On April 16th, I wrote a blog that's way better than this one that unveiled Twitter's plan to roll out Promoted Tweets, or "TweetWords" (as I completely uncleverly dubbed them--I thought of a new one right after I posted the blog: "Pay-per-Tweet"...I said new, not better) that would allow advertisers to place ads at the top of Twitter search results. 

Keywords would be purchased, searches would be tracked, performance would be measured, and Twitter would become yet another marketing money-maker aesthetically hobbled by advertising... ...So is it working?  To be honest, I haven't seen one Promoted Tweet since the program was rolled out.  However, that's a sample size of one so I wouldn't trust the data.

To Twitter's delight and contrary to my data above, its Promoted Tweeters have reached people that are searching for normal things like #airfare, or #travel and not #lonelyisland. As MediaBuyerPlanner daily recently reported, both cable channel Bravo! and Virgin America Airlines have both enjoyed early Pay-per-Tweet (use it!) retail marketing success.  As the article states, Virgin announced selling out of 50%-off airfare tickets just three hours after posting it as a promoted tweet.  Similarly, Bravo! increased impressions to their website by 200,000 after one particularly popular Promoted Tweet.



As a media planner constantly seeking cutting-edge alternative media--especially in the social media arena--for inclusion in media planning strategy, we could have an AdWords circa 2000 situation arising.  It's almost *gasp!* better than AdWords; however, considering Twitter's re-tweet** functionality: A tweep sees a Promoted Tweet offer they like, say, a free bacon burger at Carl's Jr. for one-day only, re-tweets it to their followers, and effectively adds exponential (particularly if the re-tweeter has thousands or even millions [@aplusk] of followers) reach to Carl's Jr.'s campaign. Invaluable!  Just make sure there aren't any regional restrictions first, guys... BIG mistake.

Currently, Twitter has re-tweet max/cap of 200 and features a very Google-esque keyword bidding system.  Get rid of the re-tweet maximum and switch the Promoted Tweet pricing to be performance-based, and Promoted Tweets will quickly become an absolute no-brainer in any advertising media plan. 

When Balihoo makes media recommendations to its partners in local advertising, a social media component is always included--it can't be ignored, this is where web 2.0 advertising is headed!  I know I was skeptical at first, but with these Promoted Tweets, we've got a local internet marketing sleeping giant about to awake here. 

Had to try it.  The keywords I bought? 'intelligent', 'strong as an ox', 'black belt', 'powerful core', 'real cool'.  The Promoted Tweet? "AlexFascilla: what you've always been searching for".  Still waiting on that first lucky lad...  er, click.


**Clicking the re-tweet button below another's tweet will post it to your profile as if you had tweeted it yourself