m not so sure if that’s true, as it appears the reconfiguration of it effects everybody. We’ve been waiting for Twitter to catch up with the other social media giant in this move to limit the popular voice
Allow me to introduce myself… I’m with the #OWS media team of @globalrevlive. One of the things I do concerning social justice is teach social justice and labor groups the ‘How To Do Twitter Storms’. Tracking the count on real time count numbers has been vital to developing better techniques. The best practices of this technique have been studied and shared with many groups. Our work is done.
I say… Go for it Twitter
Insert Newton’s 3rd Law
This will do nothing more than to inspire the activist world to be more creative and strive to collaborate more closely.
Plus there are new sites coming up all the time. criticl.me is a very good example of the next wave. Twitter will not survive this radical shift.
I would like to hear people’s thoughts on what some viable alternatives to the Twitter share count might be? Or are just going to have to rely on Facebook, Google+ and Pinterest now for our social proof?
I haven’t heard any yet Daniel. We’ve explored a handful of concepts but all of them are unreliable and easily gamable. There are some social share plugins out there who are already doing click or event tracking, which is the most plausible solution but it’s also the easiest to game.
Controlling the narrative is the # 1 objective for all of social media platforms. Much like Youtube has controlled view counts and flagging on alternative news channels, Twitter will control what news will be. All of these platforms are following Google’s lead, and those of us who are attempting to cut through legalized mainstream propaganda, will yet again, be put on the backburner.
Have never really looked at those numbers they are extremely easy to game for a start
Hello Don,
Good topic and impressive inputs from the fellow commenters!
While I don’t care it they put the kill switch over share counts; I also believe it’s the one step forward towards brighter side of the picture.
Though, it will bring in the great surprise and concerns in the industry but hope that something good is gonna happen after/with this change.
~ Adeel
Thank you, Adeel. One thing for sure: Twitter, Google, and Facebook may believe they hold all the trump cards, but it’s not true. A mass exodus of users will bring down ANY online giant. The people have the real power. The platforms depend on their loyalty.
The impact will be huge, especially for Twitter.
When Google stopped updating its PageRank green bar, it gave up a powerful gimmick that kept a large audience Google-focused. It could afford to do so, because nobody else could touch them. Google did not need its green bar.
Now second-place Twitter is giving up its equivalent publicity gimmick … but Twitter is in second place. Facebook keeps shooting itself in the foot with changes to privacy terms and what we can and cannot view in our stream. So I am sure there’s a huge collective sigh in Menlo Park, as Twitter grabs the gun and shoots it’s own foot this time.
Thanks, David. I guess it’s like the leveling off and powering down of an airliner when cruising elevation is reached. Maybe first-to-market branding is enough to keep Google, Facebook and Twitter on top… and maybe not. It’s not up to them. It’s up to us. An en masse exodus by users could bring down ANY online giant.
Anyone still on myspace? Can I cite bebo here too? …I believe any social media network can become irrelevant; and quickly.
I stopped using Facebook years ago when they closed groups and added Timeline and made tons of changes. I completely stopped using it for marketing. It used to be a great tool until the idiots at Facebook decided to make a bunch of changes.
Is that the smartest Twitter can come up with?
Cut analytic data off and then resell it?
I feel like goodbye twitter..
I think we are all WAY too used to getting everything for free on the internet. I can purchase a $10k+ custom theme on themeforest for $58, download a bevy of free plugins and be up and rolling for a minimal cost. Recently I added the paid version of MailChimp’s MailMunch plugin as a popup and was super-impressed with how much better the quality of the plugin was (and the ease of setup). Don’t get me wrong, I like cheap and free just as much as anyone else, but it’s just not realistic in the long term.
I’m with Karri, and I might expand on it more in a blog post, but I’d love to see all platforms remove the share count option. Might actually force publishers to be more accountable to quality content, versus just pushing Social Media 101 crud out, with a few buzzworthy soundbites, all in the name of another share…
This is a very interesting discussion, but I really don’t find that Twitter (or Facebook or any other platform’s share statistics mean much other than an immediate ego boost.
As long as Google Anaytics show me that customers are finding my website via Twitter, I’ll carry on using it. If it becomes no longer effective as a referral channel, I’ll put my efforts into other platfoms and ways to generate traffic.
Isn’t that the ultimate decision for all Social Media marketers?
“…other than an immediate ego boost.”
