Twitter Cards: A Comprehensive Guide

Twitter is one of the best social media platforms right now. From celebrities, influencers, and brand owners, people from different walks of life use this social media platform to gather and share information.

Twitter has shockingly, more than 353 million active users, making it the biggest platform for advertising and marketing. However, many don't know how they can perfectly use this platform.

In fact, they are unaware of its great features i.e. using proper hashtags, using target keywords that can help them get more reach to their websites and build brand awareness. One of those features is Twitter cards.

Twitter cards are Twitter's feature to share video previews, website links, and other types of interactive content with tweets. Twitter cards enhance the user experience, generate traffic, and help users easily share interactive content. Twitter cards help content creators stand out in the competition and gain more engagement and visibility.

This detailed article will help you learn everything about Twitter cards. The article will answer most of the questions Twitter users, especially brand owners, marketers, and content creators, have regarding Twitter cards.

So, join us on the journey of exploring the world of Twitter cards!

Why Do We Need Twitter Cards?

Imagine you have been using Twitter for a long time, are well aware of how it works, and have hundreds of thousands of followers, but still, you cannot drive traffic from Twitter to your website or other channels. This was the case before the development of Twitter cards. It had nothing to offer to marketers and content creators.

However, by introducing this feature, Twitter solved the issue many marketers were facing. Now it helps marketers, website owners, and eCommerce stores get what they want.

Here are some reasons why everyone needs Twitter cards:

1. Enhance Visual Appeal

Twitter has an excellent user interface, making even an ordinary tweet look good. However, not every Tweet attracts a lot of people. That's where Twitter cards come in handy. These cards help Twitter users incorporate various media elements, including video links, images, video previews, etc.

2. Increased click-through rate

Click-through rate is the biggest issue for many content creators and marketers. They use various strategies to enhance the click-through rate. However, they often fail to bring traffic from social media platforms, especially Twitter. However, the Twitter card feature can greatly help them improve the overall click-through rate as this feature makes the tweets interactive and visually appealing.

3. Improve Content Presentation

When it comes to content presentation, Twitter cards help users a lot. Using Twitter cards, anyone can easily make their content more appealing and captivating. These cards allow users to add various interactive elements to their content, including audio files, images, videos, etc. That's how they improve the content presentation and make it more engaging. 

4. Brand Recognition

These cards can also help brands enhance their presence and build an excellent reputation on this social media platform. Twitter cards allow users to add various elements to their tweets, making it easier to provide a customized and personalized user experience. Moreover, they can also build a great visual identity using these cards. And lastly, they can also add interactive CTAs (Call-to-Actions) to get more traffic to their websites or other social media pages.

5. Mobile Optimization (for engaging and reaching mobile users)

Most people use Twitter and other social media platforms on their mobile devices. That's why ensure the content they read or view is always mobile-friendly. Otherwise, they won't be able to enjoy it. Twitter cards ensure that the content is displayed in the best manner on all kinds of devices. No matter whether someone uses mobile phones or desktops, they help users get the best experience that allows both brands and ordinary Twitter users.

6. Increasing Shareability and Going Viral

As discussed earlier, Twitter cards enhance the visual appeal of Tweets and make them more attractive, which can result in getting more engagement. For instance, if people find a Tweet more compelling, they open it to explore more, comment on it, like it, or retweet it. It can enhance the chances of a tweet going viral within minutes or hours. In fact, brands and marketers can use them to launch a new trend.

Types of Twitter Cards

The beauty of Twitter cards is that it doesn't offer only one type of card. Instead, it provides different types of cards to assist users in reaching their targeted audiences and improving the visual appeal of their tweets.

Here are four different types of Twitter cards:

1. Summary Card

It is the most commonly used card these days. Many brands and marketers only use these cards as it helps them achieve all the desired benefits. These cards usually include the text, thumbnail image, and Twitter handle of the website or any other platform.

Summary cards are used to promote products and share ideas, information, blog posts, and other types of content via Twitter. These cards also help users inform their readers and followers about the brand and its values. 

A Summary Card should be:

Title: 70 characters

Description: 200 characters

Image: at least 120×120 pixels and no more than 1MB

If the image is bigger than 1 MB it can be compressed with the help of an Image compressor.

2. Summary with Large Image

These cards contain the tweet text and visual content that the users want to share with others, especially their followers and targeted audience. Those who wish to use such cards perfectly should not compromise on the picture quality as it can help them attract a wider audience and showcase brand personality.

Summary cards with large images are beneficial for sharing information that heavily relies on visual content. These cards are used to provide information about products, give previews, show visual data, infographics, etc.

