Twitter Turns to Television to Bring in New Users
Twitter's television ad has left some people even more confused.
— -- Twitter is turning to a traditional medium to attract new users: television.
The social network aired a television commercial this week aimed at getting sports enthusiasts interested in the service. The advertisement, which comes in time for the World Series, highlights Twitter's new Moments feature, which provides a quick way for browsing the top news stories and what people are saying about them on the social network.
With more than 300 million monthly active users, Twitter has tremendous reach but has lagged in attracting and retaining new users, who in turn entice businesses to advertise on Twitter and drive revenue. The company revealed in its most recent earnings report it had attracted 4 million new monthly active users in the past quarter.
The goal of the campaign is to target segments of users, "using their interests as hooks, rather than Twitter itself as the hook," Anthony Noto, Twitter's chief financial officer, told The Verge.
Nevertheless, some avid tweeters questioned whether the zany new ad would be enough to entice someone unfamiliar with Twitter to check it out.
It worked for at least one person, though.
