Stay up to date with today’s best practices for music and musicians on Twitter
prum The Orchard’s Daily Rind
With a user base of 353 million people, it’s safe to say that Twitter is a part of many people’s daily lives. Designed primarily for conversation, sharing thoughts and engaging with other users, Twitter and its tweets have reached every corner of the world.
After nearly 16 years of activity, changes to the platform maintain its relevance in our ever-changing world. That’s why The Orchard is happy to share our updated Twitter 2022 best practices to help you understand the latest features, monetization options, and cross-platform changes.
New Twitter Features
An updated look
The latest design guidelines for Twitter are focused on cleaning up the visual clutter and highlighting the different actions you can take on the platform. These include an official font change to “Chirp”; an extension on the left side of the screen for Western languages; official black and white colors now high contrast and less blue; high contrast buttons; more space between text; and fewer gray backgrounds.
Blue Twitter
The first major new feature that Twitter introduced last year is its new paid subscription add-on service, Twitter Blue, which allows users to access exclusive tools and services. Some of these tools include:
- Undo Tweets, where you can preview and review your Tweet before it goes live.
- Access to 10-minute video uploads.
- A bookmarks folder
- Customizable app icons
- Pinning conversations to the top of your DM inbox
- Reader form, where the user can transform long threads into an easier reading experience.
- A custom navigation bar
- Articles without ads
- Ability to see articles your audience is talking about in Top Articles
The service is currently available in the US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. It works on iOS, Android and the web. Twitter Blue is priced regionally at $2.99 US, $4.99 NZ, $3.49 CAD or $4.49 AUD. There is currently no free trial option for this feature.
FACILITIES
Next are Spaces: live, voice-only chat rooms opened by “hosts” to discuss specific topics. The spaces are public and anyone can join. There can be up to 3 co-hosts and there is no limit to the number of participants. Hosts have ultimate moderation control and can allow up to 10 speakers at a time.
To use Spaces to their maximum potential, here are some best practices to think about:
- Be sure to prepare your discussion topics in advance.
- Invite speakers who will spark a compelling discussion.
- Discuss the flow of the event with your speakers in advance before going live.
- Promote your planned event in the Space ahead of time.
- Share your Space on your timeline with the custom Tweet card provided when the Space goes live.
- Allow your audience to engage in your discussion.
- Note: You can schedule spaces up to 2 weeks in advance on the platform.
Monetization services
If you meet certain criteria, Twitter has two monetization services that can provide some income for creators on the platform: Ticketed spaces AND Super followers.
These services can be accessed in the Profile menu under Monetization. The former feature allows creators to earn money from tickets sold on their ticketed spaces. To access Ticketed Spaces, you must be at least 18 years old, have at least 1000 followers, and have hosted at least 3 Spaces in the last 30 days. Creators can earn up to 97% of revenue generated from ticket sales after platform fees.
Super followers
Super Followers is a paid subscription option for creators to earn monthly income from exclusive bonus content and features.
Super followers will receive exclusive Tweets from you and will have certain badges that distinguish them from regular followers. To access this feature as a creator, you must be at least 18 years old, have at least 10,000 followers and have tweeted at least 25 times in the last 30 days.
communities
Communities are private, invitation-only groups that contain Twitter users who share a common interest or affiliation for discussion. They present a specific resource accessible only to members in the community and are similar to Facebook Groups. This feature is currently in beta testing for select users.
Twitter for professionals
This feature is creating a new account identity option for businesses and public figures to differentiate themselves from the regular Twitter user, allowing professionals and businesses to have enhanced profile features and a professional visual brand on the profile Theirs. It is currently only available to US users.
There are currently three types of setups for Twitter Professional Accounts:
- About the Module is a standard professional account setup that contains more detailed information about the creator or business.
- The Shop Module offers the possibility to integrate your store in your profile.
- Newsletter module allows your followers to subscribe to a newsletter through your profile.
How to integrate your music on the platform
Now that you understand how the platform works and what tools are available to you, it’s important to understand how you can use Twitter to promote your music and expand your narrative as a musician. This can be summed up in three ways: promotion, conversation and action.
Fan Information (Promotion)
To announce your new projects and ventures as an artist, you want to let fans know when you release new music, collaborations, collections, etc. This can be done on the platform by adjusting your profile picture, bio, banner and link on your profile to reflect your latest music; tweeting out project release dates, details, graphics and streaming links; pinning a tweet about your latest music to the top of your profile and tagging specific collaborators or DSPs in certain messages to appear on their profiles
Engaging with fans (Chat)
To explain the story behind your music and involve fans in the process, you want to have conversations with fans on the platform who are curious about your music and are already talking about it. This can be done in multiple ways. Here are some suggestions:
- Respond to fans who talk about your music or ask thoughtful questions about it.
- Create Q&A threads where fans can ask questions and you answer them in an organized conversation that other followers can easily access for reference.
- Like tweets from fans talking about or reacting to your music.
- Keep your space to talk about upcoming music, a specific record, or general things about you as an artist.
- Create your own Super Follower subscription template for super fans to get the scoop on the rest of your fanbase and get more direct access to you for exclusive chats and content
Redirecting fans (action)
Lastly, you then want to redirect fans to listen to your new music and check out your latest music videos or other artist projects. Below are some suggestions for redirecting your followers to content:
- Tweet your specific multi-retail link for your latest release.
- Share press articles that talk about your music.
- Encourage fans to pre-save your music with pre-save/add DSP links.
- Attach YouTube music videos or official content links to your tweet.
