Twitter Kicks Off Second Year of App Promotion Ads with Shiny New Features, Video

Twitter marks one-year anniversary of advertising capabilities with more sophisticated features.

By Alia RajputSocial Media Manager at No Limit Agency, textbook Gemini, pug enthusiast.

SPONSOREDUpdated 2:14PM • 07/08/15

The social media landscape has undergone immeasurable change this past year. Facebook has reached 1.25 billion users, Instagram launched 5 new filters and Twitter has refined the capabilities attached to its mobile app promotion ads.

Marking the one-year anniversary of its ads rollout, Twitter is celebrating with a blog post highlighting how far the promotion has come and what we can expect for the future. Initially launched to help marketers drive cost-effective app installs and engagements, the next wave of Twitter Ads will include new targeting, more sophisticated measurement features and more creative capabilities to help advertisers reach their lead generation audiences on the platform.

Currently, Twitter’s ads can take users either to an app download page or to a specific page within the mobile app. Three new mobile app features, currently being tested in beta, will increase the ability to advertise with both video and bidding functionalities. These new capabilities will amplify the number of impressions of an ad and allow advertisers to target more specific demographics. As quoted from the Twitter blog post, the new features include the following:

"Video App Card: Showcase your app within a video ad - providing an immersive experience that drives higher quality app installs.

"Optimized action bidding: This new bidding type allows app install advertisers to optimize their bids according to install, while still paying by app click — offering another way to lower cost-per-installs and yield the highest possible ROI.

"Cost per install bidding: Advertisers can bid, optimize and pay by install giving you cost-efficiency and maximum control over your cost per install."

Tech Crunch’s coverage of the new features states that Richard Alfonsi, Twitter’s vice president of global online sales, noted that Twitter is a particularly appropriate place for app install ads because “the user mindset on Twitter is to discover something new.” The company also couldn’t seem to ignore the fact that 80 percent of its active monthly users are on mobile devices.

The post goes on to include several testimonials from companies that have seen success with the model, such as Comedy Central, SeatGeek, and Lyft. If those names don’t pique your interest, it’s worth a poke around the Help Center on App Engagement Campaigns to become well-versed in the capabilities before they become mainstream.

With so much of Twitter’s current infrastructure in flux, these advancements are a much-needed progressive step for Twitter advertisers. And just think where we could be next year…