Mastodon for Marketers: What You Need to Know About the Rising Social Platform

If you‘re a social media marketer, you know how important it is to stay on top of the latest platforms and trends. And there‘s a new name in social media that‘s been getting a lot of buzz lately: Mastodon.

Mastodon is a decentralized, open-source social network that‘s often described as an alternative to Twitter. It‘s been around since 2016 but has seen explosive growth recently, surging from around 380,000 users in October 2022 to over 2.5 million by the end of the year according to data from the Mastodon Users project.

So what exactly is Mastodon and should it be on your radar as a marketer? In this post, we‘ll dive deep into what makes Mastodon unique, how it works, and what opportunities and challenges it presents for brands looking to connect with audiences on the platform.

What is Mastodon?

At a high level, Mastodon functions a lot like Twitter. Users can post short messages (called "toots"), follow other users, like and boost posts, and participate in conversations using hashtags.

But under the hood, Mastodon is quite different from mainstream social platforms. Instead of being a single centralized service, Mastodon is a decentralized network of thousands of independent communities running on open-source software.

Here‘s how it works: Mastodon is made up of thousands of independent servers (called "instances") which are hosted by different individuals and organizations. Each server has its own rules, moderation policies, and content focus. Users create an account and profile on a specific server, which becomes their home base.

Image source: joinmastodon.org

But while your account lives on one server, you can still follow, interact with, and see content from users on other servers across the larger Mastodon network (as well as other platforms in the "fediverse"). Servers communicate with each other using a set of open web protocols, so the end result is a big interconnected web of communities.

This decentralized approach gives Mastodon some unique advantages:

• No single company controls the overall network or your data
• Communities can set their own moderation policies and foster different cultures
• Open source code allows anyone to spin up a new server or build apps and services on top of the protocol
• Spreading out hosting and moderation makes the network more resilient

At the same time, decentralization also introduces some new complexities compared to a traditional centralized platform. Features and user experiences can vary between servers. Content moderation is more of a patchwork. And there‘s no central entity to handle issues that span the whole network.

The Origins of Mastodon

Mastodon was created by Eugen Rochko, a German software developer who had grown disillusioned with Twitter and wanted to build a more open, transparent, and community-driven alternative.

As Rochko explained in an interview with Time, he felt Twitter had strayed from its original mission by putting more focus on advertisers vs users and trying to engage people with conflict and outrage. "In my opinion, it is unethical to build a business like that because you‘re essentially exploiting people‘s vulnerabilities to keep them engaged on your platform," he said.

Inspired by earlier open source social projects like GNU social and Identi.ca, Rochko saw an opportunity to create a Twitter-like service that would be resistant to corporate control and respect user rights. He released the first version of Mastodon in October 2016 and the network has been steadily growing ever since.

Interest in Mastodon surged in late 2022 amid concerns about Twitter‘s future following Elon Musk‘s acquisition of the company. Many Twitter users seeking an alternative flocked to Mastodon, propelling the network to over 2.5 million monthly active users. High-profile figures like journalists, politicians, academics and celebrities began promoting their Mastodon profiles as a backup or replacement for Twitter.

Getting Started on Mastodon

If you‘re brand new to Mastodon, the first thing to wrap your head around is that there‘s no single central website to create an account on. Instead, you need to choose a specific server to join. But with thousands of servers out there, how do you pick?

The good news is there are directories and tools like joinmastodon.org to help you find communities that match your location or interests. Servers range from broad general-interest communities open to anyone to more niche servers focused on specific regions, topics, professions, or fandoms.

While you can browse and interact with content from any server, the one you choose to create your account on will become your digital home and shape your local experience. So it‘s a good idea to read a server‘s description and rules and check out its public timeline to get a sense of the vibe before committing.

Once you find a server you like, creating an account is a straightforward process similar to other social networks. You‘ll be prompted to choose a username, add an email address, and create a password.

One important thing to understand is that if you want to move your account to a different server in the future, you‘ll need to start fresh with a new account and manually migrate your follower and following lists. So while you can interact with the whole network regardless of which server you join, your choice of home does matter.

After creating your account, take some time to flesh out your profile with a display name, avatar, header image, and short bio to let people know who you are and what you‘re interested in. You can also add metadata fields with links to your website, social profiles, and other relevant info.

Using Mastodon

With your account set up, you‘re ready to start exploring and posting on Mastodon. The interface has a lot of familiar elements for Twitter users. You‘ll see a box to compose new posts at the top of your home screen, a feed showing posts from people you follow, a trending hashtags section, and a search box to find users and content.

But there are also some notable differences:

• Mastodon posts can be up to 500 characters long, with options to add content warnings and control post privacy on a granular level
• Home feed posts are strictly chronological by default with no "top" posts or algorithmic ranking
• In addition to your home feed, you can view a "local" timeline of all public posts from your server and a "federated" timeline of posts from all servers your server knows about
• Robust anti-abuse tools and content controls like the ability to require new follower approval, hide content behind warnings, and limit post visibility

Mastodon‘s compose box also supports some unique features beyond basic text. You can upload images, GIFs, and short videos, conduct polls, and create multi-paragraph posts that will be collapsed behind a "read more" link in the timeline.

