Targeting

Targeting is a core concept of the Ads API. Targeting is set at the line item level and options vary across placement types. To set new targeting criteria you need to use POST accounts/:account_id/targeting_criteria and PUT accounts/:account_id/targeting_criteria to update them.

Use GET accounts/:account_id/line_items for a list of all line items and GET accounts/:account_id/line_items/:line_item_id to retrieve a specific line item.

Targeting options by placement type

Each placement type has different options for targeting. Location, Platform and Gender are available for all. The other options are contextual to the type of placement. See the support pages for Geo (Locations), Device (Platforms), Gender and Language targeting and keyword targeting types for background information on the concepts.

• Promoted Account (PAc): Age Targeting, Custom Audience Types, Devices, Events, Followers Of, Similar to Followers Of, Gender, Interest, Keyword Types (All), Language, Locations, Network Activation, Network Operators, Partner Audience Types, Platform, Platform Version, Retargeting Types, WiFi Only
• Promoted Tweets (PTw): Age Targeting, Custom Audience Types, Devices, Events, Followers Of, Similar to Followers Of, Gender, Interest, Language, Locations, Network Activation, Network Operators, Non-exact Keyword Types, Partner Audience Types, Platform, Platform Version, Retargeting Types, TV Targeting Types, WiFi Only
• Promoted Tweets for Search (PTwS): Age Targeting, Custom Audience Types, Devices, Events, Gender, Keyword Types (All), Language, Locations, Network Activation, Network Operators, Platform, Platform Version, WiFi Only
• Promoted Tweets for Timelines (PTwT): Age Targeting, Custom Audience Types, Devices, Events, Followers Of, Similar to Followers Of, Gender, Interest, Language, Locations, Network Activation, Network Operators, Non-exact Keyword Types, Partner Audience Types, Platform, Platform Version, Retargeting Types, TV Targeting Types, WiFi Only
• Promoted Trends (PTr): Not available via the API

Understanding targeting types

Interests: Target users by interest. Get the interest list from GET targeting_criteria/interests. You can target up to 100 interests.

Followers Of: Target the followers of any fully promotable users for the current account (note, currently the primary account holder is the only fully-promotable user of that account). GET accounts/:account_id/promotable_users to get a list of promotable users. You can target up to 100 users.

Similar to Followers Of: Target people with the same interests as followers of specific users. You can use up to 100 Users.

Locations: Specify up to 250 locations to target. Get list from GET targeting_criteria/locations. There are additional requirements for ads that target certain countries. See Country Targeting and Display Requirements for more information.

Gender: Target males (1) or females (2). Leave null to target all.

Keywords: Keyword targeting options are specific by type of placement. You can use up to 1000 keywords for targeting (per line item). See detailed list below for options.

Events: Specify an event for targeting. Only one event can be used for targeting (per line item). Use the GET targeting_criteria/events endpoint to find events available for targeting.

Platforms, Platform Versions, Devices, and Wifi-Only: Allows targeting of mobile devices across a variety of vectors. Platforms is a high-level targeting type that can hit broad categories of phone. Example values are iOS and Android. Devices allow you to target users of specific mobile devices, for example the iPhone 5s, Nexus 4, or Samsung Galaxy Note. Platform versions allow you to target users of versions of specific mobile operating systems, down to the point release. Examples include iOS 7.1 and Android 4.4. Wifi-Only allows you to target only those users who are using their devices on a wifi network; if this is not set, users using the carrier connection as well as wifi will be targeted.

• Users can target platforms and devices if there is no overlap. I can target Blackberry as a platform and iPad Air as a device simultaneously.
• Users can target devices and os versions simultaneously. I can target iPad Air and iOS >= 7.0.
• Users cannot target platforms that are broader than devices. I cannot target iOS and iPad Air.

TV Targeting

TV Genre Targeting: reach people engaged with all programming of a certain genre. Use GET targeting_criteria/tv_genres to determine available genres.

TV Network Targeting: target audiences engaged with a specific network. Use GET targeting_criteria/tv_channels and GET targeting_criteria/tv_markets to determine available channels in your TV market.

TV Show Targeting: reach people that engage with specific TV programs. This targeting criteria can be configured to either (a) continuously target while a campaign is active with the TV_SHOW targeting type or (b) target audiences only around a show’s airing window using the new TV_SHOW_AIRING_RESTRICTED targeting type. Use the GET targeting_criteria/tv_markets and GET targeting_criteria/tv_shows endpoints to determine TV shows available.

Mobile Network Operator Targeting: Enables advertisers to target users based on mobile carrier, using the targeting type NETWORK_OPERATOR from GET targeting_criteria/network_operators.

