Data: Top 100 most influential UK retail accounts on Twitter

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An algorithm-generated list of the UK’s most influential retail Twitter accounts, compiled by Lissted and analysed by Graham Soult.

Top 100
Rank	Name	Handle	Type	Followers	Statuses	Previous Rank	Movement
1	Retail Week	RetailWeek	Media	84,473	41,074	1	0
2	Neil Saunders	NeilRetail	Analyst	10,571	41,355	2	0
3	George MacDonald	GeorgeMacD	Journalist	13,943	39,898	3	0
4	Drapers	Drapers	Media	65,859	32,661	6	2
5	BRC	the_brc	Industry body	8,559	3,370	5	0
6	John Lewis	johnlewisretail	Retail brand	295,120	22,533	7	1
7	The Grocer	TheGrocer	Media	47,942	17,861	4	(3)
8	Retail Gazette	retailgazette	Media	15,400	8,630	13	5
9	Planet Retail	PlanetRetail	Analyst firm	44,666	20,914	14	5
10	Mary Portas	maryportas	Personality	251,039	6,465	8	(2)
11	Bryan Roberts	BryanRoberts72	Analyst	5,173	13,774	9	(2)
12	Graham Soult	soult	Commentator	8,304	27,130	39	27
13	Nicola Harrison	NicolaRHarrison	Journalist	5,325	2,867	10	(3)
14	Nick Bubb	NickBubb1	Commentator	6,788	7,869	12	(2)
15	John Ryan	newstores	Journalist	6,485	8,071	16	1
16	retailTRUST	retailTRUST	Not for profit	5,877	9,979	19	3
17	Retail Focus News	retailfocus	Media	19,612	8,019	27	10
18	M&S	marksandspencer	Retail brand	489,588	226,599	15	(3)
19	Chris Brook-Carter	CBC90	Journalist	4,820	2,415	20	1
20	Steve Dresser	dresserman	Analyst	12,263	53,816	11	(9)
21	Verdict Retail	VerdictRetail	Analyst firm	4,201	5,979	17	(4)
22	The Retail Bulletin	RetailBulletin	Media	12,125	25,443	22	0
23	Sainsbury’s	sainsburys	Retail brand	437,839	375,924	23	0
24	Jennifer Creevy	JenniferCreevy	Journalist	3,643	1,561	36	12
25	Andrew Busby	andrewbusby	Analyst	14,199	12,604	28	3
26	Waitrose	waitrose	Retail brand	249,406	99,279	21	(5)
27	Sainsbury’s News	SainsburysNews	Retail brand	51,759	21,397	24	(3)
28	Tesco News	tesconews	Retail brand	37,749	5,271	40	12
29	Graham Ruddick	GrahamtRuddick	Journalist	6,340	4,668	35	6
30	Glynn Davis	GlynnDavis	Journalist	4,103	8,109	41	11
31	Talking Retail	TalkingRetail	Media	7,847	10,222	52	21
32	Internet Retailing	etail	Media	30,799	12,631	18	(14)
33	Selfridges	Selfridges	Retail brand	318,769	59,693	26	(7)
34	Alex Lawson	MrAlexLawson	Journalist	4,830	4,371	25	(9)
35	Harry Wallop	hwallop	Journalist	26,586	29,394	43	8
36	My-Retail Media	myretailmedia	Media	39,053	29,464	29	(7)
37	Richard Hyman	rahrichardh	Analyst	1,640	929	68	31
38	Tesco	Tesco	Retail brand	428,676	1,335,394	32	(6)
39	Theo Paphitis	TheoPaphitis	Personality	500,049	13,767	57	18
40	World Retail Congress	WorldRetail	Trade show	7,691	7,123	45	5
41	Mark Webb	MarkWebb_DC	Comms/PR	4,120	25,724	34	(7)
42	Clare Rayner	clarerayner	Campaigner	5,608	43,466	33	(9)
43	Bill Grimsey	BillGrimsey	Campaigner	4,233	5,874	46	3
44	Rob Gregory	RobGregOnRetail	Analyst	3,777	2,683	53	9
45	RetailWire.com	retailwire	Media	36,170	14,763	78	33
46	Asda	asda	Retail brand	398,923	11,689	38	(8)
47	Andrea Felsted	AndreaFelsted	Journalist	3,966	2,553	30	(17)
48	European Supermarket	esm_magazine	Media	10,954	13,407	62	14
49	Tim Danaher	timdanaher	Comms/PR	6,271	10,181	31	(18)
50	Retail Express	retailexpress	Media	5,202	2,723	51	1
51	The Co-operative	TheCooperative	Retail brand	64,796	31,080	50	(1)
52	Mark Faithfull	RPAnalyst	Analyst	1,669	3,878	92	40
53	Matthew Hopkinson	MattheHopkinson	Analyst	2,235	7,317	61	8
54	Paul Mitchell	PaulTMRetail	Campaigner	25,969	21,072	54	0
55	Fiona Briggs	RetailTimes	Journalist	3,876	7,169	> 100	N/A
56	ASOS	ASOS	Retail brand	955,311	198,233	67	11
57	Conlumino News	ConluminoNews	Analyst firm	5,380	3,702	59	2
58	Rebecca Thomson	Rebeccathomson_	Analyst	4,570	3,657	> 100	N/A
59	Sarah Butler	whatbutlersaw	Journalist	1,993	2,909	73	14
60	The Retail Practice	retailpractice	Comms/PR	60,058	18,234	74	14
61	bira_says	bira_says	Industry body	2,781	5,808	56	(5)
62	Gemma Goldfingle	gemmagoldfingle	Comms/PR	3,029	3,402	69	7
63	Maureen Hinton	maureen_retail	Analyst	2,799	1,646	66	3
64	Dan Innes	DanInnes	Comms/PR	2,601	8,528	> 100	N/A
65	James Hall	JamesFHall	Journalist	4,379	4,667	49	(16)
66	LDC	LocalDataCo	Analyst firm	1,905	6,078	> 100	N/A
67	Mark Kleinman	MarkKleinmanSky	Journalist	27,976	5,078	> 100	N/A
68	Patrick O’Brien	patrick_verdict	Analyst	1,357	804	> 100	N/A
69	betterRetailing	betterRetailing	Media	4,388	7,340	58	(11)
70	Charlotte Hardie	Charlottehardie	Journalist	1,876	405	> 100	N/A
71	Ian Middleton	IanMiddletonX	Commentator	3,056	33,074	72	1
72	The Retail Champion	RetailChampion	Campaigner	5,402	16,769	42	(30)
73	Ben Sillitoe	BSillitoe	Journalist	2,785	5,362	86	13
74	Accenture Retail	AccentureRetail	Other brand	17,261	10,259	> 100	N/A
75	Marcus Leroux	marcusleroux	Journalist	5,658	8,342	93	18
76	BCSC	BCSCretailprop	Industry body	5,486	3,269	> 100	N/A
77	Tracey Davies	mrsbyers	Journalist	1,555	4,888	> 100	N/A
78	NRFnews	NRFnews	Industry body	39,751	10,100	82	4
79	Liberty London	LibertyLondon	Retail brand	197,630	30,372	> 100	N/A
80	Kantar	Kantar	Analyst firm	26,891	9,211	76	(4)
81	IGD Retail Analysis	RetailAnalysis	Analyst firm	9,004	11,580	63	(18)
82	Laura Heywood	LauraH_RW	Journalist	1,607	1,605	> 100	N/A
83	Retail Conference	RetailEvents	Trade show	3,014	9,499	64	(19)
84	C&W UK Retail Team	CushWakeRtailUK	Other brand	3,951	2,477	99	15
85	RBTE	rbtexpo	Trade show	4,137	4,968	> 100	N/A
86	Doug @Retail Prophet	RetailProphet	Commentator	19,523	18,919	94	8
87	K3 Retail	k3retail	Analyst firm	5,510	12,275	81	(6)
88	Morrisons	Morrisons	Retail brand	194,237	135,427	83	(5)
89	Business of Fashion	BoF	Media	1,554,540	24,513	> 100	N/A
90	Aldi Stores UK	AldiUK	Retail brand	263,842	52,878	96	6
91	Topshop	Topshop	Retail brand	1,277,204	42,644	> 100	N/A
92	Andy Stevens	andy_verdict	Analyst	1,419	1,594	97	5
93	Burberry	Burberry	Retail brand	6,440,787	10,329	> 100	N/A
94	Westfield London	westfieldlondon	Retail brand	81,341	9,716	79	(15)
95	Jonathan De Mello	DeMelloRetail	Analyst	1,300	3,406	> 100	N/A
96	H&M	hm	Retail brand	7,844,555	9,713	> 100	N/A
97	Harrods	Harrods	Retail brand	585,489	38,070	80	(17)
98	We Are Pop Up	wearepopup	Retail brand	22,021	15,890	> 100	N/A
99	New Look Fashion	NewLookFashion	Retail brand	324,770	27,448	100	1
100	Ocado	Ocado	Retail brand	49,177	118,130	89	(11)

