
Testing a way for you to make purchases on Twitter - hornokplease
https://blog.twitter.com/2014/testing-a-way-for-you-to-make-purchases-on-twitter
======
kordless
There are exactly zero times I wished I could buy something from a Tweet with
a button. Given that limited observation of buyer behavior, and knowing full
well Twitter wishes to make profit, I'm assuming these buttons will be forced
into my public stream somewhere, somehow. Some people on here think these
buttons will be placed there by Twitter via ads, but I have another idea:

Provide a micropayment channel program where, when I retweet a purchase
button, I get part of the revenue share. Use cryptocurrencies to implement the
feature. See @tipdoge for reference.

~~~
herge
I'm going to guess you don't use the 'one-click buy' button on Amazon either?

~~~
u124556
Amazon does use more than 140 characters to present a product.

~~~
jimktrains2
And often has reviews on the same page.

~~~
saryant
The reviews are the key. I always jump straight to the reviews. Half the time
I never read the item description.

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chton
I'm actually impressed they found a way to monetize their platform that
doesn't involve obtrusive ads. This seems like a good source of income for
them and their clients, and as long as they don't force you to follow
commercial accounts, it will be almost invisible to anyone who doesn't want to
see it.

I'm cautiously optimistic.

~~~
pionar
No, it's ads. You can just now buy from the ads directly.

~~~
chton
I don't know where you get that idea. They explicitly say "some Tweets from
our test partners will feature a “Buy” button", there is no mention of ads.
The implication is, if I don't follow their partners, I won't see the buy
button.

~~~
Touche
Just because you voluntarily follow the ads does it not still make them ads?

~~~
chton
Then any corporate accounts you follow now are 'ads'. It's an added button, no
more, no less. If that magically makes an otherwise neutral tweet an ad, you
need a more rigorous definition of advertisement.

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pinaceae
it is a big conundrum if your core product, through its simplicity, is really
great.

you hire all these product people, have all these investors, but any direction
you can take the product actually makes it worse against its initial, great
core use.

twitter as a protocol is on a level with smtp - a lucky strike, hitting a
need, something for the ages. journalists, media, etc. love it. RSS on a whole
new level.

but twitter as a product company? smtp is a not a profit model, you need to
have real, closed products - hence the API limits, hence all this other bull.
they have a narrow scope hit product and will kill it by making it broad. a
little bit like google and search, put ads on it, done, the rest is noise
driven by boredom and/or panic (we need to justify our existence!).

twitters design team is bigger than most startups - and for what? the whole
slack team fits into the twitter reception area and covers how many platforms,
apps, use cases by now?

you threw a lucky punch with a communication channel/protocol, but now you're
stuck. aren't we happy that the smtp or unix guys as a whole didn't try the
same. "monetize".

~~~
pionar
Twitter isn't a protocol. If it was, there'd be Twitter (the protocol) based
services everywhere, and it'd be open and federated.

Twitter is a service. Services need money. It's a simple as that.

~~~
arrrg
Thing is, Twitter _should_ be a protocol. It clearly fills an existing need (I
see it as very similar to email in that regard, just filling a different need
– people want to chat publicly with each other and in a very informal way
inform the public about things), but it doesn’t really make sense as a service
that wants to make money.

Twitter should be just like email, not this one monopoly controlling
everything. It’s sad that that’s the way it is.

~~~
chton
I'm not sure if it's even possible to build a twitter-like system with
distributed servers in the vein of e-mail. It's possible for e-mail because
it's a one-way system. Twitter has the concept of following a user, and that
user's tweets appear to me. It's a 2-way system that needs to constantly be
kept in sync. Even if it's possible to do, it won't be easy, with loads of
extra technical challenges that SMTP doesn't have.

~~~
steveklabnik
There was already an open standard to do everything but the private messaging
part:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OStatus](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OStatus)

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abhimskywalker
It would be interesting to see if content writers can promote their content
through this to earn money through micro-payments. Likely Steps: 1\. Capture
attention in 140 characters. 2\. Provide a good deal for the article/content
at a small price

Just being optimistic about news, article writers. I guess we might soon see
Economist stories with nice 140 character titles and eye-catchy pictures with
a buy button to read full article, post which it's added to your twitter
shelf. I wonder if this just might prove to be the payment mechanism needed
for such content consumption. Somewhat similar to the app-store economy,
twitter might become the content-store. Let's see...

