Twitter may not have plans to start reshuffling posts in your timelines this week, but it will vault marketers’ videos to the the top of the heap with a new advertising product launched today.
Called “First View,” the program will stick a promoted video in the top ad slot of members’ timelines the first time they visit the Twitter app or log in to twitter.com in a 24-hour period.
It joins a roster of other ways Twitter allows companies to pay for better, longer placement of their content in what’s otherwise a reverse chronological stream. The company’s Amplify program packages a short excerpt of content with an ad and delivers it to targeted members. Promoted Tweets, Promoted Trends and Promoted Moments surface postings to specified audiences in their home timeline.
The First View launch comes after a weekend brouhaha over the beleaguered network’s plans for shuffling the order of tweets in users feeds. CEO Jack Dorsey attempted to tamp down an outcry spurred by press reports that Twitter may shift away from its chronological timeline approach, saying no such changes were in store for this week. But he stopped short of dispelling the notion that Twitter could allow for a system that prioritizes some postings, similar to its bigger rival Facebook.
Twitter is set to report earnings on Wednesday. The company’s stock has tumbled nearly 70 percent in the last year, as investors question the network’s growth prospects.
After the ousting of its previous CEO returned founder Dorsey to the helm last fall, he has overseen an exodus of top executives that suggests major product changes to reignite the company may be delayed.