Over the last few weeks, Twitter’s been rolling out its new advertising products–you may have noticed Promoted Trends, Promoted Tweets and even Promoted Followers on the service’s web site and in some of the clients. The reaction from users, judging by comments on Twitter, has been mixed. But marketers such as MacDonalds and Disney have begun experimenting with the new product, and we wanted to find out more about the early reaction from business users toward this new advertising platform.
TWTRCON partnered with oneforty.com to conduct a November 10-13, 2010 poll of 101 Twitter business users to learn more about their reaction toward Twitter’s Promoted Product, both as users of Twitter and as potential clients of the new advertising platform.
Key Findings:
- Most Twitter business users have noticed Promoted Tweets, Promoted Trends and Promoted Accounts.
- As users, most have had a neutral reaction toward these products; the reaction is least favorable toward Promoted Accounts. Promoted Trends have had the highest response rate, with 37% saying they’ve clicked on a Promoted Trend to learn more.
- As marketers, half of corporate Twitter users are somewhat or very interested in Promoted Products as a marketing vehicle. 10% of respondents are at companies that are already experimented with these products.
- About half of business users want to see more metrics to understand the potential ROI of Promoted Tweets, Trends or Accounts. One in five describe Promoted Products as a “very powerful tool” or the “future of advertising.”
- 13% believe that “users will push back.” Others would like to see Promoted Products better integrated into the Twitter user experience. Still others questioned whether Promoted Products would result in the same levels of results that they can achieve by simply connecting with customers by engaging them in conversations on Twitter.
In general, the findings indicate that Twitter business users are very interested in Promoted Products as a potential marketing platform. It remains to be seen whether Twitter will be able to deliver the metrics and the information that marketers need to justify making them a long-term part of their marketing mix.
