Shame -They really do seem to be a great program and have been featured in The Wall Street Journal -USA Today – New York Times!
Service Description Sponsored Tweets is a new program by IZEA which is a social media marketing company. Sponsored Tweets is an advertising platform that puts advertisers in contact with Tweeters who are willing to place sponsored ads on their Twitter message boards. In return Tweeters receive compensation for every tweet they place and every click generated by those tweets. Detailed Overview All a Tweeter needs to do is sign up for a Sponsored Tweets account and fill out what compensation they expect for their sponsored tweets. Once the offers start coming in they can choose the ones they would like to do. Once Tweeters receive an offer and payment, they will start to post the sponsored ads on their Twitter sites according to the advertisers guidelines. Tweeters remain in complete control of their Twitter accounts, there is no auto-injecting of ads and each one must be reviewed manually and approved by the account owner. 100% disclosure is required, so every ad must state that it is a sponsored tweet. Tweeters may cash out their accounts once they have met the $50 threshold. Since each Tweeter sets their own prices (though Sponsored Tweets does offer pricing guidelines) it is impossible to calculate the amount of time it may take to reach that payment threshold. Advertisers can use many criteria to choose which Tweeter they would like to represent their company. They can choose from the number of followers to the Tweeters reputation among those followers. Advertisers can write their own ad copy, but Sponsored Tweets recommends letting the Tweeter write the copy. This gives a more natural flow to the tweets and stays in tune with the overall style of that individual Twitter account. They are allowed to choose what days and time frames they would like their tweets done and with so many Tweeters to choose from advertisers have a lot of control over they type of traffic they want to generate. Reputation I could find no payment proof of Tweeters receiving their compensation, but I could find no complaints about non-payment either. Most of the concern regarding Sponsored Tweets is the fact that monetizing Twitter may change the way Twitter works. That is, will lose the basic essence once it is flooded with sponsored advertising. But, advertising on Twitter has been going on a long time and it is nice to see avid Tweeters getting the opportunity to earn money doing something they already do. Domain "Whois" The Whois information for a website lists the owner and their contact information. The Whois information for "Sponsored Tweets" is public which is generally a good thing. This indicates the owner of this site has nothing to hide. Hope this helps guys