Up on until now Twitter has not turned a profit, and for quite a while there has been speculation on whether it will run advertising. It has been however is getting some revenue by supplying posts to Google, Microsoft and Yahoo, in order to give the search engines data for real time search. I think it is about time twitter has decided to run ads on its platform, some of the first advertisers in line are Starbucks, Bravo and Virgin America.
Let’s just hope the ads are well targeted and not just related to the brand names, as this will annoy people and turn them off. It is based on keywords, but unlike Facebook twitter does not have the same level of account detail.
Overall, this is a the first significant step toward a proper business model.
For more see -
Adage - Twitter Has a Business Model: ‘Promoted Tweets’
New York Times - Twitter Unveils Plans to Draw Money From Ads.
5 Responses
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Hi Mark,
I agree, it’s a good step. It will be interesting to see if they can actually make money off ads properly without turning users off. There are quite a few naysayers though. But remember back when Google launched Adwords a lot of people scoffed at the idea and didn’t see the impact the ads would have on search and advertising.
And thinking of that, I wonder what impact Twitter Ads would have on advertising if it became as big a success as Google’s Adwords offering?
They don’t need the same level of account detail as a users tweets will give away more info over time and the tweets of the people they follow will indicate their interests
Chris,
I agree there will always be naysayers, and in my experience when you have naysayers then you are on the right path
It is interesting to think of the impact to Google, epecially when you consider Ads on Facebook and Ads on Linkedin.com to name a few. These parties are taking market share from Google.
Mark.
Ronan,
Interesting perspective, as over time the tweets give context to a users conversations over time.
This is very valuable information.
Mark.
Important for them to make money to foster stable future model. I have no problem with advertising as long it is a) not too “in my face” b) easy and quick skipable c) avoidable through small, very affordable annual subscription like €1/ month or so.