Last week Tesco became the first UK brand to use a promoted Twitter Moment, the latest ad format from the micro-blogging platform. Here’s an early analysis of what seem to be the pros and cons for brands.
Like the other major social networks, Twitter is continuously extending and developing its formats and paid media products.
Tweet in my timeline outlining the initial test partners for Promoted Moments..
The logical next step to unveiling Twitter Moments (in December 2015 in the UK) was to offer a promoted version, which rolled out last week.
Clicking through to view the Tesco “Promoted Moment” (perhaps we could call them Proments…) I was struck by their very visually appealing and creative use of GIFs.
However, one notable difference from a “standard moment” was the fact that all the content was from Tesco, as opposed to a curation of content from a range of sources. Understandable of course, but it will be interesting to see how other brands approach this aspect in the future, keeping closer to the original concept of a Moment.
Tesco’s pioneering use of Twitter Moments.
Anyway, this post isn’t about any specific brands’ use of the product, rather the pros and cons of Promoted Moments…
Pros
- A PR hook: in the short term it remains something of a novelty, and will pick up coverage as “something new”, with added promotion from Twitter themselves.
- Reach: we don’t know how many people read Moments, but there aren’t that many of them created, so the proportion of people who seem them should be pretty high.
- Tangible destination: from my experience, the “Moment” felt like a much more tangible destination to be sent to on Twitter. Brands love a landing page, and this certainly gives more of a sense of a place to go.
Cons
- Here and gone: like a promoted trend (as far as I can see), you get 24 hours of fun and then it’s party over, with no lasting content (of course the assets can/should be re-used, but there’s no archive of Moments, as I understand it).
- Cost (probably): if the cost of other new social network ad products is a guide, this will be VERY expensive. Maybe a more of a “strong consideration” than a con.
- Reach: the counter of the corresponding Pro… how many people are actually using Moments… how many people are even aware of them? Are consumers getting destination fatigue? This is as much a general point on Moments and audience enthusiasm (or lack of) for them.
As I’ve mentioned before, Twitter Moments and Snapchat feel like they have a lot in common… and looking for a means to monetise is certainly one similarity. We’ll see how different brands interpret this new Twitter ad format over time.
As always I’d welcome your thoughts.
One Comment