Is #RoyalWedding an early warning sign?

TechCrunch reports on "The Pitfall Of Twitter’s Promoted Trends."

Long before social media had reached critical mass, advertisers were reluctant to place ads on MySpace. The main concern of big brands was their new high performance shoe or high paid celebrity endorsement banner being placed next to a schlocky user profile. Brands got over it because MySpace traffic kept growing and the eyeballs were tough to pass up.

Now, Twitter finds itself in a position similar to MySpace in 2006. Traffic is growing rapidly and daily ad rates are rising. Advertisers and media buyers can't seem to pass up this opportunity, in some cases employing worst practices:

Running ads promoting a time-sensitive event that's already completed:

Buying ads on terms having nothing to do with a brand:

Running a high risk of hashtag brandjacking as conversation flow shifts in real-time: 

In paid search, brand investments in contextual ads were eventually protected by algorithm. Hockey stick growth doesn't last forever and advertiser interest will plateau quickly unless the platform provides better experience. Twitter needs to find ways to protect advertiser interests or risk heading down the path to MySpace.

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Comments

[Carol L. Weinfeld]

Agree. Ads on Twitter should be relevant to brands. Otherwise, the ad hurts the brand and loses its effectiveness to consumers.

@clweinfeld

[Markcahill]

Peter,

I agree with you also.
Twitter need some wort of quality control.
Advertising/Marketing should be about connecting a product/service/solution with the relevant Market (be it B2B or B2C).

If it is not relevant then it is annoying, if it is annoying then people (twitter users) will migrate to another platform or find a way to filter. If they migrate then there is no audience for advertising, therefore their revenue will dwindle. THE END.

@MarkCahill

[McProulx]

Completely agree Peter. I did a similar post a couple weeks ago when I noticed the Chipotle promoted trend was fraught with spam/porn and negative sentiment --> http://bit.ly/i1mNQ7

I think the biggest issue as you point out is the spam factor and what Twitter is able to do mitigate against it. Will be interesting to see how it unfolds.