Is Twitter a Good Value for Radio Marketing?

Headlines in the tech world have finally started to trumpet what we’ve known at NuVoodoo for quite some time: Twitter’s user growth has stalled. Through our Ratings Prospects Studies we’ve been tracking Twitter’s stagnation for years.

When we asked the constituencies for each of the Social Media platforms whether they’re using the platform more, less or the same amount as they were six months ago, the net momentum number (more minus less) for Twitter is in the low single digits. Meanwhile, YouTube, Instagram and even Facebook are in strong positive numbers (except for Facebook’s stalled numbers at the young end).

 

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Given the press and media coverage it gets, you might assume Twitter is far larger than it really is. Twitter has gotten an outsized amount of attention for years, partly because its 140-character format doesn’t allow users to easily add nuance, shading or qualifications to their posts. The resulting too-coarse Tweets get picked up by media outlets and amplified even further, making Twitter seem broader and deeper than it really is.

Among 14-54’s who predict they and their households are susceptible to either meter or diary methodology, Twitter remains far off the huge leads of Facebook and YouTube, currently about the size of Instagram, but significantly behind Instagram among 14-34’s and without Instagram’s strong momentum.

 

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At NuVoodoo we’ve kept our clients from using Twitter as a paid media marketing solution because it doesn’t give enough penetration into key station demos, relative to the expense, and historically doesn’t have a significant a skew in favor of PPM and diary-friendly audiences. But, only time will tell if Twitter can make the turn. Rumors abound concerning their next moves to invigorate the service.

At NuVoodoo, we’ll be watching – the research, of course. We deliver an optimized media mix based on research, not based on headlines. We employ a data-driven approach based on multiple decades of combined research and marketing experience for radio and TV that gets results for our clients.