Twitter Now Using Text Messages To Help Brands Connect With Consumers

Now companies can make following them on Twitter as easy as sending a text message to a short code, thanks to a new service developed by 4INFO and Twitter.

The advertising service follows a trial 4INFO conducted on its own, which was intended on getting Twitter’s attention. Apparently, it worked. 4INFO’s CEO Zaw Thet told mocoNews in an email: “The initial results were very promising, but we both wanted to make the user experience better and seamless. This is the result.” As for Twitter, the announcement may mark the beginning of a new revenue stream for the company using SMS, however, Thet declined to comment on the financial arrangement between the two companies.

4INFO is calling the service “Text-to-Twitter advertising,” which can be used by both publishers and advertisers, who want users to sign-up for their Twitter feeds via SMS. 4INFO said it works fairly easily because most people have already registered their phone number with Twitter, so it can associate the text message with the person’s Twitter account. If a user doesn’t have a Twitter account, or hasn’t registered their phone number yet, Twitter can confirm the phone number or create an account via SMS.

4INFO said it already has one advertiser signed up for the service, but declined to say who it was, other than it was “one of the largest and most well-known producers of pet food and products.” To get an idea of how it works, send a text message to 44636 (4INFO) with the word “TWEET” in the message.

In May, 4INFO launched a month-long trial in which a handful of brands used mobile advertising to promote their Twitter feeds. 4INFO’s hope was that the trial would get Twitter to consider working with 4INFO to monetize its own traffic using mobile advertising. 4INFO published the results in June, and called it a success. Of the six brands that participated, all saw an increase in followers on Twitter, although results varied widely. On the high-end was TurtleWax, which saw its followers jump by 3,033 percent, and on the low-end Eggland’s Best Eggs increased 66 percent.