New Tools on Twitter

The Federal Trade Commission http://www.ftc.gov/ requires that alcohol brands target their advertising to men and women of legal drinking age (21 years old in the USA). In order to do this, alcohol brand websites have age verification tools that allow them to create websites and advertise through them.

Alcohol brands have been previously banned from Twitter because there is no way to prove that followers are of legal drinking age in their country of residence. I found an article in All Twitter called

Alcohol Brands Testing New Age Verification Tool On Twitter http://www.mediabistro.com/alltwitter/alcohol-age-verification-twitter_b23547 that explains how Twitter is developing a new tool that will allow age verification, and thus, permit Alcohol brands to have followers and advertise their product in this format.

I believe that this process of age verification, is a bit complicated and may be seen as tedious to some. First a user has to “Follow” the brand on Twitter to receive a Direct Message (DM) with a link to a website. The user then has to visit the website where s/he will be asked to enter his/her birthdate. If the user enters his/her birthdate within 24 hours of receiving the link, then he/she can follow the alcohol brand’s account. This is a one-time process, so the user will not have to go through this age verification process again in order to follow other alcohol brands or labels.

This new system will go through a test phase first, and will roll out if successful. In my opinion, this will not be a success, because it may be the way to lose potential followers. If a brand was able to get a consumer’s interest, the consumer should be able to have easy access to his/her interest. I’m afraid that by having to wait for a DM, go to the link, and then get access will seem time consuming and will diminish the consumer’s interest in following the brand.

If the system proves to be successful with the brands that they will be testing (MillerCoors and Heineken), and if I were a brand manager wanting to create an account in Twitter, I would go after the consumers who have already passed the age verification process, since they will already have access (no steps before following). I would wait until the more users have passed this process before I invest in a marketing strategy based on Twitter.

All being said, I can’t think of a better way to fashion an age verification system, and I applaud those that are creating solutions. Having worked in the alcohol business, I hope that the system proves to work and opens new opportunities to market products that get increasing advertisement restrictions each day.