Why Twitter’s @EarlyBird Will Outperform Promoted Tweets

Within the last few month, Twitter has introduced two new elements to their micro-blogging empire. Half of those elements are doomed to fail.

First, Twitter introduced ‘Promoted Tweets’, a paid tweet located at the top of any twitter search results. The promoted tweet is graphically designated as a paid promotion and is given prime placement. A twitter search of ‘starbucks’ reveals a prime example.

Much like Google Ads, Twitter’s promoted tweet idea is based upon content relevance. It isn’t completely abrasive, but I fear it will not be well-received by the Tweeple. I say this because Twitter has always been (albeit a short life) an ad vacuum. It has been free of advertising elements.

Most recently, Twitter introduced a competitor to the wildly popular Woot (who was recently purchased by Amazon.com). The new competitor…@earlybird. A simple, Twitter-based ‘deal-of-the-minute’ platform. After only a few short days, @earlybird already has 26,000+ followers. Not too shabby.

It is my humble prediction that one of these revenue-producing elements has a significant upper hand over the other. Why do I say this? Permission-based marketing. For years, advertising was based upon interruption. The promoted tweet is a hybrid of this (it interrupts with relevance). However, our culture is rapidly moving in a new direction.

We are becoming an increasingly permission-based marketing society. We protect our exposure to ads. We are skilled at it. But the ads we let in – opt in – we receive with open arms. If Apple releases a new product, we hardly see a commercial about it (commercials are interruptions). However, when we receive an email from the Apple newsletter we have volunteered to receive, we can’t wait to dive into Steve Jobs’ digital advertisement.

Such is the @earlybird. Our interest is peaked each day as we await our limited-time offer. We follow the Tweets, both figuratively and literally. We have opted-in to this advertisement – this point of purchase display. For this reason, I am certain that @earlybird will be far more successful than its predecessor – promoted tweets.