Twitter is set to reach $ 1 billion in sales by 2014, significantly outpacing analyst predictions and demonstrating the company’s advertising viability, sources tell Bloomberg.
The company earned $ 139.5 million in 2011, analysts say, which means if Bloomberg’s sources are correct, demand for advertising is taking off among companies looking to grow their presence on the platform.
Bloomberg’s sources said the company could change or alter those predictions, which, of course, aren’t exactly official.
Twitter will likely reach this milestone slightly more than eight years after it was founded in March 2006, putting it behind companies like Facebook, which took six years to hit $ 1 billion in sales, and Google, which took five, Bloomberg reports.
The revenue projections demonstrate that Twitter feels pretty good about the strength of the company’s business model, which was something of a question mark in its earlier years. Twitter was reluctant to emphasize the business side of its product, but has recently expanded its focus on advertising.
Advertising on Twitter takes the form of promoted Tweets, trends and accounts. Twitter also recently rolled out self-serve advertising for smaller businesses looking for promotion.
The company has wrestled with advertising revenue in the past, sharing the concern of companies like Facebook in trying to determine whether “ads inserted into social activity actually work,” as Matthew Ingram wrote earlier this year. The monetary value of a Twitter retweet or a Facebook “like” is still a question mark for brands looking to advertise, which The Wall Street Journal explored recently.
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