Tracking firms say Threads engagement dropped since debut

By Al Mayadeen English
Source: News Websites
14 Jul 2023 17:41

According to SensorTower and SimilarWeb, Threads has witnessed a dip in active users on a daily basis since the weekend.

Meta's new app Threads, New York, July 6, 2023 (AP)

According to SensorTower, a marketing firm, and SimilarWeb, Meta's Threads has witnessed a dip in user numbers and time spent on the app since the weekend.

However, with 100 million signups in only 5 days, it remains one of the biggest-debuting applications of all time and appears to be siphoning some attention away from Twitter.

Last week, the text-based social media site boasted a record 100 million sign-ups in only five days, but statistics from Sensor Tower and Similarweb show that growth and interaction have slowed.

Anthony Bartolacci, the managing director at Sensor Tower, told CNBC that “In the 10-plus years' Sensor Tower has been estimating app installs, the first 72 hours of Threads was truly in a class by itself," adding that Tuesday and Wednesday saw a 20% dip in active daily users, while time spent per user on average went down from 20 minutes to only 10.

“These early returns signal that despite the hoopla during its launch, it will still be an uphill climb for Threads to carve out space in most users’ social network routine,” Bartolacci stated.

The director explained that “The backing of Meta and the integration with Instagram likely gives Threads a much higher flood than other services, but it will need a more compelling value proposition than simply ‘Twitter, but without Elon Musk.’"

Similarweb Data, a digital data and analytics business, revealed comparable findings. Threads witnessed a reduction in daily active users of more than 25% between its July 7 high and Monday for Threads users on Android phones globally. The business is still tuning its model using iOS data.

Similarweb statistics showed usage time plummeted by more than half, with time spent among US users decreasing from around 20 minutes on July 6 to just over 8 minutes on July 10.

David Carr, the senior insights manager at the firm, told CNBC: “While there was intense interest in checking out the app initially, not every user has made a habit of visiting Threads as often as they might other social apps.”

A spokesperson from Meta expressed that the focus of the company is on "ensuring stable performance, delivering new features, and continuing to improve the experience in the coming months.”

CEO Mark Zuckerberg has also stated that the growth of the app was not a result of promotions but genuine interest from users.

Adam Mosseri, head of Instagram explained in a New York Times podcast that Threads was more "supportive of public discourse" than other platforms by Meta, noting the necessity to draw in a more news-focused crowd but focusing on lighter topics like music and fashion.

“Politics and hard news are inevitably going to show up on Threads - they have on Instagram as well to some extent - but we’re not going to do anything to encourage those verticals,” Mosseri stated on Threads.

Jasmine Enberg, an analyst at Insider Intelligence, stated that “Meta only needs 1 in 4 Instagram users to use Threads monthly for it to be as big as Twitter."

“Threads has the potential to steal significant usage away from Twitter, particularly as the Threads app team starts to fill in missing features like hashtags and topical search,” Similarweb’s Carr told CNBC.