Twitter is one of the biggest social platforms in the world, with over 201 million active users daily. Despite its popularity, the network always surprises its users with brand new engaging features that make the experience even better. Ever since the ephemeral content features by Facebook and Instagram took the online world by storm, people can’t imagine their lives without scrolling through stories. The latest platform to join the trend is Twitter, with its Fleets feature. In this blog post, you’ll find out all about Twitter Fleets, how to use them to grow your brand, how to create, share, delete them, and much more!
And when you’re finished, take a look at our other Twitter guides:
Table of Contents
What is Fleet on Twitter, and are these temporary Tweets important for your business? Twitter Fleets are Twitter posts that disappear after 24 hours.
As most other platforms do, Twitter first tested the feature on a select group of users, then released it for the whole world to see. The testing began in March 2020, when Fleets became available only for Brazilian users, and shortly after, the social media company included other locations. American users started using Fleets in November 2020.
This stories format by Twitter quickly became a popular feature among power users, who added this stories feature to Tweets, making them even more visible for followers. The Fleets bar is located right above your feed, and all the Fleets are lined up one next to another. The bar is filled with round-shaped icons that show the profile picture of the person sharing the Fleet. When you tap on the icon, you can see what the person has shared.
When the platform first released this feature, they announced that they wanted to expand it and improve it over time, using their users’ feedback. One of their first advancements was supposed to be introducing live broadcasting to Fleets, a feature similar to Facebook Live. In the meantime, platform users started reporting that they’re seeing stories from users they don’t follow. This is probably the network’s attempt to introduce Highlight Fleets.
Twitter currently doesn’t let you like a Fleet. The only way of communication between users is via direct message, and there’s a bar below each Fleet and an emoji icon to send a reaction. Unfortunately, the platform still hasn’t introduced reactions to Tweets; therefore, it’s pretty intriguing that they’re letting users send reactions to Fleets via DMs. Before you learn how to create a Fleet, you should also know that you can mute and unmute Fleets in your settings.
If you want to explore this feature and make it a part of your marketing strategy, here’s how you can create Fleets:
As you can see, this only takes minutes, but it can be a powerful tool. When you choose the right words and actions, you can start a conversation with Fleets among your followers and reach new audiences.
There are two ways you can share this ephemeral Tweet format: Tweeting Fleets or Fleeting Tweets. The first one is quite simple and lets you share your fleet as a Tweet that won’t go away after 24 hours and will stay present on your profile. The second one takes the opposite route and helps you turn a Tweet into a Fleet in a few simple steps. So here’s what you should do:
To make a Fleet into a Tweet, follow these steps:
Unfortunately, the platform doesn’t allow you to share links to your Fleets or Retweet them. However, you can easily do Fleet screenshots and share them with your audience.
Can you delete these ephemeral stories, or do they have to stay on your profile for 24 hours? Thankfully, if you’re not happy with the Fleet, you accidentally made typos in the text or forgot to add words, you can take the Fleet down. Here’s what you should do to delete it:
The user experience of Fleets becomes better after the first few tries. If you’re used to posting stories on Instagram and Facebook, you shouldn’t have any trouble utilizing this feature to your advantage and creating user-generated content.
How can you use Twitter’s ephemeral content as a part of your social strategy to grow your business? These temporary stories are a helpful tool to boost user engagement, gain more followers, and make your brand even more successful. Here’s how you can use them to get the best out of what Twitter has to offer:
Just like Instagram Stories, Fleets are an excellent spot for announcing giveaways. One thing to keep in mind is the platform’s character count limitations and considering sharing the news in multiple Fleets.
Introducing a massive Black Friday sale or a limited-time offer on Fleets sounds like a great idea. Watching these stories is contagious, so users get hooked to seeing what everyone else is doing or has to offer. Another great thing is that these stories last only 24 hours, so the special code you post will be gone, and it won’t be available for users after that. If you post a Tweet, you’ll need to remember when to delete it.
Getting feedback from your followers is essential. Also, if you’re planning on releasing new products, services, and you’re not sure what the market lacks, why not ask a question? Another excellent idea is to share the answers with the rest of the followers, especially when asking for advice or tips. Users will know that you share relevant content and will be even more invested in your brand.
Fleets are a great spot to share positive customer feedback. For example, if someone praised you in their Tweets, you can easily share that with the rest of your followers and potentially get them to purchase what you have to sell. This will also stimulate other customers to share their experiences, and when you post them on Fleets, you make them feel relevant, so they’ll love your brand even more.
This is a great opportunity to help your followers get familiar with your brand. You can share sneak peeks of the production process, packaging, how you film videos, photos, and much more.
Twitter users are obsessed with this platform because of its popular features and how it always introduces new ones that make it even better. Now that we’ve answered the question “What is Fleet on Twitter?,” it’s time for you to learn to introduce it into your digital strategy and grow your business. The user feedback is quite divided, but that always happens whenever a new feature pops up. According to most users, the highly-requested Edit button for Tweets is a top priority, so the platform has a lot to work on before making everyone happy. Until then, all we can do is share the best brand tips for everyone who finds their online presence on the network has a lot of business potential.