Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg just announced some new features coming to Threads that should make it easier for creators and businesses to build followings and connect with fans. The biggest tool is something called Insights, which is basically an analytics platform.
Insights gives users a zoom-in view on traffic, with data on the age, gender and location of people who view and engage with content. This information can also be split up into followers and non-followers, to help with conversion.
Meta has been testing Insights for a few days now and it looks fairly useful, particularly for folks with large followings. I’m talking about brands, creators and power users. However, it should be fun for the rest of us to tinker with.
Threads will also now allow for simultaneous multiple drafts. Before this move, a new draft would replace the old one, so people just had one chance to jot something down for later. To that end, Meta’s working on a post scheduling feature, but it’s not ready yet.
Finally, there’s now a way to drag and drop pinned columns for reorganization purposes. This is only for the desktop client, but it does work with the Insights page.
Threads has some serious momentum right now. It just passed the 200 million user threshold after just a year of operation and CEO Zuckerberg has plans to bring that number up to one billion.
“We’ve been building this company for 20 years, and there just are not that many opportunities that come around to grow a billion-person app,” Zuckerberg said in a recent earnings call. “Obviously, there’s a ton of work between now and there.”
I’m a fairly regular Threads user. The vibes are immaculate, especially when compared to that other app, but it still needs some work. The “For You” algorithm is incredibly slow, sometimes showing posts that are days old. The platform also has a bizarre aversion to politics and news, throwing it all under the umbrella of “potentially sensitive” content. This is a social media app that wants to be the public town square, like the bird app once was, so stop throttling news.
