Twitter is planning to earn revenue from the millions of users who see tweets all over the web but are not Twitter users. The company is gearing up to sell ads within the tweets and on other publishers’ apps and websites, says a report from The Wall Street Journal citing sources familiar with the development.
Is Twitter in talks with ESPN and Flipboard?
The micro-blogging site discussed its plans with media buyers in a presentation at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, as per the report. As of now, there is no information regarding the names of the publishers, but during the CES presentation, Twitter talked about ESPN’s Sports Center app and Flipboard. ESPN and Twitter are said to be in talks, but nothing concrete has been laid out as of now, says the report.
Citing a source, the report further says that Twitter will share revenue from the ads with the publishers. During a recent conversation with investors, Twitter talked about its massive audience size excluding its subscriber base, and tapping such users is Twitter’s dominant aim. There have been no comments from ESPN, Flipboard or Twitter as of now.
Video plans for the platform
Apart from selling ads outside the Twitter, the company also discussed video plans with its advertisers during the Consumer Electronics Show. The company wants advertisers, users and media companies to upload videos directly to Twitter. It might be possible that after a few months, users get to watch an increased number of videos playing automatically in their feeds. Such videos will play for the first six seconds, and then users will have to decide whether to watch the video in full or not, according to Ad Age.
In the long term, the company wants to boast of the largest daily audience online. On the other hand, investors are interested in returns and want to see whether Twitter succeeds in converting its user base into revenue. To earn revenue, the company is planning new ad sales.
Twitter also plans to pop up a related video preview sometime between the current running video, encouraging users to watch multiple clips in one session, according to the report. This approach could benefit advertisers selling serialized stories.
