Twitter has unveiled its plans to investors on how it will reach its goal to "build the largest daily audience in the world," and those plans include publishing advertisements outside the Twitter platform.
The Wall Street Journal reports that the micro-blogging platform will roll out Twitter advertisements to tweet streams published on third-party apps and websites, citing people familiar with the matter who say that Twitter took the wraps off its strategy in a presentation to media buyers at the International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Last year, Twitter CEO Dick Costolo repeatedly promised investors that the company is working on a strategy that will reach out to the largest audience on the Internet in response to growing concerns of Twitter's slowing growth and its lack of monetization strategies.
However, the Twitter chief did not provide details as to exactly what the company plans to do. Twitter says it has 284 million monthly active users, which is a fraction of Facebook's 1.3 billion active users every month.
The latest pitch from Twitter has gotten publishers happy. Sarah Hofstetter, CEO of 360i digital agency, says sshe was impressed by Twitter's announcement.
"Twitter clearly listened to both consumers and the advertising community," Hofstetter says. "We're very bullish on the new tools and opportunities."
It is not yet clear which publishers are on board Twitter's new program, although Twitter has reportedly dropped references to personal magazine app Flipboard and ESPN's SportsCenter. One source cited by the Journal says Twitter and ESPN have been participating in negotiations for a while but have not yet reached an agreement.
The deal will see Twitter and publishers sharing advertising revenue, says the source. It is still unknown what portion of the earnings Twitter will receive.
Twitter also unveiled more of its plans to take advantage of video. As reported earlier by Ad Age, Twitter will soon allow advertisers and media companies to upload videos directly to Twitter, with the first six second of each video to be put on auto-play. If users like what they see, they have the option to click the play button to watch the entire video.
A source for the Journal says Twitter will also push forward a related video while a user is viewing another video, a feature that could be useful for advertisers featuring serialized ads.
