Twitter has officially banned third-party ad networks from its micro-blogging platform. The decision could have dire implications for advertising startups that center their strategy on Twitter ads.
The decision comes just more than a month after Twitter launched its own advertising service, Promoted Tweets. Promoted Tweets are ordinary tweets that advertisers want to highlight to a wider group of users.
Twitter COO Dick Costolo said Twitter’s primary concern is the long-term health and value of the network. That same thinking is curbing the company’s use of its own Promoted Tweets service. Twitter, he said, wants to monitor the impact of Promoted Tweets on the user experience rather than rolling out the service more aggressively.
“It is critical that the core experience of real-time introductions and information is protected for the user and with an eye toward long-term success for all advertisers, users and the Twitter ecosystem,” Costolo said. “For this reason, aside from Promoted Tweets, we will not allow any third party to inject paid tweets into a timeline on any service that leverages the Twitter API.”
Polluting Tweets?
Costolo made it clear that there are opportunities to sell ads on the platform, and he expects third-party monetization engines to crop up in the timeline. Costolo also acknowledged that the new terms of service ban activities that could squelch the efforts of companies that have invested time and money. But he did not apologize for Twitter’s stance.
“Twitter’s API is used by hundreds of companies, and some of those have started to try and monetize the data. TweetUp is the most visible example, but there are several others,” said Greg Sterling, principal analyst at Sterling Market Intelligence. “What Twitter appears to be saying is that it’s going to tightly control the placement of ads around the feed. No ads will be allowed — other…