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In a bid to boost visibility, social media giants, Twitter is switching from social networking to news.
Following yet another quarter of sluggish user growth, Twitter has changed how its flagship mobile application is categorized on Apple’s iTunes App Store.
Instead of competing against Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, WhatsApp, Pinterest, and others in the crowded “Social networking” category, where Twitter had previously ranked in the top 10, the company has moved its app to the “News” category, where it’s now #1.
The change has a two-fold effect. For starters, Twitter has been consistently ranked as a #5 application in Social Networking over the past several months – which is certainly nothing to be glum about – but ranking as the #1 app in a category could be better in terms of App Store visibility.
As users set up new iPhones for the first time by visiting various app categories, they’re likely to take a number one ranked application into heightened consideration.
More importantly, becoming a number one ranked app could potentially impact Twitter’s “Overall” ranking, which would give it better visibility in the App Store’s top “Free” apps chart where Twitter is #28.
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