2021 was the year that #MarketingTwitter, the delightfully helpful community which had risen out of the ashes of 2020… kind of imploded… immediately.
For a short while, there was drama aplenty.
HOWEVER, all that drama changed nothing about how much quality digital marketing knowledge is shared on the bird app every single day.
So once again, for your reminiscing/learning pleasure, I have collated and curated the top digital marketing tweets of the year!
[Note: This is why there are no tweets from January below, as I’ve scrubbed it from memory.]
In case anyone needs to hear this:
Your ideas have value on Twitter.
You should be having fun on Twitter.
You have nothing to prove to anyone on Twitter.
— Jason Bradwell 👋 (@JasonRBradwell) January 5, 2021
Congratulations to all those who were chosen, and apologies to all those I missed. But before we get to the glorious and great tweets – for the sake of clarity here are the rules & judging criteria:
- One Tweet per person
- No links
- No threads (sorry @darth_na)
- Tweets must have been *so incredibly great* that they made me either:
- Tell someone about it IRL
- Change how I work
- Think about it weeks later
While you’re scrolling down, I would like to encourage you to play a game I call mass-follow. All you have to do is click on every tweet and follow every account. You can thank me for it later.
Now come with me once more, as I remember that time…
![Top 30 Digital Marketing Tweets of the Year [2021]](https://theonlineadvertisingguide.com/wp-content/uploads/Top-30-Digital-Marketing-Tweets-of-the-Year-2021-min.png)
When Brisa told me stop looking for shortcuts…
Hate to break it to you but there’s no good hack for growing a social media following. There are strategies to help you produce good content and to stay on brand, but there’s no cheat sheet.
— Brisa (@breezrrs) February 9, 2021
When Hiba told me to do the research…
ALWAYS Google your target keyword before you write a blog or create a page.
Search intent is so important.
— Hiba Amin (@h5amin) February 11, 2021
When Andrea showed me prioritising by channel is simple…
A basic framework I use to understand what to prioritize in a marketing strategy:
– Pre-existing demand? Search
– No pre-existing demand? Social
– More time than money? Content
– More money than time? Ads— Andrea Bosoni (@theandreboso) March 11, 2021
When Asangi told me to say it again…
Repetition is fine. In fact repeat!
📍Your consumers don’t always see your posts/ comms.
📍They don’t always u’stand at first read/ view
📍They need convincingRepeat in different ways, in a chosen few channels. #marketingtips
— Asangi (@asangi_j) April 15, 2021
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When Jack made me think about why…
Social Media Strategy, the checklist:
– what are you trying to accomplish?
– who are you trying to reach?
– what resources do you have?
– how will you measure success?— Jack Appleby (@JuiceboxCA) May 18, 2021
When Ross told me to stop just asking for stuff…
Don’t just send an email trying to get a backlink.
Build rapport. Bring value to the person you’re reaching out to. Make sure the content is beneficial to their audience. Don’t disappear when one story doesn’t land. Create a human to human connection.
— Ross Simmonds (@TheCoolestCool) June 11, 2021
When Amanda helped me use my anger for good…
Viral tweets often come from spiky takes.
Best when they don’t put people down. Invisible subtweets, so to speak.
How to write them:
1/ Next time you’re triggered, draft a response.
2/ Add context to make it a standalone idea.
3/ Edit later with a fresh mindset.— Amanda Natividad (@amandanat) June 30, 2021
When Ryan reminded me that content is no longer about FPTP…
Be early or be better.
I started in content marketing ten(!) years ago. I wasn’t very good, but back then, you didn’t need to be. Disproportionate results came from mediocre execution.
But today… different ball game. Being early isn’t an option. You have to be better.
— Ryan Law (@thinking_slow) July 6, 2021
When Janet told me who to talk to…
4 Types of social media engagements you should never lose sight of:
1. Engagement with fans.
2. Engagement with your audience.
3. Engagement with your customers.
4. Engagement with high-visibility relevant contents.
— Janet Machuka (@janetmachuka_) August 3, 2021
When Shama put the strategy back in everything…
Create content strategically.
Promote content strategically.
Use social media strategically.
Know why you do what you do.
— Shama Hyder (@Shama) August 19, 2021
When Sam broke SEO down into stages…
The hierarchy of SEO needs:
1. Crawlability – Is content discoverable?
2. Indexability – Is it indexable?
3. Rankability – Does it fulfill an intent?
4. Shareability – Is it popular/trusted?
5. Accessibility – Is it user-friendly?
6. Clickability – Is the snippet optimised?— Sam Underwood 🇬🇧 (@SamUnderwoodUK) September 2, 2021
When Alex made tweeting simple…
How to get good engagement:
Make people see themselves in what you tweet.
— Alex Llull 🕵️♂️ (@AlexLlullTW) September 3, 2021
When Kim put bad websites into perspective…
😕Imagine a store with no aisles, just piles of stuff. No one is there to help you. You can’t see a checkout.
