Twitter buys startup Niche to connect brands with web celebrities

PanARMENIAN.Net - Twitter Inc. acquired Niche Project Inc., a startup that helps video makers connect with advertisers, as the social-media company works to profit from online-video celebrities, Bloomberg reports.

Twitter bought Niche for about $30 million, according to a person with knowledge of the matter, who asked not to be identified because the terms are private. The deal will let Twitter link advertisers directly to people who understand how to make content go viral on Vine, Twitter’s six-second video-streaming service, and Google Inc.’s YouTube, which also hosts video creators that work with Niche.

Twitter has been working to make it easier for people to create content on the service as it strives to increase usage. Last month, the San Francisco-based company added a way for people to capture and edit video on the main site. Twitter also wants to make the content on its site easier for Internet users to find, recently striking a deal with Google to make tweets more discoverable through Google search.

“As more users and creators use different products as a way to share what’s happening in their world, brands are also looking to partner with those individuals in hopes of generating comments that resonate with the people they are trying to reach,” Twitter said in a blog post.

Niche makes money by taking a cut of any deal between an advertiser and content creator, which Twitter will be able to tap into, said the person familiar with the situation. The New York-based company also provides data about how the videos are performing around the Web.

Twitter last week projected that its number of new users will pick up and posted quarterly revenue that topped estimates. The company said it may add 13 million to 16 million users in the first quarter, up 4.5 percent sequentially -- faster than the 1.4 percent growth in the prior period.