Online advertising on social platforms is changing. Google and Meta no longer hold majority control over advertising dollars, according to The Wall Street Journal, with Amazon and TikTok cutting in to sway advertisers to other platforms. It’s clear that Twitter is also hungry to redirect ad dollars to its own platform, as it announced yesterday that it will be “relaxing” its political ads policy and allowing more “cause-based” ads. The company is also planning to expand to allow other forms of political advertising “in the coming weeks.”
Promising to share more details soon, the @TwitterSafety account tweeted Tuesday that from now on, Twitter’s goal is to align its advertising policy “with that of TV and other media outlets.” It’s unclear what exactly that means on a platform like Twitter, but the Federal Communications Commission specifies that it works to restrict censorship and ensure equal opportunity to political advertisers. This aligns somewhat with Twitter CEO Elon Musk’s stated "free speech absolutist" position. Twitter could also be looking to emulate the FCC to diminish the company's responsibility to review or ensure the accuracy of all political ad content.
Twitter’s recent policy change reverses a decision the platform made in 2019 to ban political ads to limit misinformation spread. That 2019 ban included exceptions for some cause-based advertising, where advertisers were permitted to conduct some microtargeting of Twitter users based on limited geographic location information, keywords, and interests. Notably, advertisers were not allowed to target audiences based on political affiliation like “conservative” or “liberal.” Under these prior rules, Twitter certified cause-based advertisers approved to promote content created to “educate, raise awareness, and/or call for people to take action in connection with civic engagement, economic growth, environmental stewardship, or social equity.”
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