Though I hope the dominant commerce part is kept as a separate tab perhaps
like "Discover" tab, as I guess I wouldn't want to have my twitter stream as a
series of ads. One or two "buy" tweets might be ok though I think... Will have
to wait and watch how this goes.

~~~
GregorStocks
That sounds like it'd encourage misleading clickbait even more than the
current Internet.

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softbuilder
See Chirpify[1], who has since pivoted. I don't know if that pivot was because
of the idea or because Twitter decided it made more sense to be an ad wall
than a platform.

I really, truly do not understand Twitter's thinking. I'm sure on someone's
spreadsheet of imaginary numbers it looks more attractive to be a billboard,
but Twitter had the opportunity to be a true platform. A platform gives you
control. It's a longer-term play, but my goodness the opportunities missed.
Including this one, which could have been in play years ago.

Whether people will actually use this feature is a whole other question.

[1] [http://www.crunchbase.com/organization/sell-
simply](http://www.crunchbase.com/organization/sell-simply)

Edit: Clarify first P.

~~~
stdbrouw
This is a little bit too hand-wavy to me. You mention only a single
opportunity Twitter missed by not focusing on being a "true platform", and
then you immediately hedge by saying that you're not sure people will actually
use it.

~~~
softbuilder
Sandy comes to mind, and is actually a better example. (Although Google seems
to have forgotten it existed.)

For clarity, I see Twitter as having this amazing potential as a message bus
for both people, apps, and services. And I feel that potential has been
squandered.

I'm unsure if this _particular_ idea is going to pay off. But the general
notion of an ecosystem of services hanging off of Twitter seems like the right
one to me.

(This is usually where someone says app.net, and I say 'critical mass'.)

~~~
jfb
How do you make money as a message bus? I'm not saying I disagree (I take no
position on the merits of Twitter-as-a-servce, as I am not a user), but
clearly the Best Minds have decided that the attention economy (read: ads) is
the way forward. How do you pay for that critical mass? Twitter isn't
something that falls out of infrastructure -- decisions had and have to be
taken to spend resources.

While selling people to advertisers is getting harder, and therefore less
margin-friendly, it'd take a braver company than Twitter to turn their back on
the model. IMO.

~~~
softbuilder
It's not entirely either/or. They have a website and an official app, so
advertising is always going to be on the table.

You make money by charging companies for access to the platform. Charge for
access, charge for users, charge per tweet. There are options. This is not a
new idea. (See EDI etc.)

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kkl
Not sure how happy I'll be with the pairing of this and Twitter's supposed new
"Facebook"-style timeline. Time will tell.

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mkr-hn
So that means people could eventually buy the ebooks I promote right from the
tweet. Neat.

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rattray
In an incredible turn of timing, I created a mockup of a Facebook icon for the
exact same functionality about six hours ago:

[https://www.dropbox.com/s/sed9ewxz25turey/Screenshot%202014-...](https://www.dropbox.com/s/sed9ewxz25turey/Screenshot%202014-09-08%2017.32.03.png?dl=0)

~~~
psaintla
Facebook already tried something like this when they purchased Karma and it
didn't work out too well.

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dacort
I think one of my favorite things about this is that it actually makes product
information available in the meta tags.

<meta property="twitter:item:variant1:id" value="n6NDAWFNqjkNZftJWq0BQw==" />
<meta property="twitter:item:variant1:title" value="Small" /> <meta
property="twitter:item:variant1:inventory_count" value=1 /> <meta
property="twitter:item:variant1:price" value=75000000 /> <meta
property="twitter:item:variant1:tax_category" value="included_in_price" />
<meta property="twitter:item:variant1:last_updated" value=1409259500000 />
<meta property="twitter:item:variant1:attribute1:text" value="Small" />

------
WoodenChair
It's interesting that they would not partner with Square somehow for this
given @Jack...

