Do the economics of real-time search ads work out?
Now that Twitter has revealed that its advertising strategy largely hinges on search, will its approach prove to be as much of a blockbuster as Google’s AdWords? The company, which long evaded questions about monetization, is pitching marketers with a variation on search ads. One prong of its strategy will be to sell sponsored tweets that stay atop results about different keywords. If the tweets don’t take off with Twitter users and aren’t replied to, retweeted or clicked on, they’ll disappear from view. Search advertising clearly made Google the powerhouse it is today, with $23.7 billion in annual revenues last year. But a big question is how well it will work for real-time search, which is Twitter’s bread and butter. Real-time search is fundamentally different. Users look for what’s happening now — like news about the Polish president passing away or Justin Bieber. They’re not searching for general information or advice on what type of car to buy. So the percentage of queries that ha
