What advertisers need to know about Google's 'firehose' deal with Twitter
During Twitter’s recent Q4 earnings call there was an interesting announcement on a new deal signed with Google. The announcement confirmed some of the recent rumours with a partnership of the two platforms allowing Twitter to reach out to its “logged-out userbase”. The deal allows Google access to tweets directly, rather than having to scrape content after it is posted as it does with other sites.
Chris Camacho
This will allow Google to plug in directly to the “firehose” of tweets, as the company refers to Twitter’s stream. From here tweets will show up in search results, allowing more users to see the messages and driving users to Twitter which can then further monetise the subsequent impressions.
While Twitter hasn't explicitly confirmed whether this will be rolled out globally, its CEO Dick Costolo did allude to the fact that this would be available to anyone in the world, whether they have a Twitter account or not.
Past deals and benefits to Twitter and Google
Twitter has partnered with Google in the past in a similar fashion, allowing Google more access to Twitter data in a more efficient way, but the deal was not renewed.
The announcement of the new partnership has led to several rumours around a possible acquisition of Twitter by Google. However, Costolo has been quick to dispel these by pushing the deal as the chance for the two to work closer together to grow Twitter’s business and expand the available audience for their current ad offering. This keeps in line with the recent slowdown in Twitter’s user growth, and its continued push to make more of the users it has.
The deal will make Twitter more visible to a wider range of 'logged-out' users (ie those unregistered or not currently logged-in), driving them to a special 'logged out' page, likely providing them with a 'sign-up' option while displaying a number of ads, driving increased impressions to the Twitter platform and increased revenue as a result.
Impact on advertisers
Twitter’s ability to drive a larger number of users to ads in a standalone format and potentially collect more users via the sign-up option will make the site more desirable for advertisers. With a greater number of impressions and being able to branch out from a traditional walled garden approach, Twitter will be able to make more money from users arriving externally.
Targeting options have not yet been provided by Twitter on the new deal, but without having users logged in the options are likely to be limited to the placement itself. Pricing has also not been made clear by Twitter; this is likely to be a similar rate to existing targeting options and bought on the traditional CPE-basis until Twitter rolls out wider buying metrics.
Real-time marketing will be of greater importance. With Google being able to display tweets in real-time, brands will want to be more proactive on Twitter with time-sensitive offers, as the ability to reach users through an alternative medium without Twitter accounts at no additional advertising cost is an opportunity too good to be missed.
This new deal will also give rise to an increase in the integration of search and social across both paid and organic platforms. Twitter is a form of search engine in itself. Intertwining that with the world’s biggest search engine, by allowing tweets to appear within search results, will only make the search landscape even more complex.
Advertisers will need to increase their brand reputation management across all platforms and keep a close eye on the relationship between social signals and search intent.
Chris Camacho is managing partner, Precision Marketing at Starcom MediaVest Group. He tweets @chriscamachosmg