Twitter Now Lets Brands Purchase “App-Install” Video Ads

Twitter has a new way for brands to promote their smartphone apps. The social media site has introduced the ability for marketers to purchase and display app-install video ads.

App-install advertisements are what they sound like: ads which direct users to download a company’s smartphone application. Twitter introduced this ad format for marketers back in April 2014. The social site’s VP of Global Online Sales Richard Alfonsi told AdWeek app-install ads have been a “major focus” for Twitter over the last year.

It only makes sense then that Twitter would now upgrade the app-install ad format to include video. The new app-install video ads allow marketers and brands to showcase more of what their smartphone app is about through short video clips. Twitter users can click on the video ad to be taken directly to a page where they can install the corresponding app.

“The union of video and a call to action—driving app installs—that’s new,” said Alfonsi. “It’s an immersive experience to have video directly in the tweet. It creates great performance and lets marketers convey a lot more about what the app does.”

Currently, Twitter works with brands like Postmates, Comedy Central, and Lyft to run app-install video ads and promote the installation of the companies’ apps. Lyft in particular has found the ad format to be effective in its own marketing strategies.

“Twitter has become our go-to channel for social media marketing. We’ve seen tremendous results with up to three times better performance than other social media channels,” the company said in Twitter’s announcement, as reported by AdWeek.

In addition to introducing the new app-install video ads, Twitter is letting marketers bid and pay for these ads using a pay-per-install method it calls “optimized action bidding.” “This new bidding type allows app install advertisers to optimize their bids according to install, while still paying by app click—offering another way to lower cost-per-installs and yield the highest possible ROI,” Twitter explained.

Twitter’s app-install video ads are the most recent addition to the social site’s video-centric updates. In addition to letting users embed native videos on other websites, Twitter has started auto-playing videos (and Vines and animated GIFs) without sound on users’ feeds. With this update, Twitter promised brands they only have to pay for video ads when they’re in 100% viewability of a user’s screen and have been watched for at least three seconds.