The Emergence of Twitvertising

Note: This post originally appeared on Mark Evans Tech.

Here’s the thing about Twitter: it has huge potential to become a lucrative advertising platform – something that Twitter has continually resisted, although its resolve may be weakening (or disappearing) based on recent comments by COO Dick Costelo.

There’s a great story in today’s New York Times about how advertising networks such as ad.ly and Ted (Pay Per Post) Murphy’s Izea are doing gangbusters by getting popular Twitter users such as John Chow to insert affiliate links into their Twitter feeds. Chow made $3,000 in October by simply posting these kind of links.

While Twitter has taken the stance that advertising would ruin the experience, the fact is relevant and contextual advertising could be a massive business. So while Twitter sits on the sidelines (until, apparently, next year), a growing number of entrepreneurs are moving into the Twitvertising market with no qualms or concerns about sullying the ecosystem.

You have to wonder what Twitter thinks of all this activity given it’s still scrambling to create a business model to justify more than $100-million in venture capital. As Google has illustrated, relevant advertising works: consumers like it because it meets their needs and interests, while advertisers like it because its targeted and measurable.

While there be huge concerns about spam, the great thing for Twitter users is they can quickly unfollow anyone who they believe is spamming them or sending them too many affiliate links. And if the advertising networks are smart, they will lean towards disclosure so that Twitter users receive some warning about the existence of ads.

As Twitter evolves, there’s no doubt advertising is going to be a growing part of the mix. Before it explodes, Twitter would be wise to lay out the ground rules of what’s acceptable. This isn’t suggest that these rules will be respected but at least Twitter will have made an effort to control the beast before it escapes out of the cage.

Would you be open to ads on Twitter? If so, how much advertising would you see as acceptable?