Twitter Announces Mobile Sales Of Movie and Concert Tickets

The fierce competition between social media companies is a hot topic in the digital marketing industry, with many different players fighting for their place in this constantly evolving realm. While Twitter continues to be one of the most popular of these platforms, the company must find new ways to stay relevant and to experience growth in its monetization initiatives.

To this end, a Twitter executive explained that part of its strategy is to begin processing mobile payments in 2015, according to a report by Mobile Commerce Daily. However, the company’s goal is not to create a mobile payment platform but instead to allow a new advertising option for movie theaters and concert venues to sell tickets. The report indicates this software is still in the testing phase, and although the rollout date for the “Buy Button” has not yet been determined, it’s expected to be coming soon.

The company explained that it will initially embrace movie and concert tickets because they are easiest to process. Although consumers may not support a broad commerce conversion, the company expects that they would accept sales of movie and concert tickets once Twitter completes its testing of the “Buy Button” on its platform.

“I don’t see a whole lot of people fully converting on bigger purchase items that involve a more complex decision process,” said Ori Carmel, Marketing Manager at Twitter. “That will take a little bit more time. And of course, Apple Pay is going to accelerate all that.”

Considering the fact that Twitter is under increased pressure to monetize its service, the addition of an immediate call to action, linked to tracked, proven e-commerce and mobile commerce sales could be a big move in this direction. Last September, Twitter stated by providing users with exclusive access to offers and merchandise they can act on directly in the Twitter apps for Android and iOS, it will give sellers a new method for turning the direct relationship they build with their followers into sales. Some industry experts anticipate that if Twitter can aggregate and track the direct influence of Tweets on sales, the company may be able to open up the ability to retain a percentage of these sales.

Although the announced plan is only for selling movie and concert tickets, it’s a fair assumption that Twitter will expand into sales of other categories of products and services if the initial phase proves to be successful. While 2014 saw many of the leading technology companies making announcements about strategic mobile payment initiatives, 2015 may well prove to be the year that these systems move towards reaching critical mass.