Twitter's advertising plan - 'Promoted Tweets'

Biz Stone

It was only a matter of time. After seeing the amount of revenue Facebook generates from online advertising, Twitter has announced that it will allow advertising for the first time.

The plan would see advertisers buying 'Promoted Tweets' that will then appear in Twitter's real time search pages. This would potentially allow advertisers to inform Tweeters of the latest deals and offers in a real-time manner.

Not traditional advertising?

Twitter has been renown for being hesitant in its use of advertisers, but co-founder Biz Stone has said that 'Promoted Tweets' would not be traditional ads and that they would "resonate with users" and be part of conversations.

Unsurprisingly considering Twitter's popularity, big name organizations such as Sony and Starbucks are lining up to get in on the Twitter advertising market. When the new system goes into service, users will sees sponsored tweets at the top of their Twitter search results, based on the context of their search terms.

Similar to Facebook's ads and Google's AdSense program, these sponsored search results have yield huge profits for those who use it.

In order to assuage those who fear Twitter may soon become ad-riddled, the social media giant have assured users that ads will be completely 'organic' and that any ads will be based on tweets that Twitter's advertising partners (such as Virgin America, Bravo, Red Bull and the aforementioned Starbucks and Sony) have already sent out in their regular Twitter streams.

On Twitter's blog, Biz Stone wrote, "There is not a single 'ad' in our Promoted Tweets platform that isn't already an organic part of Twitter."

"This is distinct from both traditional search advertising and more recent social advertising."

Making money

Despite being massively popular and valued at $1 billion, there has been concern that Twitter hasn't really made any sort of revenue. As such, the advertising plan is a smart step to finally generate some profit for the service.

Even Twitter itself have described their stance as a "stubborn insistence on a slow and thoughtful approach to monetization."

Of course advertisers can see the benefits as can Twitters, but Tweeters are a bit more dubious. Speaking to the BBC, Christine Overby, vice president of interactive marketing at research company Forrester said,  "There is a risk that users may get turned off by too much advertising."

"But I think this risk is easy to manage - they can look at how Google for example has handled this. Advertisers are accustomed to 'pay per click' or 'pay per thousand' [advertising units] models."

"They may not appreciate this model - there will certainly be a discussion as to what the 'pay for resonance' model actually is."

How do you feel about ads being put on Twitter? All for it, or as Twitter lost whatever credibility it may have had?

Relevant articles:

Is Twitter losing its tweet-factor? | How many tweets are sent a day? | The celebrity Twitter backlash

Timon Singh

Timon Singh is a graduate of Liverpool University where he received a degree in Social and Economic History. He has previously worked for BBC Magazines on BBC Who Do You Think You Are? Magazine, the publication for the popular genealogy show.

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