The UK’s small businesses are increasingly turning their backs on using Twitter/X to raise awareness of their businesses because they are “losing faith in it”, according to a leading UK digital marketing firm.
JDR Group, which specialises in working with SMEs and has nearly 3,000 clients based across the country on its books, says an increasing number of its customers are asking the company to reduce or stop their marketing activity on X because they no longer think it is the right platform for them.
The move away has followed a change in the user experience on Twitter/X which, since it was acquired by Tesla billionaire Elon Musk last year, has been subject to a series of alterations, including a new algorithm and a decision to make likes private.
It has also come under extra scrutiny following the UK race riots during the summer, with the platform having been used to spread divisive misinformation.
A host of American firms and celebrities have publicly quit the platform this year and the supreme court in Brazil has also banned the platform from operating in the country.
Now Kerry Baker, social media manager at JDR Group, which is based on Pride Park in Derby, says many of the British small businesses it works with are following them, having become disillusioned with low engagement, clickbait and controversy.
Instead, they are asking to switch their efforts to LinkedIn, which has steadily been attracting more users this year, including influencers and brands more associated with B2C social media platforms such as Instagram and Facebook.
LinkedIn passed the one billion members mark in June, having added 70 million members in just a year. Meanwhile, although around 250 million people visit Twitter/X every day, a recent YouGov poll found only 51% – just over a half – of daily users of UK X users say they have a favourable view of the platform.
She said: “We serve primarily B2B clients and, traditionally, their campaigns were ideal for Twitter or LinkedIn, but ever since Twitter has changed to X, those who are on it say they are losing faith in it, while X barely comes into the conversation these days when we talk to new clients.
“X has essentially become a giant global chatroom and a great resource for people who work in the media or like to participate in online debates, but for small companies who want to become better known locally, it has lost a lot of its appeal.
“LinkedIn has definitely picked up their business and we have seen a number of well-known influencers from other platforms joining LinkedIn and building up their audiences in what is now becoming the leading B2B social media space.”
However, one platform which does not seem to be benefiting in any great sense in the UK, says Kerry, is Threads, which was launched by Musk’s social media rival and Facebook owner Mark Zuckerberg two years ago.
Kerry added: “We said to our clients when Threads launched to wait a little bit before investing in it, because it’s very difficult for new platforms to establish themselves in what has become a very crowded marketplace.
“Two years on, we’d still recommend the better-known platforms, because, while it is growing, Threads still hasn’t become the phenomenon Meta had hoped it would be.”
JDR Group was founded in 2004 as a business coaching company and although it has evolved into a digital marketing firm it continues to coach and train owners of small and medium-sized businesses while offering a range of services including SEO, web design, social media and content marketing.
Last year it was named in the top one per cent of HubSpot’s global partner agencies which use the customer platform to bring their clients’ marketing, sales and customer service activity together within one integrated system.
To find out more www.jdrgroup.co.uk
