There are many different ways to advertise your business, but with the wild popularity of social media, you may be wondering if advertising from a social media platform is worth your time. Twitter’s advertising capabilities are growing, and it just might be a great time for you to jump on the Twitter advertising bandwagon. Sponsored Tweets Twitter, an advertising platform less developed than Facebook’s, offers advertising through “Sponsored Tweets” or “Promoted Tweets.” Here, advertisers will pay per impression to have their tweet show up at the top of feeds when certain search terms are searched on Twitter’s search engine or certain hashtags are used. This is a very effective tactic, as it forces consumers to pay attention to your tweets. However, this method can become costly, and is often only an option for large corporations with hefty advertising budgets. On a cost per click basis for promoted tweets or cost per follower basis Twitter recommends a bid of between $0.5 and $1.50/each. Promoted Accounts/Tweets As we’ve discussed before, Twitter advertising used to only be a viable option for big businesses with big budgets. But times have changed! Because sponsored tweets can get expensive for small businesses, Twitter now offers “Promoted Accounts,” where Twitter looks at your current followers, searches for people with similar interests, and then recommends your business in the “Who to Follow” section, as well as “Promoted Tweets,” where Twitter constantly monitors your tweets and automatically promotes your best tweets. Businesses only pay when the promotions get someone new to follow your account or a user engages with your promoted tweet. For overall pricing for small businesses promoted accounts, a business will enter a daily budget of how much they can spend per day on both promoted tweets and accounts and their plan won’t exceed that. The minimum daily budget is $1, so at a minimum, businesses have to spend $30 a month. Positives of Twitter Ads The great thing about ads on Twitter is that they don’t look like ads. As opposed to Facebook, where ads blatantly appear on the sides of users’ feeds, Twitter ads casually show up right in users’ tweet streams. Twitter also has a leg up on Facebook when it comes to mobile advertising. On mobile devices, Facebook’s apps can’t show many ads, whereas Twitter’s “promoted tweets” and other ad formats seem to integrate more seamlessly into its apps. The real-time nature of Twitter communication is also good news for marketers. Twitter makes ads more relevant and timely to their users. There are many great things about advertising on Twitter, but when it comes down to it, each business must look at its individual advertising needs. Consider who your target customer is and evaluate which social media advertising outlet will allow you to reach your audience with as little cost as possible. Try giving several outlets’ advertising a chance – you never know what might work. But remember, if the confusion and cost comparisons get too complicated, an experienced social media consulting agency can help – SocialNicole love to partner with you in your online marketing journey! Photo Credit
