A long-time, well-established voice actor many of you affectionately know, is giving me permission to tell his story of buying Twitter ads. He’s OK with my using his name, but I think we’ll just call him Basil Humphreys.
Basil is not the kind of guy I would’ve pegged for buying Twitter ads. He’s plenty smart, but was not someone who was utilizing social media all that much. He did, however, have a healthy curiosity about its potential.
Backtracking:
For the longest time Twitter made money in ways that ran counter to it’s Social Media brethren. Namely, they really HAD no monetization. The social network was wildly popular almost right from the start, and Venture Capital investors were scrambling to give them money, so they were not hurting. But they weren’t really SELLING anything. Signing up was free, and it was the 3rd-party applications — using the Twitter Application Program Interface (API) or the Twitter raw data — that were cashing in. All those months and years, really, Twitter remained aloof to raw capitalism.
Giving in:
Finally (and you heard it first here on Voice-Acting in Vegas) Twitter started selling ads: May 7, 2013 Advertise Your Voice on Twitter. Thousands of people (not necessarily voice-actors) dived in. The results were mixed. But like most advertising, it’s how you use it, who you’re targeting, and what you hope to get out of it.
I’m not sure Basil had all that figured out when he began his Twitter Ad campaign, but it did bring immediate results, and he was excited. Here are some excerpts from his first excited email to me in late July:
Dave, I have to admit. I have paid absolutely no attention to Social network advertising, thinking it was pissing into the wind. I started tweeting my stuff to my followers but soon realized that I WAS really just pissing into the wind.
Well, yesterday I started Advertising on Twitter. My followers have doubled and that includes businesses in my targeted industries. Traffic to my website has increased already by just under 1000%. I’m reaching an audience of about 18 million with each tweet. Auto dealers and ESPN have clicked on my stuff. No new business yet but it’s only Day 2.
Un-freaking-believeable!! … AND I can control the cost on a daily basis.
That was the last I heard until earlier this week, when I pinged Basil again to find out how things were going. About 3 weeks had transpired. His reply:
Well, Dave, I got a lot of new followers. A number of people, car dealers among them, favorited some of my tweets. Of course, so did a lot of kids. Got into a short-lived pissing match with a no name Radio DJ up in Alaska. No jobs have come of it yet but I don’t expect anything too soon. It’s probably too soon to tell whether it will have an effect on my income. Had a conversation with a book author in Seattle via twitter and I hope to God she doesn’t ask me to read a book. Also had numerous retweets.
All in all, all types of results considered, I have to say that Twitter is the easiest, most cost effective way to reach millions of people almost simultaneously and drive them to your website. Better than Facebook, Google Ads or Linked In. The easiest, fastest way to get your name out there into the world but I do recommend a newbie have some work to back up the ads. The cyberworld can be a mean, nasty unforgiving place due to User’s Anonymity. Just as quickly and easily as it can bolster a reputation, that reputation can also be torn to shreds and mocked mercilessly by millions.
So it ended up costing a couple of hundred dollars due to my marketing choices but I feel I certainly got my money’s worth.
I strongly recommend it. Two thumbs up!
So, there you have it. One voice-actor’s brief experience with Twitter Ads, and it’s mostly positive. Now, mind you, I have no idea how he configured the ad, what words he used, or what times of day Basil ran the ads, so it’s not like a scientific study or anything…more like a case study.
If this is something you’re thinking about, here are the pertinent links to get started: .
A long-time, well-established voice actor many of you affectionately know, is giving me permission to tell his story of buying Twitter ads. He’s OK with my using his name, but I think we’ll just call him Basil Humphreys.