How long would you stay? Would you buy anything?
📣Your website is your ONLINE store, whether you directly sell on it or not. It needs FLOW!
— Kim Scaravelli (@KimScaravelli) September 8, 2021
When Katelyn put people first…
The more you learn about what makes people tick, click, and buy…
The better your marketing performs
That’s it. That’s the “secret”
— Katelyn Bourgoin ⚡️ (@KateBour) September 17, 2021
When Ranajayant pointed out the most obvious of hypocrisy…
Google to publishers: Don’t put ads in more than 30% of screen
Google: [120% Screen with Ads]@JohnMu @dannysullivan Can you explain the reason?
…
We rank on top but get less than 2.5% clicks.
…@TheVerge @WSJ @business @ReutersBiz @brave @DuckDuckGo @timsoulo @semrush pic.twitter.com/Pk4KR3Zsdf— ranajayant (@theranajayant) October 4, 2021
When Cristina updated Pavlovs dog for digital marketing…
If you only respond to your customers when they complain and you ignore them when they love you, you are conditioning them to only talk about you when they need to complain.
Put out the fires, but water the flowers.
— Christina’s chaos magic (@ThatChristinaG) October 6, 2021
When Adrienne reminded me that there isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution…
A friendly reminder: some marketing hot takes will not work for your clients, industry, or job and that’s okay.
Test theories for yourself. You may be surprised by the results and what you learn along the way.
— Adrienne (@AdriSheares) October 6, 2021
When Lauren made analytics sound romantic…
I’m just a social media manager, standing in front of a social media management platform rep, asking them to give me accurate total reach numbers.
— Lauren Alissa (@HeyIts_LaurenA) October 12, 2021
When Jon-Stephen found the beauty of limits…
Brand guidelines don’t limit your creativity—they focus it.
— Jon-Stephen Stansel (@jsstansel) October 13, 2021
When Andrew said to not mess with success…
If an article is ranking well;
Don’t touch it.
Don’t think about touching it. pic.twitter.com/d4q8nyoofR
— Andrew Charlton (@bertiecharlton) November 8, 2021
When Deb glared at all the black hats…
You know all those marketing tricks and games?
Stop doing them.
We see right through them and they erode trust.
Choose the high road.
Earn trust and build it.
— Deb Coman (@DebComanWriting) November 15, 2021
When Jessica made social media life feel way less stressful…
Social media marketing myths:
❌ I need to show up every day.
❌ I need to be super active to grow.
❌ I need to push through, even if it’s not aligned.— Jessica Thiefels | Mindset + Marketing (@JThiefels) November 17, 2021
When James connected the dots between money and effort…
This is a law of advertising I have observed over and over again. The more money you have, the less of an idea you need. And if you have no money, you better have a really, really strong idea, because your execution won’t save you. Here it is expressed as a shit graph. pic.twitter.com/yAAMcAErMY
— James Hodson (@misterhodson) November 17, 2021
When Praveen found the perfect gif to explain himself…
⛅️ #SEO – Canonical Tag 🌤️
🔸 When you forget to add a canonical tag to your pages. 😬😄 pic.twitter.com/b417nxdQgs
— Praveen Sharma (@MusingPraveen) November 25, 2021
When Chani added moment + messenger to the message…
Remember: engagement doesnt dictate the value of an idea. It could be directed at the wrong audience, shared at the wrong time, etc.
I posted a tweet a few months ago that got zero likes. Just saw the exact same tweet from a guy with a big audience: 4.2k likes.
I’m fascinated
— Chani (@ChaniKrinsky) November 29, 2021
When Harrison summed up thousands of hours of wasted time…
PPC Wrapped for 2021:
– You Adjusted 42,000,000 bids
– You appealed 14,000 incorrect decisions
– Your accounts were wrongly deactivated 14 timesI feel like my numbers might be low? 😆
— Harrison J Hepp (@HarrisonJHepp) December 2, 2021
When Tim got that very special message…
Me: Minding my own business, trying to get through a normal workday
Google: OH NO YOUR AD HAS BEEN DISAPPROVED IN A CAMPAIGN THAT HASN’T RUN IN 2 YEARS#ppcchat— Tim Jensen (@timothyjjensen) December 7, 2021
When I retweeted someone called Justin. YUCK! When Justin told websites to get to the point…
99% of landing pages I see don’t clearly tell me:
– Who you help
– What you help them do
– How you help them do itToo much clever.
Not enough clarity.
— Justin Welsh (@JustinSaaS) December 8, 2021
When I broke the rules and included one thread, and only because it’s for charity (and because it’s great – click it and see).
CHOOSE YOUR OWN GIVING ADVENTURE.
A #GivingTuesday Thread.
— GoFundMe (@gofundme) November 30, 2021
Excellent work everyone!
P.S. You might have noticed that it was the top 50 tweets last year. I thought a shorter list would force me to raise the quality. You can decide for yourself whether it worked by looking at last year’s list.