What Are Twitter Ads & How Do They Work?

In short, Twitter ads are paid advertisements that allow businesses to promote their content to their target audience. Twitter Ads allow businesses to reach new users and promote their products or services to those who are most likely to have an interest in what their business offers. 

Twitter offers a wide range of ad formats depending on your unique campaign goals, such as in-stream video ads, promoted tweets and promoted accounts, and also offers targeting options based on things such as demographics, location and interests.

Are Twitter Ads Worth It?

The simple answer to this question is - it depends. The effectiveness of Twitter ads comes down to a number of factors, such as the competition in your industry, your target audience, and your specific business objectives, just to name a few.

For example, the level of competition in your industry or target market can affect the effectiveness of your Twitter ads, as more competitive industries may require higher bids to reach desired engagement rates. 

Your target audience is also a big factor when it comes to deciding whether or not Twitter ads are worth it. For example, the most common age group found on Twitter is 25-34 years old, which make up 38.5% of Twitter’s user base, followed by:

• 35-49 year olds: 20.7% of users
• 18-24 year olds: 17.1% of users
• 50+ year olds: 17.1% of users
• 13-17 year olds: 6.6% of users

It is essential that you understand your target audience to find out how active they are on the platform. The effectiveness of your Twitter ads will depend on whether your desired audience is present on the platform and how well you can alter your ads to resonate with them. For example, if your target audience are mainly 13-17 year olds, Twitter is probably not the platform for you. 

That said, there are numerous benefits of promoting your business on Twitter, some of which might come as a surprise.

What Are the Benefits of Twitter Ads?

The benefits of twitter ads include:

1. They can be super cost-effective
2. You can choose from various ad formats
3. Twitter is a highly engaging platform
4. There is a huge user base

1. They Can Be Super Cost-Effective

Compared to other advertising platforms, such as traditional media or other larger social platforms, Twitter ads can be pretty cost-effective. Twitter gives you complete control over your advertising budget and bidding strategy, allowing you flexibility over your financial capacity. 

When it comes to advertising on Twitter, there are two main types of bidding options, including automatic bidding and manual bidding. Automatic bidding sets your bids based on your campaign goals, while manual bidding allows you to set specific bid amounts. 

Higher Return-On-Investment

Across a number of studies by Twitter, the average Twitter Ads ROI is 40% higher than the average media ROI for other social advertising channels. The studies also found that Twitter’s Video ad format can be ‘up to 20% more effective in driving sales than other Twitter ad formats, and that product-focused advertising on Twitter drives the highest short-term ROI’. 

Better Click-Through-Rate (CTR)

Various studies have shown that Twitter Ads have a better CTR over time, when compared to other platforms online. For example, the CTR for Facebook Ads averages at around 0.90% across all industries, and this figure ranges between 0.22% and 0.88% for Instagram. Twitter’s CTR, however, averages at 1.64%, meaning that more users on Twitter find ads helpful and relevant compared to the other platforms. 

This could be due to a number of reasons, but mainly due to the fact that there are less brands taking advantage of Twitter than there are on Instagram & Facebook, which are already quite saturated with brands battling it out for their audience's attention. 

2. You Can Choose From Various Ad Formats

One of the great things about advertising on Twitter is that you can choose from a range of different ad formats depending on your preferences.

Different Types of Twitter Ads

Whether you’re looking to use text, images, videos - Twitter Ads has you covered with its range of ad types.

1. Text Ads

Twitter Text ads aren’t as popular as they used to be, mainly because visual content like images and videos are much more engaging and attention grabbing when it comes to user engagement. That being said, text ads are still an option. 

These ads are all text, and they do particularly well if you want to promote specific Tweets you’ve published organically that have already gotten some traction, but want to give a little boost to reach a wider audience.

2. Image Ads

Single Image ads feature one image below a section of text and are one of the most widely used types of ads on Twitter, as they’re fast and super easy to create. They can be Retweeted, replied to, and liked, and are marked as “Promoted”.

3. Video Ads

Twitter Video ads are another popular Twitter Ad format as they are quick and easy to create and are typically used to drive your target audience to your website, app, or simply to engage with your advert’s message.

If you don’t feel confident creating high-quality video ads for Twitter or you simply haven’t got the time, our expert creative team at Aura Ads can help! We are well-versed in creating scroll-stopping ads on social media platforms such as Snapchat, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. 

4. Carousel Ads

Carousel ads are a relatively new format on Twitter, and they’re very similar to Facebook’s carousel ads.  Businesses can use this format to create ads with anywhere from 2-6 images or video slides. 

3. Twitter Is a Highly Interactive Platform

Twitter is a highly interactive and engaged platform, and unlike other platforms, ads on Twitter can encourage user engagement through retweets, likes, replies, and follows, which in turn can amplify your promotional message and increase brand awareness.

According to Twitter, 237.8 million monetizable people use the app per day (55% of all users). These users spend on average 34.8 minutes on the platform, compared to users on Facebook who spend 30.1 minutes per day on the app. There’s therefore no denying that Twitter has the potential to help brands, like yours, grow their consumer base by gaining new, highly-engaged followers.

4. There Is a Huge User Base

Twitter has a significant user base, with millions and millions of active daily users around the world. In fact, Twitter has around 450 million monthly active users worldwide, and Elon Musk has recently announced that Twitter sees approximately 259.4 million daily active users.

Just looking at the United Kingdom alone, 19.05 million people had Twitter accounts as of October 2021, and more than half of those accounts are owned by males, meaning they mostly dominate the platform gender-wise - great news if your target audience are mainly males.

I hope this blog has helped you understand the wonderful world of Twitter ads. If you’d like to know more about Twitter video ads or social media advertising in general, be sure to book a call with one of our team by hitting the ‘Schedule a call’ button above.

For more tips and tricks from our experts on maximising your social media ad strategy, head over to our social media marketing blog page.

Written by Kate Jones for Aura Ads.