#YearInReview: A Golden Tweet for @Wendys

By
Thursday, 8 December 2011

And the winner of the 2011 Golden Tweet Award is…@Wendys!

The most retweeted Tweet this year — which we honor each year with the Golden Tweet award — was from @Wendys. This Tweet, one of more than 60 billion Tweets people shared this year, raised $50,000 to help foster children. Wendy’s offered to donate 50 cents for every retweet, and the world responded by sharing the Tweet for a good cause.

This Golden Tweet is noteworthy because it came from a company, not an individual. Last year’s Golden Tweet award went to Stephen Colbert, for his Tweet about the plight of oil-soaked birds in the Gulf of Mexico. Wendy’s Tweet is also notable because it was a Promoted Tweet, part of a Twitter advertising campaign that Wendy’s ran in June to celebrate Father’s Day. That campaign, whose call-to-action encouraged people to #TreatItFwd, was so successful that another Tweet from the same campaign was the second most retweeted Tweet of the year.

One of the most powerful things about Twitter is how easily Tweets can be shared. With one click, you can share messages that make you laugh, or think, or ones you think your followers should know about. Retweeting makes it possible for those messages to reverberate around Twitter, potentially reaching millions of people. We’ve developed our Promoted Products to amplify this domino effect, mirroring the way people already use Twitter organically.

As this year’s Golden Tweet award winner shows, anyone —or any company— can have an impact when their message connects with others. Congratulations to @Wendys!