Twitter Inc said on Wednesday it is opening up its platform to
third-party advertising management software, taking another step to
establish its ad-based business model ahead of an initial public
offering.
The ads application programming interface, or API, would
allow advertisers to connect their existing ad management software to
their Twitter account to automate ads on the micro-messaging platform.
Twitter
said that it would begin by integrating with ad software by Adobe
Systems Inc, Salesforce Inc, Hootsuite, SHIFT and TBG Global.
"With
the Ads API, marketers now have more tools in their arsenal to help
them deliver the right message, to the right audience, on the desktop
and on mobile devices - all at scale," Twitter product manager April
Underwood wrote in a blog post.
Under pressure to show growing
revenues, Twitter in recent years has ramped up its ad-serving
capabilities while building a sales staff to woo corporate marketers.
The firm said last year it would allow marketers to target Twitter users
based on a profile of their perceived interests and by location.
Twitter
makes money every time a user clicks or retweets a "promoted" message
paid for by an advertiser. The new API would allow great automation for
advertisers, who previously had to manually write every promoted tweet.
In
2013, Twitter's ad revenues are expected to grow nearly 90 percent to
$545 million, according to eMarketer which noted that Facebook Inc
experienced similarly rapid growth after opening its API to advertisers
in 2011.
© Thomson Reuters 2013