News

Twitter tests ‘highlight and tweet’ feature with the New York Times

Twitter could soon be rolling out a service that would allow users to directly tweet out highlighted sections of a news story, rather than the current system which only allows headlines to be tweeted.

It was tested with the New York Times on a Saturday Night Live article. NYT selected the phrases it considered prime material for a tweet with readers then able to click on the highlighted section, taking them to the familiar pop-up box.

The reporter behind the story, Dave Itzkoff, explained to Poynter that deciding the suitable sentences was "just a bit of educated guesswork trying to imagine what readers would be drawn to and what would make the best travelling billboards for the overall story."

Crucially, NYT noted an increased interaction, finding the article was tweeted 11 times more frequently than "the average of the top 500 shared Times articles from the last month.”

The move comes after Twitter announced a Related Headlines service which automatically lists relevant stories alongside tweets.

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Jennifer Faull

Jen Faull is deputy news editor at The Drum with a remit to cover the latest developments in the retail and FMCG sectors. Based in London, she has interviewed major business figures including top marketers from Mondelez, Unilever, Tesco, and Lidl.

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