TWITTER

About Twitter

Twitter, also known as the “SMS of the Internet”, was founded in 2006

and now has more than 300 million registered monthly active users who

post and read messages with up to 140 characters. Users can add links,

photos and videos to their tweets, include hashtags to help others find

their message, and run polls within a tweet.

For advertisers, Twitter offers a variety of ad types that can be tailored to different

campaign objectives, from increasing website visits and sales to creating a bigger

following for a company’s Twitter account. Twitter also offers rich options to target a

specific audience, including demographic, interest and behavior targeting.

What ad types does Twitter offer?

Twitter organizes its different ad types by campaign objective: i.e., the action an

advertiser wants a user to perform. Depending on which campaign objective you choose,

the ad will be displayed in a different format, which Twitter calls “Cards.” For detailed

technical specifications of the different card types, take a look at Twitter’s

documentation. Here is an overview of the different campaign objectives you can choose

from, and what the ads look like to the user:

Tweet engagement

Promote a new or existing tweet to your target audience. You pay for engagement with

the tweet, e.g., clicks, retweets, likes, follows and replies. If you prefer to maximize brand

awareness and care less about engagement, you can book an Awareness campaign. Here

you pay for the number of impressions (CPM). You can attach up to four images to your

tweet. If you do this, only 116 characters are available for your Tweet, as 24 characters

are used for the images.

Video views

Embed a video in a tweet and promote it to your desired

audience. Your videos will auto-play muted on scroll,

encouraging users to tap or click to open the tweet and

watch. Twitter will show your ad as a “Video Card” that

consists of your ad copy (max. 140 characters), a video, a

video title (max. 70 characters), and a video description

(max. 200 characters). You pay for video views, which

Twitter defines as follows: “A view occurs when a video is at

least 50% in-view on the user’s device and has been

watched for at least 2 seconds, or the user clicks to watch

the video in fullscreen.”

 Promoted tweet with video

Grow your followers

If you want to promote your Twitter account and grow your follower base, this is the ad type for you. Twitter suggests to your target audience that they follow your account, and also indicates whether any of their followers follow your account. These ads show up in the user feed and in the “Who to follow” sidebar on Desktop. You pay for every follower the ad generates.

Website visits Drive your audience to your website using this campaign type. Twitter will display your message in a “Website Card” that consists of your ad copy (max. 116 characters), an image and a website title/description (max. 70 characters). You will pay for website link clicks.

Website conversions

This ad type makes use of the “Website Card” shown above, but optimizes campaigns for

conversions such as purchases or downloads on your website. Advertisers have to

integrate the Twitter website tag on their site, so Twitter can track conversion. User data

about interests and intent helps Twitter optimize the campaign delivery. Although the

objective is conversion, you still pay for website link clicks.

App installs and re-engagements

If your campaign objective is to generate downloads of your

mobile app or motivate people to open it again, this could be a

great ad type for you. This promoted tweet is shown as an “App

Card” which consists of an ad copy (116 characters), an image,

the app name, price and rating (pulled from the app store), and a

call to action button. You can choose to either pay for app link

clicks or app installs.

Promoted tweet for app installs

Lead generation

With the lead generation campaign type, you can create

promoted tweets that aim to collect the user’s email

address, so you can follow up with a newsletter or offer.

The Lead Generation Card includes your ad copy (116

characters), a Call to Action button (20 characters), a

short description (50 characters) and an image. If a user

clicks the Call to Action button, Twitter will submit the

name and email associated with the user’s Twitter

account and show a customizable message (100

characters). You pay for the number of leads generated.

What is the minimum budget to advertise on Twitter?

Twitter requires you to set up a maximum daily budget for your campaigns, after which

Twitter will stop distributing your ad. Optionally, you can also set a maximum budget for

the duration of the whole campaign. The cost of an action (defined by campaign type, as

explained earlier) depends on how much other advertisers, who compete with you for

the same audience, bid. Unlike Facebook and Instagram, Twitter does not ask you to

commit a minimum budget.

How to get started

To get started you need an active Twitter account. Go to Twitter Ads and you will be

prompted with a screen where you select your campaign objective. These objectives

match the ones we have discussed above. If you get stuck, have a look at Twitter’s

documentation for Businesses.

Case Study

L’Oréal Paris Australia wanted to drive traffic and engagement from exclusive TV content

around red carpet events, using Twitter. To do this, the brand used Promoted Tweets, a

Promoted Trend and a Twitter Amplify campaign that directed users to L’Oréal’s Get the

Look Website.