Using Twitter analytics and Twitter cards
4 min read
On august 27th Twitter announced they will be rolling out Twitter analytics to all users, this feature was previously only available to advertisers or verified users. The update means anyone can get valuable statistics and insights into their Twitter marketing.
In order to qualify for Twitter analytics; your account must be at least 14 days old, doesn’t violate Twitters policy and hasn’t been deleted, restricted, protected or suspended. You must primarily tweet in English, French, Japanese or Spanish. Twitter has provided an elementary support guide for their analytics dashboard.
However, what do these newly available statistics mean to you? Twitter analytics data can give you free insights into your Twitter marketing in a number of ways;
- What are your most engaging tweets? What gives you the widest social reach? Is it “funny cat” pictures or insightful user guides? Twitter data will help you with the process of developing and composing tweets to reach the maximum audience.
- Insights to your audience? Are you tweets targeting the right audience, is your content hitting the right tone with your target audience?
- It can help you assess the most sought after aspect of social media marketing; ROI. Is all the time you’re working on social media bringing you a positive return on investment?
You can access Twitter analytics with your normal username and password here.
Utilizing Twitter Cards
Following the update to Twitter analytics, I thought it would be a good time to reiterate the benefits of using Twitter cards as part of your social media marketing.
What are Twitter Cards
Twitter cards allow you take your tweets beyond just a piece of simple basic text. They allow you to add visual interest to your tweets through images, product info, videos, etc. It also means that readers of your content, who want to retweet your tweet do so in a way that creates a media-rich experience for their followers.
It’s a well-known fact that tweets with media attachments gain far greater exposure than the standard tweet. In fact, HubSpot A/B testing found that tweets with images received a 36% increase in clicks, a 41% increase in retweets and a 55% increase in leads!
Types of Twitter cards
In total there are seven free varieties of Twitter card to choose from and understanding them will help you to utilise them as part of your Twitter marketing.
The Summary Card: The summary card is used to provide extra information about a web page. With things such as further detail on the tweeted URL, a thumbnail image, a title, and a Twitter handle.
Summary Card with Large Image: As the name suggests this is the same as the summary card, but with a large featured image.
Photo Card: There’s not a lot of difference between a photo card and a summary card with a large image. The main difference is that, with the photo card, the image is displayed first with the text below the photo.
Gallery Card: The gallery card is collection of four photos, but works in the same principle as a photo card.
App Card:This card is to promote apps, allowing you to share content related to the app. Or for mobile users it can take them directly to the App Store.
Player Card: The player card allows you to include video clips and audio within your tweets. Users can watch/listen without leaving Twitter.
Product Card:The most exciting option for most marketers is the product card. This card is designed to showcase products via an image, a description, and it also allows you to highlight two other key details about your product.
Implementing Twitter cards
Twitter suggests it takes less than 15 minutes to implement these cards and can be done within 5 simple steps:
- First off choose a card type you want to implement.
- Second, choose the relevant Meta tags that need to be added to the code your website page.
- Then Run your URL against the validator tool to be approved.
- After you’ve run it through the validator for approval, simply tweet the URL and the card will appear below your tweet.
- Finally, don’t forget to make use of the free Twitter Card analytics to measure your results.
As an aside, if you have a WordPress website you can take advantage of the Yoast SEO plugin which makes installing Twitter cards even easier. Simply locate the social settings within the plugin menu and tick the “add Twitter card metadata” (see below).
Many big brands and small businesses are already taking advantage of Twitter and in a few simple steps, you could be too.
If you have any issues or need any assistance implementing Twitter cards or would like some help making the most of your social media please feel free to contact us at [email protected] or call us on 01223208008