Summary Card with Large Image should be:

Title: 70 characters

Description: 200 characters

Image: at least 280 x 150 pixels and no more than 1MB

3. Player Card

Player cards are usually used to tweet audio or video content. This card type is really helpful for video content creators and musicians as they can use it to preview their audio and video content and enhance users' curiosity about their content. Moreover, it can also lead them to the actual audio or video file.

The player card usually includes audio or video, thumbnail images, relevant text, and description. Using these things, anyone can quickly grab the attention of Twitter users and bring more traffic to their websites. 

Player Card Should be:

Video: dimensions up to 640 x 480 pixels at 30 frames per second (fps)

Audio: AAC, Low Complexity profile

4. App Card

Many social media platforms only support a few types of content. However, this is not an issue with Twitter. Twitter users can easily promote their apps and increase the download count. And for that purpose, app owners can use App cards.

App cards include multiple things, including the app name, description, icon, and CTA. You can also customize the CTA to enhance users' curiosity and encourage them to visit the store and download the app.

APP Card should be:

Title: Pulled from app ID

Description: 200 characters

Image: The app logo is pulled from the app ID and image should be at least 800 x 320 pixels and can be in JPG, PNG, or GIF formats

How to Generate and Set Up Twitter Cards For Custom codeWebsite?

Those who want to generate a Twitter card on a custom-code website don't need to worry. There are two simple ways to generate Twitter cards.

1. Do it yourself 

If you want to generate a Twitter card yourself, choose the card type. Once you know what kind of card you want to set up, you have to add meta tags to the web page. The next step is to check whether the URL is working or not. If everything is fine, tweet the URL with your textual tweet, and you will see the card appear there.

However, sometimes many people don't understand how they can perfectly generate the Twitter cards themselves or find the whole process difficult. So, they can use the second method.

2. Use an Online Twitter Card Generator

Many online tool-based websites have developed free-to-use Twitter card generators. These Twitter card generators can quickly create Twitter cards without doing anything except choosing copy and pasting.

When you open a Twitter card generator, it asks you about the type of card you want to generate and provides the information. When you add accurate information, it quickly generates Twitter cards HTML code that you can use to make your tweets more interactive and useful. So, next time you want to generate Twitter cards, try an online Twitter card generator; you will find it very helpful and time-efficient.

Here is an example of generated Twitter card HTML code:

  <meta name="twitter:card" content="summary">

  <meta name="twitter:title" content="Your Title">

  <meta name="twitter:description" content="Your Description">

  <meta name="twitter:image" content="URL to Your Image">

  <meta name="twitter:site" content="@YourTwitterUsername">

How to Set up Twitter Cards on CMS-Based Websites?

Setting up Twitter cards isn't a difficult task for professionals. In fact, people with less technical knowledge can also set them using easy techniques. Plus, you can easily set up Twitter cards no matter what CMS you use. For users' ease, here are some guidelines for setting up Twitter cards for each of the most prominent CMS.

1. WordPress

Many people prefer WordPress websites because they are easy to use. No matter what they want, they can quickly get plugins for that. These plugins make WordPress websites more manageable. For example, if you want to add Twitter cards to your WordPress website, you will quickly find multiple plugins. 

Yoast, AIOSEO, RankMath, and many other companies have built plugins to set up Twitter cards. Install any of these plugins and set up Twitter cards without any hassle.

2. Shopify

Shopify also allows users to easily set up Twitter cards. You don't need to make many changes to the code to set up these cards. Also, it doesn't take a lot of time. To add Twitter cards, you need to create a Twitter account first.

After that, check whether your theme already has a built-in snippet for Twitter cards; if it has, move on to the next step; if it doesn't, create a snippet and save the file. Once the snippet is added, submit the website to Twitter. That's it!

3. Wix

To set up Twitter cards on Wix, go to the custom meta tags section and choose "Add Custom Tag." Add the meta tag there according to your needs. Click Apply to save changes once you have successfully added the custom tag.

That's how you can add Twitter cards to Wix's HTML code. After that, whenever you Tweet anything with your website's link, the Twitter card will be generated and help you boost your presence on this platform.

Final Words

Twitter cards are one of Twitter's most exciting and remarkable features. This special feature has completely transformed the game of marketing on Twitter. Now many brands, marketers, influencers, and content creators utilize this platform to generate tons of leads, enhance brand recognition, increase engagement, and provide valuable data to Twitter users.

Although Twitter was already great before this feature, it made it more useful for a wider audience, especially digital content creators and business owners. Moreover, it also assisted users in getting more diversified content on their feeds. So, it is a win-win for each party involved. 

However, Twitter users must learn more about this feature to utilize it perfectly. That's the only way they can take advantage of this technology and platform. Otherwise, they won't be able to achieve their goals.