Boom. 🙂
This change will make no difference to me or the way I use social media. I’m only interested in the real world engagement that I can generate from sharing interesting or useful content. Vanity metrics tell me nothing of substance; conversations tell me everything.
@HuwSayer
This move is no different than when Facebook reduced organic reach on pages, making it necessary for brands to pay to reach their fans. Going forward we’ll need to pay a Twitter owned service to get data. Why is everyone so surprised given their recent financial performance?
It’s simple, somebody moved the cheese and so instead of worrying about the next piece of cheese it’s time to pony up and go find it.
Business is business. When you work B2B there are always going to be opportunities to find new avenues of doing what we’ve been doing. They purchased a company that provided the data. They want to make more money through that company. Okay great, they have the right to grow just like we do.
If we’re that concerned we need to go back and read Who Moved My Cheese again.
Yes, but in this case, if Twitter removes social proof, writers whose primary social network was Twitter will see less traffic, fewer retweets, fewer shares. This means they need to jump ship and invest their time elsewhere, thereby hurting Twitter because Twitter hurt them.
This move is bad for everyone involved. Further, without any social proof that people actually care about Twitter, how in the world will we ever convince our clients to pay for ads on that platform?
One thing that is happening is that some sites are finding a way around this by hand coding shares from sources such as opensharecount. Others will promote existing content with high share counts they retained using the Social Warfare plugin over newer content with no tweets visible.
We really need Warfare Plugins to come up with a solution or those sites with coders who can pull Twitter numbers in somehow will benefit while those who don’t have their own coders will lose traffic and shares.
Twitter was my #1 traffic source so this greatly affects someone like me who loves Twitter and invested more time and effort there than on any other platform. I’d jump to something better, but what?
LinkedIn is the obvious choice, but they just made two huge mistakes (messaging and groups). Google Plus can’t get it together; each succeeding change makes it worse instead of better. Facebook already proved they are a pay-for-view platform.
Twitter is uniquely valuable to someone like me. I would prefer to find a solution to keep using it to take advantage of my current advantages there while quickly expanding onto other platforms because this won’t be the last change they make that drives us away.
First we need to restore our Twitter counts. Then collectively we need to get behind some other network. GrowthHackers or Inbound or even Tsu? Or maybe BizSugar could turn themselves into a replacement for Twitter? We need to do something.
Good post and great comments! Glad to have stumbled in…
I’ll take the contrarian viewpoint here and say that Tweet counts are BS and ditching them is a step in the right direction for Twitter and for social media analytics and influencers.
The tide was already changing when ‘retweet with comment’ was launched a few months back. Those ‘commented’ shares didn’t get counted as retweets. Did that not strike anyone as odd? Not boosting signals of ‘social proof ‘ and ‘virality’ would seem counter to Twitter’s interests.
Given the vast networks of bots and tools that consume feeds and auto-tweet articles, the share count is beyond useless. We’ve all seen undeniably crappy content with thousands of shares. If you’re getting paid to exert your social influence, then isn’t WHO tweeted your content far more important than a gross count? Sure, that makes the job harder, but it also brings a lot more credibility to true influencers.
So regardless of whether this is part of a master plan, a thinning of the public API using hoard, or an executive fiat…what are we really losing?
Karri, you’re actually correct, but I think they’re throwing out the baby with the bath water. If their site is being flooded with spam links from automated bots, that’s the issue that should be corrected first. Fix the illness(the spam), not one symptom (numbers that may be inflated by the spam) of the illness.
I hear you Karri. As social media professionals, we know how easy the numbers are to game and we know how little they have to do with real KPI. But we also have to remember to step outside of our own knowledge and consider what the mass-market (if our intended audience is not professional social media marketers) perceives about such things.
As much as I’d like to educate everyone about what those numbers actually mean, human psyche is hard to change. The human mind instinctually looks for cues in its environment to give it hints as to how to perceive what they’re seeing. Social proof is a strong indicator for most.
Great information. Thanks for sharing. It’s business though and business cares about its bottom line. I’m curious to see how it plays out. It does seem that marketers can’t rely on one network or source for visibility, data, or analytics. You’re walking on solid ground then BAM, quicksand.
Karen, isn’t that the truth! I suppose it should be no surprise that their number one priority is now their investors…not their users. But I just wonder if this is going to help turn them around or if alienating their base is just going to continue to contribute to the decline of their profits and stock price. 🙁
From the first rumor that they were planning on becoming a publicly traded company I knew it was bad news. This is just the kind of counter-active decisions that social-tech companies end up making that are obviously bad for users but they somehow believe it will translate to higher stock value. When will they learn?
