Twitter was influenced by texting, which — group messaging aside — isn’t a big advertising platform. So it’s not surprising perhaps that despite its strong growth, Twitter still isn’t an advertising powerhouse. Part of the reason is the fear of killing the golden goose: Run too many ads and your users will flee to a competing service. But another reason is that the founders of Twitter want to invent something new. Slapping banner ads on Twitter.com clearly doesn’t have any appeal.Nevertheless, Twitter has to make money somehow, and charging for access doesn’t appear to be on the table. So, as the infographic below demonstrates, Twitter has waded into advertising slowly, adding a Promoted Tweet here and a Promoted Trend there in an attempt to find a winning formula. As with Facebook, Twitter’s decision to hold off on advertising seems like a smart move in retrospect. The platform is now well established enough that no serious competitors exist. Time will tell, though, if ubiquity equals financial success.
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