Every day, millions of people (157 million to be exact), access Twitter to see what’s happening right now. However, there are still several barriers such as slow mobile networks, expensive data plans, lack of storage and even poor mobile signal all held accountable from stopping more users from visiting the social media platform…
So, what’s the solution? Well Twitter have delivered Twitter Lite, a new mobile web experience dedicated to minimising data usage, loading faster on slower connections and is more resilient on slower networks… but most importantly, it takes up less than 1MB on your mobile or tablet device!
Inside our web grower post, our Cheshire web agency will investigate what Twitter Lite is, what are the advantages and what impact this could have on your digital marketing efforts. Let’s get started…
Twitter Lite is a faster, data friendly way for people to use Twitter to see what’s happening in the world.
? https://t.co/AIUgyCAFj0 pic.twitter.com/9EIG7pgK6O
— Twitter (@Twitter) April 6, 2017
“Twitter Lite is a faster, data friendly way for people to use Twitter to see what’s happening in the world.”
What is Twitter Lite?!
Twitter Lite is a new mobile app experience designed to minimize data usage, load faster on slower connections, and is much more robust when signal is struggling over slower networks. Optimized for speed, Twitter claims in the new lighter version has up to 30% faster launching time as well as streamline navigation throughout Twitter, so you can still access the key features such as your timeline, Tweets, Direct Messages, trends, profiles, media uploads, notifications, and more…
Available to download on the Apple Store and Play Store, straight out of the box you will notice that the streamline version has a size of just over 0.5MB. That’s a significant size-reduction compared to the official, full-version of Twitter which can take up to 33MB – 35MB of vital storage.
If rolling out a streamline version of Twitter isn’t enough, Twitter have also released a ‘Data Saver’ feature, which will further reduce the amount of mobile data usage. Now introduced on the full-version, you can turn ‘Data Saver’ on within your settings, and images will now appear blurred for preview. You can then simply choose to tap on image to load on view.
According to Twitter, this can reduce your data usage by up to 70%, making it much easier and affordable to use Twitter when signal is 2G or 3G or when you are close to exceeding your monthly data plan.
What impact will this have? Will this change digital marketing for my business?
As a Cheshire web agency, within our industry, we have experienced first-hand how the approach of mobile-first indexing has shifted the pattern of how we design, build and optimise your websites. A major contributing factor is speed, and with the average attention span now shrinking to less than 7 seconds (That less than a Goldfish), fast, instant results are now being introduced to social media platforms…
Twitter are not alone in introducing a lighter, faster version of their social media app. Facebook have also introduced Facebook Lite, supported in 56 different languages to over 100 million users each month. YouTube have also joined by releasing YouTube Go, a streamline version of the app that allows you to download videos to your phone.
Another contributing factor to releasing ‘lighter’ versions of social media apps is to expand brand awareness across the globe. For international brands looking to capitalise on digital marketing, lighter apps are much more accessible to users on 2G and 3G areas meaning marketers can target countries such as Brazil, India and the Philippines in an effort to drive further revenue.
Cheshire Web Design Opinion
Okay, so as a web design agency based in Knutsford, Cheshire, we hardly going to be pulling up any digital marketing trees in places like Brazil or India soon. The moral of the story to take from this is speed is such a huge, contributing factor to website experience, and continuing to push digital marketing on social media can reach anywhere in the world, if you need it to.
If you would like to take advantage of our free website speed testing services, simply get in touch or give us a ring and mention “Twitter Lite” for a free report.
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