DISLIKE, dislike! I’ll definitely be tweeting #SaveOurShareCounts and putting out some visuals later this week to promote that. I love the transparency of the Internet – and if Twitter is the FIRST social media platform to hide their share counts, where is our transparency going? This has me worried and concerned.
(Thanks for this awesome content piece, Dustin! And for letting me know about it on my own brief blog on this matter: https://expresswriters.com/is-twitter-doing-away-with-share-counts-on-tweet-buttons/)
Julie, thanks for the support. I can’t wait to see those visuals that you make for this. Please be sure to tag us when you publish those. I would love it if enough people get involved that Twitter decides to reverse this decision. That would be awesome!
You’re welcome Julia! Please let me know when you release your content! 😀
Julia I double dislike too. Stinks of desperation and then some!
Twitter is technically not the first to hide our social shares and growth. Google has been doing it for yrs via their algorithm changes and slaps.
Facebook does it daily following in google footsteps by literally burying people’s updates. Today you find many updates by people with barely any engagement. Facebook literally hides the content if someone is “Not actively being social” on there. A lot of BS if yo ask me…its all down to the bottom dollar and sod the consumer, esp. free users. Whom they actually target with Ads.
Oh well Don Awesome Post time to go and use other social media to get our messages across! By the way HOW DID YOU KEEP YOUR TWEET COUNTS Don? Watch out for then new Penguin Update coming in New Year!
Reading between the lines, ie the stealthy manner in which this was announced, this move is not the result of a great strategic masterplan.
More than likely, as most commentators have implied, this smacks of desperation; a bold, but unco-ordinated attempt to placate shareholders with the promise of a few pieces of silver.
If recent history is anything to go by, the tech unicorns exist in a parallel moral universe. They call the shots. We obey. If you don’t like it, get a typewriter.
Remember Google Authorship? When every serious blogger on the planet was coerced into associating their content with Google+ (and adding a cheesy profile pic for good measure.)
What was our reward for loyally obeying every whim of Google? That’s right. They scrapped the whole idea.
Hence, this latest missive from another unicorn comes as no surprise. They want to maximise growth and revenue. If they can do that by betraying ‘freeloaders’ ( ie you and me) and sucking up to the corporates, then they will. No regrets. No apologies. No remorse.
We are the Unicorns. Lower your shields and surrender your business plan. You will be assimilated. Resistance is futile.
Love it, Jeff. Game Theory at work.
I think you made some pretty good points. The sneaky way in which they made this announcement is incredibly revealing about the motives of the decision.
Hahaha! Very poetic Jeff! And was that a Dr. Who, Cybermen reference?!
Good post!
Concerning a reason for this move, it could be another move to bully competitors. I have to admit that I know very little about Periscope and Meerkat, but I do know that Twitter acquired the former and that ever since, they’ve made moves to try and bully Meerkat out of existence. This might be one more such move.
Also, from what I understand they acquired GNIP, which will now be the only source for this kind of data – again a move that bullies the competition.
I can’t see this as a strategic move to try and monetize access to the data, since prices for GNIP seem to start at around $3K/month. If you remove something that has mass appeal and want to replace it with a paid option, that paid option would have to have mass appeal as well, which definitely doesn’t apply to a $3K+ recurring price tag.
Overall, I think this is a bad move and I’m curious to see how it will play out.
Thanks, Shane. You nailed a big part of the mystery: “If you remove something that has mass appeal and want to replace it with a paid option, that paid option would have to have mass appeal as well, which definitely doesn’t apply to a $3K+ recurring price tag.”
Yep, spot on about the mass appeal thing Shane.
I would expect Twitter usage to drop. The regular user (e.g. regular internet surfer) may think no one is sharing on Twitter anymore, so why even bother? Twitter usage could drop.
I’ve heard a few people suggest this now, and I think that this may very well be an unintended side effect of this decision.
I agree.
I totally agree Pamela. I think this may be a more subtle side effect that will influence people’s perception negatively.
Yes, and that’s why we are not getting that result on twitter.
I have counted my social shares (http://mycodingtricks.com/count/) for my blog post and all have less counts just because of twitter.
Twitter hasn’t found a way to make money. The advertising model they are attempting is awful and I’ve advised all clients not to pay to send their tweets to non-following tweeters.
