Twitter

From the articles I read, twitter makes money in three different ways.

1. Cost-per-click from its Promoted Tweets. These are keyword-targeted, cost-per-click ads that appear in all Twitter search results in some applications, trending topics, and of course on http://search.twitter.com. You bid on keywords kind of like Google AdWords and can drive users to anywhere a link can go, including high-value brand engagements, videos, lead capture landing pages, etc. Currently the minimum bid is $0.50 and goes up depending on the keywords and categories in your campaign.

2. Cost-per-follower from its Promoted Accounts. These are keyword-targeted, cost-per-follower ads where you target users based on what they talk about and who they follow. This is a great way to quickly build your base of followers (basically Twitter friends who have opted in to receive your tweet messages). At the moment, and depending on the category, followers are running at about $1 to $2 apiece.

3. Exclusivity from its Promoted Trends offering. This is a flat-rate; daily sponsorship that drives huge amounts of impressions, engagements, and clicks. A sponsor can receive over 60 million impressions in one day, but it does require a rather large financial commitment. If you want to see the needle move in a short period of time, high-impression sponsorships like this and other home page buyout opportunities can be effective.