As it has been throughout 2014, social media is going to be a key battleground for companies and organisations this year.

With major campaigns being run by big retail chains on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, the results are out for what has occupied most  UK Twitter users in 2014.

The most popularly viewed tweets this year were put out by the One Direction marketing machine, while posts about the World Cup also headlined.

Despite England being thoroughly disappointing once again, six of the top ten most chatted about British tweets for 2014 focussed on matches in the competition hosted in Brazil.

By far the most tweeted about match was the 7-1 demolition of the host nation by eventual champions Germany. The second most popular occurred as Wayne Rooney brought England level with Uruguay.

Coming in third was another of England’s World Cup moments of note: Daniel Sturridge’s equaliser against Italy.

The most retweeted 2014 post was from One Direction. Harry Styles’ tweet about the band’s fourth anniversary took that particular mantle. The post read:

“4 years. Thank you to everyone who is involved in this. I feel so lucky to be part of it. Everyone who has worked with us thank you..”

At the time of writing, the message had been retweeted around 360,000 times.

For more serious news, the event gaining most chatter on Twitter in the UK was the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines’ MH370 flight back in March. Meanwhile, the vote for an independent Scotland took second place for current affairs.

Companies looking to start off 2015 well may want to consider that the New Year also traditionally sees a huge boost in Twitter activity, as users wish their friends, families, and followers a good start to the year. As such, it could help with engagement for brands to do a little well-wishing of their own.

Richard Bell

Richard has a First in English Literature and Creative Writing, and has experience writing fiction and short stories (which he has published both online and in magazines).