Introducing Broad Match for Keyword Targeting

Wednesday, 11 December 2013

Earlier this year we launched keyword targeting in timelines, which allows Twitter advertisers to connect with an audience based on keywords mentioned in their Tweets and the Tweets they engage with. Since then, many advertisers have leveraged this tool to reach users with the right intent, at the right moment, and in the right context. More recently, we’ve also added features like sentiment filtering and negative keyword match to support the increasingly sophisticated needs around keyword targeting.

Today, we’re excited to share a significant improvement to keyword targeting on Twitter with the launch of broad match for keywords.

Twitter users have conversations about topics in a number of different ways, and the same intent can be expressed by using synonyms, different spellings, or Twitter-specific lingo. Broad match makes it easier for advertisers to reach users having these conversations by automatically expanding their targeted keywords to include related terms.

For example, a coffee shop that wants to reach coffee enthusiasts can run a campaign targeting the broad match keywords “love coffee.” This would allow them to connect with users who are tweeting or engaging with Tweets containing the keywords “luv coffee” or “love latte”.

Introducing Broad Match for Keyword Targeting

Just like on other keyword advertising platforms, if the coffee shop sells lattes but not espressos, they can use the “+” modifier on the broad matched terms to prevent broadening. Targeting “love + latte” will match to users who Tweet “luv latte,” but it won’t match to users who Tweet “luv espresso”.

Broad match is now available through ads.twitter.com and our advertiser API. Setting up a broad matched keyword campaign is simple, since broad match will be the default matching type for targeted keywords moving forward. Existing campaigns will remain unchanged and will be automatically opted into the “+” modifier to prevent broadening. And, broad match for keywords will not change the frequency of ads shown to our users, who will continue to have the ability to dismiss Promoted Tweets that they don’t find relevant.

We are excited to bring this improvement to our platform and look forward to helping our advertisers target precisely at scale. For more information about broad match and keyword targeting, please see our help center article.