How to Monetize Twitter

Twitter lets you make money -- 140 characters at a time.

Twitter lets you make money — 140 characters at a time.

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At first glance, Twitter may not seem like a powerful money-making platform. After all, it is free to join, free to post and free to subscribe. However, underneath the seeming smorgasbord of free information dispensed 140 characters at a time, creative people have found ways to make money on Twitter. While there are a number of different monetization strategies, they fall into two broad camps: selling space on your twitter feed so that other people can advertise on it and using it to sell or advertise products or services for yourself.

Preparing to Monetize Your Twitter Feed

Establish a habit of regularly posting informative and interesting content which your subscribers find interesting and at least periodically retweet.

Promote your Twitter feed through other media such as email, blogs, Facebook and other on- and off-line sites.

Build your Twitter subscriber list to a healthy number in the thousands. One easy way to do this is to subscribe to a number of related Twitter feeds. Many other tweeters will reciprocally subscribe to anyone that subscribes to them.

Sell Ads and Access on your Twitter Feed

Create an account with a Twitter Advertising network like Twittad, Adly or Sponsored Tweets by going to their website and filling out their new account paperwork.

Use their website to indicate your advertising preferences so that they can send you offers.

Tweet the requested text or give the network access to your Twitter account to send out the advertising text when an advertiser comes up with a suitable message.

Be careful to maintain a healthy balance between valuable tweets that you write and advertising tweets to avoid alienating your subscribers.

Use Your Twitter Feed for Profitable Activities

Periodically tweet out links to products that could be of interest to your Twitter followers. For example, if you run a travel website you could tweet a link to a travel guide that you think is particularly worthwhile. Make sure that the link that you tweet contains your affiliate code. If your followers buy the product as a result of your link you will receive a commission.

Tweet out reminders of sales or promotions, especially if your Twitter feed is related to a brick-and-mortar business, to help motivate prospects to come in and buy from you.

Consider signing up for a Twitter ecommerce solution like Chirpify. While these solutions typically require both you and your followers to sign up for accounts, they make it very easy for you to tweet out products and equally easy for your customers to buy from you.

About the Author

Solomon Poretsky has been writing since 1996 and has been published in a number of trade publications including the “Minnesota Real Estate Journal” and “Minnesota Multi-Housing Association Advocate.” He holds a Bachelor of Arts, cum laude, from Columbia University and has extensive experience in the fields of financial services, real estate and technology.