The trouble with Twitter - Fine Point Communications

Do you think Elon Musk is feeling thankful this week?

The man gained control at last of Twitter, his favorite social media platform, for the low, low price of $44,000,000,000. Then he started tearing down much of what it had been known for.

What Twitter 2.0 will become and who it will serve remains anybody’s guess. That uncertainty has many users and advertisers standing by — too nervous to use the service as they always have; too captivated by its potential to walk away.

This seems a wise course for schools, as well: It’s not yet time to put Twitter into the attic alongside Google+ and Tumblr. I do not recommend deleting your school’s account or removing the Twitter link from your home page (although I have done the latter). But it is timely to reconsider how you use Twitter and whether it produces the outcomes you expect.

Twitter, after all, is a 16-year-old service in an industry where trends and business plans change very fast. You may be invested in a model for driving attention and message that no longer exists.

Yes, your account probably has thousands of followers that you would be sad to abandon, but look beyond that vanity metric: Does that audience respond to your posts in ways that profoundly matter to the school? Likes and comments can provide hits of dopamine to an underappreciated communications staff, but what you really want to see is a connection between what you post and how parents or students talk about your school.

Another concern for schools: Twitter is starting to face an association problem.

The service’s new, hands-off approach to what gets posted has already led to more deceptive and divisive content distributed widely (some of it from the owner himself).

Is this coarsening conversation consistent with the mission of independent schools? If asked, could you explain why tweeting — and thus contributing to the conversation — serves your institution in a way that refraining would not? To put it more bluntly, why are you still on Twitter?

For the second time in about a year, we communicators face an unraveling of what we understood about social media.

Last fall, the Wall Street Journal published “The Facebook Files.” This series of articles, as I wrote at the time, proved that Facebook and its Instagram subsidiary “harm its customers, even when used as intended, and are addictive and difficult to quit.”

Musk’s changes now threaten truth itself: A prank tweet, purportedly from the company Eli Lilly, an account Twitter marked as “verified,” rocked the real medical company. What school can say confidently that what happened to Lilly could not happen to them?

Amid such threats, the carefree days of using social media simply to show off fun little slices of the school day are nearing an end. Schools need to reckon with this and figure out other ways to communicate their particular advantages.

Don’t-miss clicks

In that vein, a piece from 2Communique titled “In Search of New Avenues of Delight” is most timely. Laura J. Cole examines how schools can expand “boundaries of what’s possible when it comes to storytelling,” particularly through the use of new media. Some clever ideas for inspiration.
And Morgan Housel has an essay on “Attention” that not only sums up the challenge facing every communicator but also offers some solutions. He urges, for instance, that writers not busy themselves with pieces that have a limited shelf life but instead be timeless. Hmm, perhaps Morgan would have tut-tutted a newsletter email about Twitter. Ah, well.

What’s new at Fine Point Communications

We’re celebrating a birthday at Fine Point HQ: This little company turned 2 years old on Nov. 12!

This has been a year of professional growth and stretching: In June, FPC sponsored the Global Forum on Girls’ Education, my first time at a conference as a sponsor. Six new clients came on board this year, while eight returned for more work. I helped edit a book, Rob Garver’s “Here Forever: The Timeless Impact of John Smale,” and I am producing an anniversary book.

I’m very grateful for all the clients who have put their trust in me — more than a dozen in education — and for the good work that we have done together.

I am also thankful for you, dear reader: Now 22 issues into Refill, I am proud that this newsletter is finding new readers — the audience has grown 60% this year — and continues to earn a place in your inbox each month. I never take your attention for granted, and the responses I get to each issue mean the world to me.