With Olympics backdrop, Twitter goes for gold in ad strategy

SAN FRANCISCO (REUTERS) - If the millions of Olympics-related tweets flooding the Internet in recent days are a measure of Twitter's popular appeal, the company's big presence in London also signals something else: its arrival as a major player in the world of big-time brand advertising.

In sharp contrast to Google, which initially built its businesses mostly by persuading thousands of small companies to buy "direct response" ads, Twitter's emerging strategy focuses on selling elaborate brand campaigns to major marketers such as Procter & Gamble and Verizon Communications.

The Olympics have presented a prime opportunity for Twitter to position itself as a new media channel that complements TV broadcasts - and carries the big-name ads to match.

"We can service the very biggest brands in the marketplace," Mr Adam Bain, the company's president of revenue and key advertising strategist, said in a recent interview.