Twitter has laid out what seem to be their plans for the first half of 2015. We can look forward to:
- The ability to record, edit and share videos natively within the Twitter app. While they seem to say this will coexist alongside Vine it’s easy to take the next step and guess that Vine functionality may one day exist solely within Twitter and Vine cease to exist as a standalone app.
- Further “experiments” with how “relevant” Tweets are surfaced in someone’s Timeline. The post certainly leaves the door wide open for the much-discussed algorithmic feed that would mimic Facebook’s to an extent but it also hints at giving you a prioritized recap snapshot for the period you were away from Twitter so you can catch up.
- A way to fill up the Timelines for those people who haven’t put the legwork into following a bunch of people. It’s easy to expect that these “personalized” timelines will be to some degree filled with the accounts Twitter thinks someone will engage with most.
- A revamped Direct Message experience. The end goal here seems to bring DMs more in line with other messaging apps, though details here are the light.
Put all of that together and you can see the company is focused on two audiences: Light/casual users and big media companies.
The first is absolutely being targeted with the changes that are being made to the timeline. While it’s still unclear as to whether those changes will be opt-in/out or not, the idea of seeing “top stories” immediately upon returning is meant to appeal to those who maybe don’t have Twitter open all day or who don’t have other ways they’re keeping up with the news. In fact, here Twitter may have an advantage over Facebook. If Twitter can indeed figure out how to surface stories that are important and not just highly-engaged with (as Facebook) does then it can retain its standing as the place people go for news while Facebook stays as the place for people who want to watch that Christmas ad with the penguins.
The second is being targeted because they’re the ones behind the accounts (along with celebrities) who are most likely to be used to fill in the Timelines of the people who don’t build their own. And even if a “top news” recap does skew more toward actual news, these are the accounts who are likely to be included in that recap. Finally, they’re going to be huge users of Twitter’s native video capabilities, particularly if (as rumored) it includes auto-play, which brands love and the audience loathes.
It remains to be seen how this will all play out, obviously. But now Twitter is on the record with where they’re heading in 2015. How all this will impact brand publishers can only be guessed at right now. There are certainly potential upsides (more exposure though the display of “important” updates) and downsides (if your posts stink they may not be deemed important *enough*), but the devil will be in the details. More certainly to come.
