While social networks obviously need users, having even a billion people doesn’t really mean anything if they don’t have advertising to pay the bills. In December, Twitter passed 200 million users, but what the network really seems to be focused on these days isluring advertisers, and potential business clients.
Twitter lauched a redesigned resource for businesses to learn… well, how to user Twitter, it was announced Monday.
The new business.twitter.com features include:
- A 101 section to help put your best Tweets forward with sections on How Twitter can help your business, a glossary of terms, Who’s on Twitter?, and Twitter & mobile
- For the more advanced user, there are advanced marketing tips, including sections entitled Understand your results with analytics, Integrate your marketing efforts with Twitter buttons and embedded Tweets, Scale your efforts to maximize your impact and Get results with successful promotional tactics and strategies
- Ideas for how businesses can promote their presence, including Use events to engage, Launch your product, Flock to Unlock, and Twixclusive
Twitter also links success stories like Airbnb, Cirque du Soleil, Etsy, Hailo, and HubSpot.
“Since Twitter is such a dynamic new platform, marketers have a lot of questions. How do I connect with the right audience? How do I do that real-time marketing thing? How do I make 140 characters sing?” Christine Tseng, B2B Marketing at Twitter, wrote.
“Brands and businesses constantly find interesting ways to engage their customers on Twitter. So visit us often to keep ahead of the Tweet curve.”
Twitter’s advertising push
Last month, Twitter launched a new API that is designed make it easier for brands to manage campaigns and get more value out of advertising on Twitter, by allowing them to integrate with its ads platform through a list of API partners that will supply them with better targeting and tools. The first five of these partners were HootSuite, Adobe, Saleforce, SHIFT and TBG Digital.
The point of the API, Twitter said at the time, is not to create more advertising, but to make advertising on the network better overall.
And that strategy seems to be working so far, as market researcher eMarketer reported last week that it is projecting Twitter to grow revenue by 63% to nearly $1 billion in advertising sales by 2014.
By 2015, Twitter is expected to pull in $1.33 billion in worldwide ad revenue. In September, eMarketer had projected that the network would take in $807.5 million in 2014, but has now revised that number to $950 million.
More importantly, more than half of the networks ad revenue, roughly 53%, is projected to come from mobile this year, and that number is expected to top 60% by 2015. The report estimates that Twitter will earn $308.9 million in mobile ad revenue in 2013, more than double the mobile ad revenue of $138.4 million the year prior.
The only way Twitter will be able to make those numbers a reality is if it can get businesses to see the benefits of being on the network.
Twitter also released this video to give businesses an overview of what Twitter can do for them:
(Image source: http://advertising.twitter.com)