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piyushpr134
This could become big. Imagine celebrities tweeting buy link for their album
or donation links when some calamity strikes or AMZN/Flipkart launching an
exclusive deal/product on twitter or imagine launch of a new book/phone/car
and tweeting buy button to prebook it. This could take impulse buy to a whole
new level. Has Twitter finally found a viable business model ?

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Erwin
I wonder if there's a way to generalize this so any text or image can have
metadata about purchasing the exact product. Something like a shorter UPC but
with a non-intrusive reader embedded everywhere offering you to buy the
product through manufacturer-controlled channels (varying depending on what
country you are in).

You "just" need to get enough users to install the scanning software; maybe
the next iPhone will come with Apple Shopping that scans all text you see and
all images for the metadata/watermarks. As it detected a product, the new
second $ button lights up. Press down on it for a second, and the product
information pops up (Apple Shopping knows your size/address/credit card
already of course). Hold it down for a few seconds longer, and you've made
your purchase. Don't, and a few weeks later maybe the seller gets to send you
a 10% off coupon.

Actually, Amazon's phones might already have something like that, letting you
scan a bar code in a physical shop but purchase from Amazon.

~~~
pjc50
Isn't this effectively the failed cuecat model?

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johnrob
Any app/website with a large user base should probably add this feature. The
main value here, compared to simply dropping an ecommerce link in a tweet (the
current use case), is piggy backing payment and fulfillment on top of the
existing twitter user account.

~~~
mahmoudimus
Would be interesting to see how these things develop -- fulfillment and
payment processing are double-edged swords.

Bolting on fulfillment to a twitter-purchase seems like a lot of work, but as
another commentator said, I'm cautiously optimistic.

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grayclhn
Lots of people enjoy shopping, so this isn't as obviously bad of an idea as
some of the comments here imply. Open question whether this will be more like
"hanging out at the mall" or "watching QVC."

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brianbreslin
This is the first positive move I've seen from Twitter in a long time as far
as building a sustainable business.

[edit] I say this after having tried every single one of their ad products
without any success.

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liotier
Let's hope that the selling-out of Twitter will give a nudge to its open
decentralized competitors... I'm not holding my breath, but who knows ? I
still dream of an XMPP Twitter...

~~~
pradn
I don't think that Twitter's effort to monetize is directly equal to selling
out. If the service's quality degrades significantly (too many pushy ads and
buy buttons) then, I'd say it sold out. So far, I've found the ads fairly
relevant and not too frequent.

~~~
liotier
I may be oversensitive to spam (I must admit that my love of ad-blocking
software in all sorts of systems borders on mania) but the very idea that I
now have to be wary of Sponsored Tweets that require an effort to unsee has
already started to spoil the experience.

~~~
ericras
There's no such thing as a free lunch, etc, etc. I like the Sponsored Tweets
compared to the alternatives: either paying to use Twitter or banner ads.

~~~
liotier
Or hosting your own... Take a look at
[http://twister.net.co](http://twister.net.co) \- it has potential for
scalable decentralized peer-to-peer microblogging.

------
king_magic
The question on my mind is this: how can this possibly make anyone any money,
given Apple's 30% cut on in-app purchases? I seriously doubt Apple would give
that up.

~~~
j_s
Interesting point - depending on how this is implemented, all iOS Twitter
clients could already be violating the App Store guidelines!

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aapje
My main concern is security. When Twitter stores your payment information it
will be easy to buy something with a single click. But I've seen way too many
Twitter hacking going on when I look at friends' timelines. If tweets like
'How I lost 100 lbs in 3 months! Click > bit.ly/youwillbehacked' can be posted
without too much effort, these same hackers could buy stuff for free by just
hacking into your Twitter account.

~~~
blackaspen
Twitter offers 2 factor authentication for account logins (SMS a code every
time you login).

~~~
cowls
This should be forced whenever you try to purchase something

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Grue3
Because buying a product based on a 140 character description is a thing that
should be encouraged.