For accessibility, Mastodon strongly encourages adding descriptive alt-text to images and makes it very easy to do so when uploading. Taking a few seconds to describe your visual content can go a long way to making your posts more inclusive.

Mastodon Culture & Norms

Beyond just technical differences, Mastodon tends to foster a different kind of culture and social norms than mainstream networks like Twitter.

In general, interactions on Mastodon tend to be slower-paced, more thoughtful and substantive compared to the rapid-fire dunking and attention-seeking common on big social media platforms. Mastodon‘s decentralized, community-hosted model seems to promote healthier incentives and standards of behavior.

Many Mastodon servers have strict rules against hate speech, harassment, and misinformation that are proactively enforced by moderators. When you first join a server, it‘s a good idea to review its posted rules and lurk for a bit to absorb the local norms before diving in with your own posts.

Because Mastodon is organized into topic-focused communities, people tend to use it more for in-depth discussions and knowledge sharing within their areas of interest as opposed to just generalized social networking and link sharing.

Mastodon for Marketers

So what does Mastodon mean for brands and marketers? While it may not have the same scale and real-time buzz as platforms like Twitter (yet), Mastodon is attracting an engaged and influential audience, particularly in creative and tech fields.

Established brands like Flipboard, Shutterstock, and Penguin Random House have set up official presences on Mastodon, as have many prominent journalists, academics, activists, and open source projects.

But marketing on Mastodon requires a different approach than on mainstream social networks. There are no native advertising tools, promoted posts, or creator monetization systems. Attempts at overt marketing and self-promotion are likely to be ignored at best and shunned at worst by the Mastodon community.

Instead, brands need to focus on providing genuine value and building trust within the specific servers and communities they participate in. Some tips:

• Find relevant servers where your target audience is active and engage authentically in discussions
• Share your unique insights, expertise, and behind-the-scenes perspective
• Curate and amplify high-quality third-party content, not just your own
• Collaborate with respected voices and thought leaders in the community
• Take a stand on important issues and put your brand values into practice
• Provide great customer service and be responsive to feedback and inquiries

Oregon-based coffee company Rogue Roasters is a great example of a brand using Mastodon effectively. They‘ve been an active participant in the pdx.cafe server for Portland food and beverage lovers, sharing coffee brewing tips, product photos, and local event info.

When Rogue recently used Mastodon to promote a limited-edition coffee benefitting a local nonprofit, the announcement was boosted by dozens of other pdx.cafe members and resulted in a sellout. By consistently providing value to the community first, they‘ve built up goodwill and permission to occasionally promote.

Mastodon & The Future of Social Media

Mastodon is just one part of a larger wave of decentralized, open source, and user-controlled social platforms that are starting to gain traction as alternatives to the ad-driven, attention-harvesting machines of Big Tech.

The so-called fediverse has been expanding with interoperable Mastodon-adjacent projects like PeerTube for video sharing, PixelFed for photo posting, Funkwhale for podcasts and music, and WriteFreely for long-form blogging.

We‘re starting to see the emergence of an interconnected ecosystem of niche communities built around shared interests and values rather than one-size-fits-all global platforms.

It‘s still early days and uncertain whether decentralized social will reach the mainstream. Mastodon and the fediverse have some challenges to overcome:

• Decentralized apps require more technical literacy to get started with
• Complex networks of servers can lack consistency and be hard to navigate
• Niche communities may not achieve the same lock-in and network effects as large social graphs
• Lack of ad tools and sophisticated APIs limit opportunities for brands and developers
• Toxic behavior can fester on servers with lax or absent moderation

But Mastodon also has some powerful tailwinds at its back. A growing backlash against surveillance capitalism and the attention economy. Rising demand for more privacy and user control. Popularity of remote work and decentralized governance models. Increasing recognition of the mental health and societal harms of social media addiction.

Whether Mastodon itself becomes a major player remains to be seen. But its rapid rise is a clear signal that the age of monolithic, centrally-controlled social networks dominating the internet may be starting to wane. The future of social media could look more like an interconnected web of diverse communities than one big town square.

As a marketer, that means it‘s more important than ever to invest in owning your audience through email, your website, and genuine community participation rather than renting attention from closed platforms. Mastodon may never replace networks like Twitter or Facebook, but it‘s well worth experimenting with as part of a multi-channel strategy to stay connected to your customers.

TLDR

Here are the key points about Mastodon for marketers:

• Mastodon is a fast-growing, decentralized social network made up of thousands of independently-hosted servers that communicate with each other
• It has a lot of the same features as Twitter but some important technical and cultural differences
• Mastodon‘s open, community-moderated model is attracting an audience looking for more control and healthier interactions than ad-driven social media
• Marketing on Mastodon requires participating authentically within niche communities and providing real value, not just promotion
• The rise of Mastodon and the fediverse could mark a shift toward a more diverse and user-empowered social media landscape

The jury is still out on whether decentralized social will disrupt the major networks. But innovative brands and marketers should definitely keep an eye on Mastodon and consider participating thoughtfully in relevant servers. Focus on listening and providing value, not just using it as another broadcast channel.

Even if Mastodon doesn‘t become your primary social platform, you‘ll likely gain some valuable insights, ideas, and connections from plugging into its unique communities. The potential upside of establishing an early presence is well worth the learning curve.