NB: Numbers in brackets represent negative movement.

How is the list formulated?

As Adam Parker, Lissted’s founder, explains: “Lissted’s proprietary algorithm analyses Twitter users’ relationships and interactions – not just how many followers they’ve got – meaning that in a field like retail, someone with a relatively modest Twitter following can still rank highly if the industry’s key influencers follow and engage with them.”

To generate its new results, Lissted identified a sample of 3,419 of the UK’s top retail-related Twitter accounts – mostly UK-based individuals or organisations, but including others with a strong UK connection. The algorithm then analysed 1.8 million follower relationships and more than 66,500 replies, mentions and retweets generated by these accounts.

To assist analysis, the accounts were categorised by type – media, journalist, retail brand, and so on – but that’s genuinely the extent of any human subjective input.

Graham Soult: What does the updated chart show us?

At the top end, it’s hardly a surprise that the three most influential accounts – Retail Week (@RetailWeek), Conlumino’s Neil Saunders (@NeilRetail), and Retail Week’s George MacDonald (@GeorgeMacD) – all remain unchanged from last time. After all, these are Twitter accounts that anyone in UK retail turns to if they’re after objective and up-to-the-minute industry insight.

Indeed, there’s relatively little churn overall, though this is to be expected given Lissted’s methodology – making enough impact in the community to rise up the ranks significantly is hard. Hence, all but two of the top 10 were there in October, while 81 of the previous top 100 reappear this time.

There are several notable climbers, though, including Mark Faithfull (@RPAnalyst), RetailWire.com (@retailwire), Richard Hyman (@rahrichardh) and, er, me (@soult) – partly owing to the October list raising my profile a bit further.

There is a slight shift by overall type as well. Retail brands, journalists and media organisations have all increased their representation, and now occupy 55 of the 100 spots, up from 50 previously. Conversely, the number of retail commentators in the list – people like me – has dropped from seven to four.

And what about those who have dropped off the list? Often they’re Twitter users who have stopped being as active as they were, or who, in a couple of cases, haven’t tweeted at all since August.

Clearly in the Twittersphere, just like in retail, you can’t afford to stop getting the message out if you want people to remember and engage with your brand.