New Mobile Device Targeting: reach people based on the date that they first accessed Twitter via their device, using the targeting types NETWORK_ACTIVATION_DURATION_LT and NETWORK_ACTIVATION_DURATION_GTE.

Tailored Audiences: use this targeting type to reach users through an approved ads partner to target groups of customers, and connect with them on Twitter.

Language Targeting: use this targeting type to reach users who understand specific languages.

Age Targeting: use this targeting type to reach users based on pre-defined age buckets.

Behaviors: use this targeting type to target pre-made audiences from select partners. See GET targeting_criteria/behaviors.

Installed App Store Categories: use this targeting type to target users based on the categories of apps they have installed or have indicated interest in. See GET targeting_criteria/app_store_categories.

Tweet Engager Retargeting: Tweet engager retargeting enables advertisers to target audiences across devices who have previously been exposed to or engaged with their promoted or organic Tweets on Twitter. With this targeting advertisers can follow up with people who saw or engaged with an advertiser’s content on Twitter and are most likely to further engage or convert with subsequent messaging or offers. Users will be eligible for targeting within minutes of exposure or engagement and will remain eligible for up to 90 days afterwards for engagements and 30 days for exposures.

Tweet Engager Targeting Types:

• ENGAGEMENT_TYPE which accepts either IMPRESSION or ENGAGEMENT as a targeting value. This specifies whether you wish to target exposed users (IMPRESSION) or engaged users (ENGAGEMENT).
• CAMPAIGN_ENGAGEMENT uses a campaign ID as the targeting value. Users who engaged with or were exposed to this campaign (depending on ENGAGEMENT_TYPE) are the ones who will be targeted.
• USER_ENGAGEMENT which uses the promoted user ID as the targeting value to target users who were exposed to or engaged with an advertiser’s organic content (depending on ENGAGEMENT_TYPE). This must be the promoted user ID associated with the Ads account.

Note: ENGAGEMENT_TYPE is required in addition to at least one valid CAMPAIGN_ENGAGEMENT or USER_ENGAGEMENT value. Both tweet engager targeting types may be present and multiple campaigns may be targeted on a given line item.

Keyword Types

See our support document on keyword targeting for a conceptual overview.

• Broad (default value): match all words, independent of order. Not sensitive to capitalization, plurals or tense. Will automatically be expanded when possible (i.e. “car repair” would also match “automobile fix”). If you want to target without expansion, you need to add a + sign before the keywords, like “+boat +jet”. Using keywords without the + will default to Broad Match.
• Unordered (deprecated): match all words, independent of order. Not sensitive to capitalization, plurals or tense.
• Phrase: match the exact keywords string, other keywords can be present.
• Exact: match exactly the the keywords string, not any others.
• Negative: avoid matching searches that include all of these keywords somewhere in the query, regardless of the order in which they are written, even if other words are present.
• Negative Phrase: avoid matching searches that include this exact keywords string somewhere in the query, even if other words are present.
• Negative Exact: avoid matching searches that exactly match these keywords and contain no other words.

PUT accounts/:account_id/targeting_criteria has a good technical recap of all values, with required/optional and specific details for each.

Targeting Criteria Combinations

Updated Campaign Workflow

Create campaigns which target broadly with geo, gender, language, and device/platform criteria. Advertisers can then combine the broad targeting with additional targeting criteria (e.g. interests, keywords, followers, tailored audiences, TV). If no targeting criteria is specified for a line item, the line item will target all users worldwide.

Targeting criteria will be combined for your ad group such that:

• “Primary” Targeting Types will get ∪‘d (i.e. put in a logical union).
• Other Targeting Types will get AND‘d.
• Same types will get OR‘d.

Some examples

At a glance: [(Followers) ∪ (Tailored Audiences) ∪ (Interests) ∪ (Keywords)] AND (Location) AND (Gender) AND (Languages) AND (Devices and Platforms)

A Geo example:

Let’s say we want an ad group for our campaign to serve targeting:

• Twitter users in the U.S., England, and Canada (Location)
• who are Women (Gender)
• derived from Tailored Audiences list (“Primary”)
• with Keywords (“Primary”)

The targeting criteria will be:

[US OR GB OR CA] AND [Female] AND [Tailored Audiences ∪ Keyword]

Additional examples

• Select Gender and Geo but no primary:
  (Male) AND (US OR GB)
• Select Gender, Geo, Interest:
  (Female) AND (CA) AND (Computers OR Technology OR Startups)
• Select Gender, Geo, Interest, Tailored Audiences, Keywords:
  (Male) AND (GB) AND (Cars ∪ Tailored Audiences for CRM ∪ autocross)