To most of the people that are not used to follow or connect with these social media platforms in a daily basis, it is quite difficult to understand why and how to post different content on Facebook and Twitter. But it is a fact, that these little details will make a difference in how people are engaging with your brand in these platforms.
Source: (ruderfinn.co.uk, 2015)
The first relevant difference between Facebook and Twitter are the posts. Twitter will limit your tweet to 140 characters, which means you have to be concise and clear. It is the perfect way to promote one of your products in a powerful and direct sentence.
Source: @CoffeeBean (twitter, 2015)
It is also important to note the different ways people connect on Facebook and Twitter. If we notice, on Facebook we ask for someone´s friendship and on Twitter we follow someone or something. It doesn´t look like big deal but it does have some differences. While on Facebook the users connect with family and friends, on Twitter the users follow interesting topics and celebrities that make Twitter less about social friendship and a more detached relationship with the item/person followed.
Lifespan of the content is a very important detail to take in consideration when posting on both these platforms. Statistics say that 92% of the engagement will be happening on the first hour after you tweet. On the contrary, Facebook´s content can be engaged for hours or even days. Following these statistics, it is advisable that you use Twitter for subjects that are time sensitive (example: 20% off for next hour on all coffees and teas), and Facebook for important subjects that are relevant for a longer period of time (Visualscope.com, 2015).
Source: (Facebook & Twitter, 2015)
Another great difference, as stated by Darell (2012), is the way to reach people. On Facebook the more connections you have the more chance you have to be seen, as the connections of your connections will be able to see their friends activities and interactions with your posts.
On Twitter awareness works in a different way. Twitter has developed the Hash Tag idea. It is important to understand how the hash tag works and take advantage when marketing our products. With the Hash Tag it is possible to reach people that would never be in our followers or be able to see our tweet otherwise. It is a way to categorize messages by marking the key words as we can see in the previous example of The Coffee Bean´s tweet. By using #HappyValentinesDay this tweet is now part of a group of tweets that have used the same hash tag.
Twitter says that tweets that use hash tags have 2 times more engagement than those without! Here are some websites where to find popular hash tags that you can use in your next tweets:
We can identify a lot of differences between Twitter and Facebook but in conclusion Facebook is more of an “ongoing social relationship builder” while twitter keeps people updated as trending conversations and topics are constantly changing. It is more about keep people posted rather than social connections (Visualscope.com, 2015).
References
Darell, R., (2012). The Power Of A Twitter Hashtag [Infographic]. Bit Rebels.com, [Online] Available at: http://www.bitrebels.com/social/twitter-hashtag-power-infographic/ [Accessed 11 April 2015].
Visualscope.com, (2015). Twitter Vs Facebook. [Online] Available at: http://www.visualscope.com/twitfb.html [Accessed 11 April 2015].