~~~
weavie
By the looks of it, clicking on the link brings you to a page with a lengthier
description.

~~~
dmix
You can see more information, select variations of the product ('red or
green') and there should also be a link to the vendors product page as well.

The Buy button in the feed might confuse some users though, since it will
likely open the information panel.

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ardahal
A way to bet on a sport/game via Twitter would be an interesting thing to do.
Couple of months ago, I actually looked for ways to do it around the Twitter's
cards API but never managed to get beyond the initial thoughts of doing so.

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tinkerrr
Not sure how many people would like to associate their credit card information
with their Twitter profiles. Maybe they can include other sensible options
like Bitcoin?

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Lidador
Don't we all have a friend or two who tries to sell you stuff while we're
hanging out with friends on a night out?

That's what buy ads feel like on social networks.

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foobarqux
How are the economics of such a model for twitter? Retailer margins are
usually thin and you need further split with stripe and the feed publisher.

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flurdy
As long as it doesn't get forced onto 3rd party clients, even their own
Tweetdeck, then I don't really care. For now...

~~~
Flavius
I don't get it. How can a "Buy" button bother anyone? You're following a
company that sells something you're interested in, they have a promotion or
something on Twitter, you buy it with one click. Am I missing something?

Or is it just super cool to hate anything that could potentially generate some
profit for Twitter?

~~~
rschuetzler
Unless it's not from a company I'm following. Inevitably this will show up in
the ads I'm shown on the site, which are things I do not follow.

~~~
wodenokoto
With or without the buy button you are seeing the adds.

~~~
TheOtherHobbes
Also, total change of culture from distributing (arguably) interesting and
entertaining content to selling and promoting stuff.

Result: more noise, much lower snr.

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ebbv
Because when I'm browsing Twitter my first thought is usually "Gee I wish I
could buy some random thing."

~~~
chrisan
Just a guess you aren't following "random" companies but rather things you are
interested in?

OcculusVR: New Rift is out! [Buy]

SXSW: Tickets on sale now! [Buy]

JKRowling: Just release my new Book [Buy]

Steam: [Some new Triple A game] is released [Buy]

RaspberryPi: New Pi Beowulf cluster available for purchase [Buy]

RedCross: [Some disaster] we need your support [Donate]

(I'm sure a donate will come along if this works)

Anywho, there have to be _tons_ of impulse buyers in the world. People will
click

~~~
liotier
> (I'm sure a donate will come along if this works)

That would be a very relevant functionality : Twitter is all instant emotion
and therefore a perfect platform for impulse donations !

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shk
After seeing this, I had a thought what if FB also brings 'buy' buttons on
similar lines where pages can post items with a price tag and 'buy' button? It
will surely be a nice revenue stream. Both FB and Twitter have an incredible
reach. If Twitter can bring this experience about in a non-intrusive way, then
it's a win-win for everyone.

~~~
sjg007
They have.

~~~
shk
They are definitely trying to get the experience right by going with limited
partners and exposing the feature to small user base. I imagine, if they had
opened the floodgates immediately, then we would have seen the 'buy' button
left right and centre on the feed.

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lordbusiness
I can see this being useful, and welcome it. Particularly for music downloads
a la iTunes etc.

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pla3rhat3r
Wonder if this spells the end of companies like Chripify that do this as their
business model.

~~~
pla3rhat3r
Didn't realize someone had already commented on that very thing. :\

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eik3_de
If you don't like the direction twitter is heading, try quitter.se, ello.co,
app.net

~~~
mkr-hn
The problem with those is no one I know uses them, and they're generally happy
with Twitter. And I don't disagree with them.

app.net wanted more than I could afford to follow more than a few people, but
the others look interesting. I'll give them a look.

edit: ello won't accept my email for the invitation request. Quitter looks
like a clone of Twitter, and barely anyone in the public timeline speaks
English. Not sure what to do with this.

edit 2: It looks like it took the request and sent me ten different
confirmation emails while showing an error on the form. This doesn't make me
feel good about the service.

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liotier
So, who has a good Twitter client capable of filtering the [redacted] Promoted
Tweets ?

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pain
Will Twitter compete with tipbots, and will that effect their legality?

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samstave
Bought on Twitter: Twought.

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samstave
SO, now twitter wants to store financial data on users now too?

No thanks

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f1nch3r
Do not want.

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amerf1
Some of the participating followers in this program have millions of
followers, Twitter is seriously getting into this purchasing business