The evolution is necessary for Twitter to figure out, but they are thinking about it the wrong way. Twitter is also very hard to use for a lot of newbies. Make Tweetdeck the default Twitter.com interface. (simplified, of course) And get the spammers out of there. The problem is, if they deleted all the fake and spam accounts, their numbers would be cut in half, so that would not please any investors. Twitter’s got a problem. I wrote something about how they could change a while back, but the principles still remain true.
http://uber.la/2013/10/evolution-of-twitter/
Thanks for this informative article. Let’s hope they get their ship in order and don’t do something so stupid as removing share counts.
I agree. I’ve used their advertising a couple of times, and never with the success that I’ve seen elsewhere. You’re also spot on about how they need to evolve. The twitter.com interface is not used by most because Tweetdeck (among other apps) is simply so much better. That’s all I use.
Great news, folks. Michael Stelzner jumped in to help out via Blab yesterday. He and Social Media Examiner can add major push to our efforts to focus eyes and ears on the potential ramifications of Twitter’s move. Thanks, Michael! Here’s the link. He turns to this story at about 26 min: https://blab.im/michael-a-stelzner-morning-social-media-marketing-talk-from-smexaminer-7
Speaking as someone building an analytics product on the Twitter platform, I completely understand the why of this decision. But the way in which we found out is utterly appalling – it’s like being broken up with via post-it note.
Also, lemme get this straight: you’re a product company that’s looking for new revenue streams, and you decided overnight to shut down a product that is *actively used by thousands of developers* #facepalm
That’s a great analogy. They issued this notice as a side note to their button redesign. I have to wonder how much farther their stock is going to have to trend downward before they decide to start working with developers instead of against them.
Thanks for adding your thoughts Jason, and I totally agree about the break-up note.
Curious to know your thoughts on that “why” for something as simple as the share count. I can get my head around that piece. I can definitely see more intelligent data requests, but share count? What are your thoughts?
I don’t have a problem with Twitter monetising their analytics data as long as the Analytics API offered to third parties is high quality and self service. The issue at the moment is that Twitter data sales require an enterprise license which means friction for innovative startups who want to help monetise twitter data via new use cases.
Toby, bear in mind that it’s not just about it being monetized, it’s about the HUGE financial barrier to entry. By requiring us to use Gnip for this data, they not asking for $50 or $100 bucks for small users. The starting price is literally in the thousands of dollars per month. That barrier is going to stop tons and tons of developers from being able to access that data.
Twitter can’t stop stumbling over themselves. The pennies they make with GNIP are not worth the dollars they lose by blinding publishers, advertisers, and the community.
This is a continuation of a consistent move to alienate folks like us who are wanting to prove Twitter’s value, but get blocked. Perhaps the numbers have shrinked such that they don’t want anyone to see. Check out: https://dennisyu.wordpress.com/2015/04/13/twitter-shoots-itself-in-the-foot-by-cutting-off-datasift-access/
Dennis, Awesome write up on your article. I think you’re exactly right. Facebook has built a huge ecosystem of apps and users because of the access that they provide to third-party developers for their platform. Twitter is pretty much doing the opposite. I loved your quote, “The pennies they make with GNIP are not worth the dollars they lose by blinding publishers, advertisers, and the community.” Great stuff.
I think it’s Dorsey’s way of saying “there’s a new sheriff in town.”
Was this a Dorsey decision?
Just like Facebook forced brands into pay-to-play, I think Twitter landed on ‘social proof’ as their leverage point for monetization. Now we’ll ‘pay-to-proof’.
Though I’m sure it’s possible, tanking organic reach like FB did to monetize doesn’t make as much sense for the real-time news value Twitter brings. They need better ways of monetizing without risking tweet velocity.
It’s their platform, they’ve empowered us for years with visibility into our content stats. Now they have shareholders to answer to and a half billion users to keep engaged. Seems strategically brilliant to me.
What about Kristi’s thoughts? Do you think this has the potential to backfire on them as well since potential advertisers will no longer be incentivized to grow the social proof of a link?
Possibly, but I submit that established brands don’t need social proof as much as lesser known companies do. They want stats, traffic and inbound links to content. Most people will continue to share content from a brand, simply because it’s already trusted. Perhaps brands that advertise at certain levels will be able to publicize social proof in some way. Strategically, the move here is to phase out the democracy Twitter was built on, and transfer platform value in favor of those willing to spend ad / content budgets.
