Dive Brief:

• According to Venture Beat, Twitter is testing integrating MoPub ads with Twitter Kit timelines, a move that would allow marketers to reach non-Twitter users with tweet ads in third-party apps. It also means Twitter is looking to earn revenue from non-Twitter users.
• Developers already have the ability to include MoPub ads in apps, but there was no easy way to merge them with timelines.
• The move is one of Twitter’s first forays into monetizing an audience outside of its platform, but wary stockholders should be somewhat placated.

Dive Insight:

Ever since Jack Dorsey retook the helm at Twitter, the social media platform has been willing to make changes to its product and overall business model. These changes are even happening around its most iconic feature – the 140-character limit for tweets – with news this week that it will stop counting links and photos as part of the limit.

Twitter’s shareholders have been less than silent about the need for the company to find a path to financial success as well as continue to grow its user base. With Dorsey at the helm, the company has made a series of major updates that it hopes will help lure new users.

The move to actively earn revenue from non-logged in Twitter users on third-party apps is definitely a shift in its business model. And while shareholders are likely cheering a new revenue stream, marketers should also be happy to have a new advertising vehicle that reaches an entirely new audience with tweet ads.

With the new integration, third-party app developers will be able to serve sponsored tweets as well as native video ads.