Gabby's Social Media Blog

How to Crush the Competition and Expand Your Following on Social Media

Netflix has remained the streaming giant for movies and television for years, but their reign is coming to an end with the creation of competitors like Disney Plus. They’re not only losing in being the top streaming platform, they’re also losing in how good their social media strategy is. After examining Disney Plus’ social media presence on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook for the past few weeks, I’ve realized that they are at the top of their game. I compared their content to their top competitor’s and they’re destroying Netflix after just three months. Here’s are three ways that Disney Plus is doing better than Netflix on Twitter:

Keeping Retweets to a Minimum

I don’t follow either Disney Plus or Netflix on Twitter (and still don’t), so I only ever see their tweets if they’re retweeted onto my timeline. After seeing both profiles and having a glance at them, it’s clear to me that Netflix goes absolutely overboard on retweeting other people. Their retweets are a mixture of other Netflix-affiliated accounts (like @NetflixFilm, @QueerEye, @StrangerThings, and more) and Netflix users.

According to the Meltwater article “How Often Should You Post on Social Media?” you should tweet at least ten times a day. I understand that Netflix wants to have content their followers can interact with every day, but having an abundance of retweets is annoying. It’s great that Netflix is somehow interacting with users, but it gets annoying to see a bunch of fan tweets instead of Netflix’s own content. On the other hand, Disney Plus keeps their retweets to a minimum. Although they aren’t interacting with fans and just retweet other Disney-affiliated accounts, their feed looks a lot cleaner and it’s easier to find things they’ve tweeted.

Using a Consistent Bio

One of the easiest things Netflix can do to have a better Twitter presence is having a bio that is consistent with their company’s mission. As I’ve stated in my previous blog posts, having a bio that matches your company’s mission is an important best practice to follow. According to Chloe West’s article “15 Twitter bio ideas for brands to attract new followers,” there are various ways to spice up your bio on Twitter. Netflix doesn’t follow any of the 15 ways that West mentions in her article. Their current bio is “go follow @StrongBlackLead!” in order to promote the Netflix-affiliated account that focuses on Black-created content for Black History Month.

Although it’s great that they’re promoting diversity and inclusion through their bio, it would be more effective for them to retweet @StrongBlackLead or tweet about their Black-created content. They only promote the @StrongBlackLead account through their bio. If anyone went to Netflix’s Twitter and wasn’t sure of what the brand was, they would probably be confused since their bio isn’t the brand’s mission or anything similar to that. Netflix could have a normal bio and just add “follow @StrongBlackLead” to the end.

Directing Users to a Help Account

An important thing that I failed to mention in my past blog posts is that Disney Plus utilizes a secondary Twitter account exclusively for customer service (@DisneyPlusHelp). This could explain why their user-engagement on Twitter is low (on the @DisneyPlus account). Disney Plus’ help account has 35,000 followers, and they’ve sent over 10,000 tweets since November 2019. According to Twitter Business’ article “4 tips for providing effective customer support on Twitter,” it pays off to respond to social customer service requests in real time: research shows when a customer Tweets at a business and receives a response, they’re willing to spend 3–20% more on an average-priced item from that business in the future.

Even though Netflix has been around for 22 years longer than Disney Plus, a Netflix help account does not exist. It doesn’t make a lot of sense as to why Netflix can have a slew of Netflix-affiliated accounts that they constantly tweet on, but don’t run a customer support Twitter. I think that they’ve been making a big mistake by not having a way for customers to tweet them for support, and their presence could be better if they had a help account.

Just because a brand has been around for 22 years, doesn’t mean it is automatically the stronger brand. Disney Plus really proves that time isn’t an indicator on the strength of a brand through its outstanding Twitter presence. There are similar things that both brands do that make their engagement strong, but Netflix is missing some fundamental things that should be common sense to them at this point. Who do you think has a stronger Twitter presence? Leave a comment below to leave your vote for Disney Plus or Netflix.

5 Ways Disney Plus Is Winning on Twitter

Just because a brand has been on social media for awhile, doesn’t mean they’re the best. Some newer brands prove that time isn’t a factor in the strength of a brand’s social media presence. One brand in particular, Disney Plus, is proving that statement true. They’ve existed for almost three months and have a better understanding of how to capture their audience than other brands who have been attempting it for years. I audited Disney Plus’ Twitter from January 15 to 21, 2020, and found a lot of strengths but also some weakness in their strategy. Here is a list of five things that Disney Plus (and other brands) practice well that other brands should be doing to keep up with their momentum.

Post Daily

Posting everyday is the simplest practice a brand can follow. Disney Plus tweets every day, and they generally post around the same times (anywhere from noon to 8 pm). If they need to, they space out tweets if they’re doing a thread. According to Meltwater, your brand should be tweeting at least 10 times a day. Although Disney Plus does not accomplish this (they post anywhere from 1-6 tweets a day, including a retweet or two), they provide enough content. I think Meltwater’s expectation is a little too high depending on what your brand is, and that 10 can be overkill for specific brands.

Don’t Ruin the Meme

One practice that Disney Plus does well on Twitter is actually being hip to memes and other Twitter joke trends. Instead of jumping onto the trend after it’s way over, they actually do it while it’s still relevant. For example, right now there is a Twitter joke template going around that is “_ can have _ as a treat,” and Disney Plus tweeted “The Child can have a little frog, as a treat ” (in reference to Baby Yoda from the Mandalorian).

Use Emojis the Right Way

Another best practice that Disney Plus executes well is proper emoji usage. They already show that they know how to use emojis right through their bio on Twitter and Instagram, and use them in their tweets. They don’t overdo it and put an emoji in every tweet, and use an emoji if it makes sense and fits the content. They also don’t overdo it in each individual tweet and do about one to two emojis.

Have a Bio that Stands Out

According to Sprout Social article “15 Twitter bio ideas for brands to attract new followers,” it’s important to have a bio on Twitter that stands out. Sprout Social says that you can spice up your bio by playing with emojis, linking to other accounts (that are relevant to your brand), and using an appropriate hashtag.

Disney Plus executes all three of these, by linking to the five media brands that have content on Disney Plus, using an emoji, and using a hashtag (their bio is @Disney + @Pixar + @Marvel + @StarWars + @NatGeo = (exploding head emoji). Start Streaming #DisneyPlus Now). Their bio properly uses all three of these key points without executing them wrong.

Respond to Your Customers and Other Pages

According to the Sprout Social article “Twitter Marketing: Strategies and Tips to Try Now,” a best tip to market your Twitter is to make at least 30-40% of your Tweets replies to other people. Disney Plus fails at this, as they have almost no replies to anyone out of their 5000 tweets (I didn’t go through all of them, but scrolled through quickly and didn’t see many).

I think that if Disney Plus interacted with more people, their presence on Twitter would be a lot more friendly and welcoming than it already is. Despite this post about the 14th anniversary of High School Musical having the most replies to any of their tweets, they didn’t engage with anyone who responded to it.

And They’ve Only Been on Twitter for Three Months!

I think that Disney Plus’ presence on social media is fairly strong since they just launched a little shy of three months ago. It helps that they are directly related to Disney, which is a media behemoth, and I think that if they keep up their strategy it can help convert people who weren’t big Disney fans prior to the launch of their service.

What are some brands that you think should follow these best practices? Are there any other practices Disney doesn’t follow that I missed? Feel free to leave your thoughts below in the comments!