Truly, the squeeze is on 3rd party developers who’s tools hook into the API for stats, as well as emerging ‘brands’ to find a way to stay in the game. We also have the choice to move on, but Instagram and others will eventually make similar moves. It’s about becoming the real time media platform of the 21st century, not giving 7 billion people each equal voice just for the sake of it.
Love that quotable, Bill. Times are changing. “It’s about becoming the real time media platform of the 21st century, not giving 7 billion people each equal voice just for the sake of it.”
Thanks for the excellent post and summary of insights, Don. I appreciate being part of the pontificating…
I just wish, Bill, Twitter would come on out and say, “Hey, we have shareholders to please.” Same for Google. Don’t try to hide the profit motive with rhetoric.
Ha ha. How true! I wish this about a lot of companies. There’s a lot of talk about transparency, honesty, authenticity, but major companies don’t care the slightest about that. They make decisions that they believe will increase their profits, and then they create talking points that make it sound like they did it for the benefit of their users.
You got it, Nick. Those who provide valuable products and services should never need to apologize for seeking a return on investment. Selling is a necessary part of commerce… and the more open the transaction, the better both parties feel about it.
Totally agree Don. Just be honest!
I totally agree with Don, Nick and your good self Dustin. Its disingenuous of Twitter to claim they did it to level the playing field…and i quote “Engineering trade-off we had to make…for a better platform.” For whom?
Generally speaking, we should assume all public companies are beginning with shareholder value, not necessarily the end user / customer. Boards have fiduciary responsibility while management has customer responsibility, but in big audacious decisions, the board always trumps management.
Any and all social networks that go public, ultimately have the mandate to become advertising platforms for the biggest dollars possible.
I agree that Twitter has to make money, please Wall St. That’s just the reality.
CFOs who can’t see the reach of Tweets are not likely to continue spending on the platform while others provide share counts. So in that way Khristi is right, this will backfire on Twitter.
Twitter’s also talking about making Tweets longer than 140 characters – which would essentially decimate the essence of Twitter. http://recode.net/2015/09/29/twitter-plans-to-go-beyond-its-140-character-limit/
Given the huge demand on our time made by the mountains of information that fly by us every day, longer posts on Twitter will just mean less reading and less engagement.
I don’t see the combination of those two moves having a positive outcome.
Sadly, however, I don’t think Twitter really cares what we think unless our opinions will cost them money..
I like how you looked at both this decision and their decision to change the allowed number of characters, and I agree with you completely. I have no idea how they’re coming up with ideas over there, but this is just bad news for them and I fear these changes are going to lead to a continuation of their declining profits.
B.L. Ochman… do you think business growth (especially going public) necessarily results in the effect you mention: “I don’t think Twitter really cares what we think unless our opinions will cost them money.” … can corporations maintain a heart, or do they sell their soul to Wall Street upon arrival?
100% agree! That 140 character limitation is part of what makes Twitter special. They’re fools to eliminate it.
Great Report! We all give something away for free to get an email, a lead…. people like “me” are little and can compartmentalize our giveaways. Big companies realize the perceived value and get greedy. They all take the level the playing field high road at the same time they sell the holy grail. Tweet shares are cool. Who will capitalize on providing better sharing metrics as a result, and who will shun Twitter?
Wouldn’t the irony of this be losing the publishers/advertisers who promote Tweets in order to get Twitter users to their content, with the hopes that those people would tweet the content to inflate the Tweet count?
True story, Kristi. Someone called it “Throwing away dollars to make pennies.”
Yeah, no kidding. I hadn’t even thought of that possible effect. Good thinking.
It’s certainly an intersting play from their side and I can agree that it could well affect publishers and advertisers….but at the end of the day it’s also one platform and I’m pretty sure al lof us (as marketers) will “adapt”.
Will be intersting to see what comes next.
I wouldn’t be surprised.
Well my two cents is that serious advertisers have been paying for advertising and “Tweet counts” for years and have lost those historical counts by the one Twitter action.
The current advertising value of twitter doesn’t lend to many entrepreneurs buying into Paid twitter ads, Because of the length of tweets on a newsfeed. I don’t like the smell of this and I did post a blog post on my views 2 weeks after it went into effect. I had hoped twitter would reconsider. I for one lost thousands of historical Twitter counts which were and still are my highest social shares.
So now I actually do log into twitter to check my stats…so bravo on that Twitter!
Great. It’s really good work.