Advertising Age: Tell us about your approach to
Hatch.
Ross Hoffman: Probably about a quarter in
advance, we'll prepare a laundry list of questions for a brand and
an agency really getting at the root of what they want to do:
[whether] it's around an event, a product release, a key time of
the year. We want to think about the innovation that we can push
with them.
Marketers ultimately want two things: they want impact and
innovation. Can we do something that's truly special and rises
above the rest? Can we measure the efficacy of it?
We work with the brand [and] agency in those weeks and months
leading up to a day where we'll have one to three pretty good ideas
about where we'll be going. As opposed to getting in the room and
saying, 'We're gonna leave this room with greatness.' We want to do
that ahead of time.
Ad Age: How do you select a brand partner? What
characteristics are you looking for?
Mr. Hoffman: A marketer that we've been working
with for a while, that has committed resources to us and who we've
committed resources to, whether it's time [or] revenue. These are
not things that we're going to work with a marketer who just got a
[Twitter] handle or has just dipped their toes in the water with
our promoted product. They know us really well; we know their teams
really well.
Once you have that trust ... you hear someone say, 'Bring us the
crazy stuff. We wanna do something totally out there and
wacky.'
Ad Age: But sometimes that backfires. Brands
take risks on Twitter and end up
putting their foot in their mouth.
Mr. Hoffman: There are scenarios like that --
it's ultimately people controlling the handles.
When you have the right processes in place, a lot of that can be
avoided. At the same time, you can't have a 10-step scenario and
flow-chart for when you're going to publish a tweet. We're a
real-time platform. If you're second or third in that moment, it
can work against you.
Ad Age: At Twitter, you've been pushing for
marketers to utilize a variety of big moments, like the World Cup.
What type of events are you focusing on beyond that?
Mr. Hoffman: It can be a product launch, an
event-based sponsorship. NFL, NCAA, the Grammy's -- anything like
that. I love it. When marketers are integrated in television,
they're running media across the entire web for a specific moment
in time, Twitter can be a connective tissue across all of that.
It sounds simple, with a hashtag. But a hashtag can actually be
the glue that ties all the media together and lets it work in
tandem.
Ad Age: What attributes do you look for in
marketers tapping into these events?
They're always building out their foundation on Twitter. That
can be a tone of voice that they have; that can be a cadence. It
can be always building their following, both organically and paid
products. And they're amortizing that cost and they're leveraging
it during a big event.
If you think about a big event, everyone wants to be there.
Apple launches a phone, the Super Bowl. We're an auction based
platform. If everyone's there, there's a higher bid, you're going
to be paying more. It's simple economics. Therefore, if you're
continually building that following, building the reach, building
that muscle memory, getting your agencies more nimble, that's when
you can exploit those major moments.
What T-Mobile does well -- and what I'd like to see other
marketers take advantage of on Twitter -- is real-time, anonymous
word-of-mouth. By anonymous, I mean someone you don't know, but you
can click through their profile to see, 'That is an actual person
who just changed their plan to T-Mobile.' That's so powerful that
they can do that. We have 'Whitelisting' -- so Nike white-lists [NBA star]
LeBron [James]. When LeBron has a new shoe coming out, LeBron
tweets about it. And it is promoted by Nike. You could, in theory,
do that with anyone.
Ad Age: Are there any ad products that
marketers aren't using to the fullest potential?
Mr. Hoffman: No, I think it's the opposite.
I've been pleasantly surprised. They're still innovative uses of
all of our ad products, especially with promoted Tweets. It's a
simple unit. But they're so many ways it can be taken: with the
copy, with the media that's going to be attached to it, with the
Cards that are within the tweets, which is where there will be a
lot more focus moving forward next year.
Ad Age: What is your biggest frustration with
marketers on Twitter?
Mr. Hoffman: A frustration I have, which is
lessening: I'm starting to see a better relationship between
marketers and their legal departments. They could often lead to
some friction. Think about it: a marketer wants to take risks; an
attorney is paid to make sure the risk is very granular.
I'm starting to see them have an understanding. Whereas, in the
past, that was difficult. We'd be coming up with an idea, and
everyone's happy about it. And then we'd get a red-line contract
back. Then we'd explain the intricacies of the platform, and they'd
get it. I'm starting to see that less and less.