Inside the Social Platform: The Design Choices That Could Help Threads Stay Viral (& What Could’ve Inspired Them)

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In July 2023, Mark Zuckerberg launched Meta’s much-anticipated X competitor: Threads. Meta’s vision for this new social platform was to offer “a new, separate space for real-time updates and public conversations” that was built on the foundation of Instagram’s existing community, content, and infrastructure.

As explained in Meta’s official announcement, “Threads is to take what Instagram does best and expand that to text, creating a positive and creative space to express your ideas.” Like Instagram, you can follow friends and creators who share your interests.

Of course, Threads has received its fair share of criticism, from accessibility concerns to accusations of using “dark design” tactics. Nevertheless, Threads hit more than 30 million sign-ups in its first 16 hours alone. It’s continued to gain traction since then, demonstrating the strength of the app’s design.

In this article, we’ll cover the design choices that have helped Threads go (and stay) viral, the areas in which it has fallen short, and what it might take to address these shortcomings.

Table of Contents

What is Threads?
Why was Threads created?
How Thread Leverages Great Design
Where Threads Falls Short

What is Threads?

To understand the design choices that underpin Threads, it’s important first to clarify what Threads is — and what it isn’t.

At its core, Threads is a standalone app that lets users share short, text-based content of up to 500 characters per post. It also offers many features with which Twitter (now known as “X”) users will likely be familiar, such as liking, quoting, or sharing posts.

Threads is also closely tied to Instagram. While there are options to create custom profiles, by default, Threads simply ports over data from users’ existing Instagram accounts. It also offers seamless integration with Instagram, with capabilities such as sharing Threads posts to your Instagram story or in an Instagram DM.

You can also automatically follow the same accounts on Threads as you already do on Instagram.

However, integration with other platforms remains limited: While Zuckerberg has promised compatibility with an open social networking protocol, it’s not currently possible to engage fully with Threads content without first creating an account.

In addition, Threads is not yet available in the European Union due to “regulatory uncertainty” regarding Meta’s adherence to the EU’s strict privacy and security regulations.

But in spite of these shortcomings, Threads has truly taken the world by storm.

According to Meta, the platform reached more than 100 million sign-ups in its first week, and it has remained consistently popular since then. As such, marketing leaders looking to stay up-to-date on the latest social media trends would be wise to pay attention to this important new platform.

Why was Threads created?

The timing of Threads’ launch was likely quite intentional: Zuckerberg’s announcement regarding this new app came on the heels of mounting dissatisfaction with Elon Musk’s leadership of Twitter.

Observers have suggested …read more

Source:: HubSpot Blog