Twitter extends 'promoted tweets' to non-followers

Users of micro-blogging site Twitter may soon see promoted tweets (ads) from brands they do not usually follow, as Twitter expanded its "Promoted Tweets" for advertisers. Twitter, which started rolling out the feature this week, said the Promoted Tweets - paid tweets by an advertiser - will be clearly labeled as such. "In every other respect, Promoted Tweets act just like regular Tweets and can be retweeted, replied to, favorited and more. All Promoted Tweets are first displayed as regular Tweets to the timelines of people following an account. The advertisers can then promote those Tweets to spark additional conversation," Twitter said (https://support.twitter.com/articles/142101-what-are-promoted-tweets). It said Promoted Tweets can be seen at the top of relevant search results pages on twitter.com, and in Search Results for a Promoted Trend. But in some instances, Twitter said Promoted Tweets may be visible within a user’s timeline if an advertiser has promoted a Tweet that is relevant to that user. Promoted Tweets may also be displayed through Twitter’s official desktop and mobile clients, including TweetDeck, Twitter for iPhone, and Twitter for Android, it said. Twitter said a Promoted Tweet will appear in a user’s timeline only if the Tweet is likely to be interesting and relevant to that user. "Our platform uses a variety of signals to determine which Promoted Tweets are relevant to users, including what a user chooses to follow, how they interact with a Tweet, what they retweet, and more," it said. Twitter said it is rolling this out slowly and "conservatively" this fall, starting with a small percentage of users. "During this initial rollout, we will be conservative about the number of Promoted Tweets that people see in a single day. Any Promoted Tweet people see in their timeline will appear just once, at or near the top of their timeline. Then, the Promoted Tweet will scroll through the timeline like any other Tweet," it said. Dismissing promoted tweets Twitter said users who dislike a Promoted Tweet can dismiss it from their timeline with a single click, using the “Dismiss" button that appears as part of the Tweet. But it said users cannot opt out of getting Promoted Tweets, at least for now. "Users who dislike a Promoted Tweet can simply dismiss it from their timeline with a single click. But, they will not be able to opt out of seeing ads in the timeline," it said. Started in July Tech site CNET said Twitter started inserting paid tweets into people's streams in July, although at the time, people would only see paid tweets from companies they were following. "Now they'll see tweets from whichever company is running a paid program," it said. —TJD, GMA News