Last week Twitter announced the launch of Keyword Targeting for Promoted Tweets. If you currently advertise on Twitter using Promoted Tweets or Promoted Accounts, you already know that you can target your paid content by targeting by interest categories like stage of life, education, etc. or by targeting specific users’ followers.
So to create a campaign to inform college students about a new student discount using Twitter’s previously existing tools, you could use a combination of interest categories and users whose followers are likely to be college students. Your targeting might look something like this:
Odds are good that using these techniques you’d reach an audience that was mostly college students.
With Twitter’s new keyword targeting you can insert your branded tweets into the conversation that Twitter users are currently having about student discounts by displaying ads to people who have included your keywords in their recent tweets, or tweets users engaged with through retweeting, favorites, or replies.
So to reach college students who are interested in student discounts, we could test the following keywords:
Because you’re using those keywords, these people could potentially see your promoted tweets (their last names and twitter handles have been removed to respect their privacy):
Creepy? Maybe. Effective? Apparently. According to Twitter, companies that tested keyword-based ads got higher than average engagement. By connecting with someone through Twitter, you can increase your brand awareness and conversion by engaging with consumers at exactly the right moment- like when they’re about to buy coffee, they’re feeling the pain of high priced fuel, or they’re eager to use their student discount as much as possible before they graduate. With real-time keyword targeting, your timing is now as crucial as your target audience or what you’re advertising.
