eMarketer: Twitter's advertising revenue is expected to reach $139.5 million in 2011, a 210% increase

On September 29, 2011, TechCrunch, a US technology blog, reported that the US market research company eMarketer expects Twitter's advertising revenue to increase 210% to $139.5 million in 2011 from $45 million in 2010. eMarketer made the above prediction after considering a variety of factors, including expected analysis of consumers, markets, advertising and the number of ad impressions on Twitter, and referring to the revenue expectations made by research companies and other institutions.

Twitter CEO Dick Costolo told the media a few weeks ago that advertising is a key part of the company's strategy. Twitter has launched new advertising platform products including Promoted Tweets, but eMarketer still lowered its advertising revenue forecast for this year in its report, but believes that once Twitter launches self-service advertising products, advertising revenue will grow significantly in the next few years.

Earlier this year, eMarketer had forecast Twitter would generate $150 million in ad revenue in 2011. But it lowered its forecast this year because of Twitter's slow pace in setting up ad sales offices in overseas markets and its later-than-expected rollout of several ad products and self-service platform.

However, eMarketer said that once Twitter's products and teams are in place, its advertising revenue will continue to grow rapidly. eMarketer expects Twitter's advertising revenue in 2012 to increase by 86.3% from 2011 to $260 million, of which $234 million will be in the U.S. market and $26 million will be in international markets, accounting for 10% of total advertising revenue. By 2013, eMarketer expects Twitter's global advertising revenue to reach nearly $400 million.

In comparison, Facebook is expected to have more than $3.8 billion in advertising revenue this year, but the launch of a self-service advertising platform could help Twitter achieve Facebook-like growth. Twitter may begin testing this platform service in the near future. eMarketer said that self-service advertising revenue accounts for about 60% of Facebook's total advertising revenue, and Twitter's self-service platform will likely accelerate its advertising revenue growth once it is launched. But now the question is when Twitter's self-service advertising platform for brand customers will finally be launched.