Twitter introduced Fleets — its take on Instagram Stories — to India roughly a year back as part of a test phase and rolled the feature out to everyone in November. Although the feature hasn't taken off as well as Stories on Instagram did, there was one particular advantage on Twitter and that's the fact that Tweets didn't feature any adverts.

On Facebook-owned Instagram, while viewing stories of friends, people also get numerous Stories containing ads in between. Now, Twitter is additionally looking to bring ads to it Fleets. The social media giant has announced that it's beginning the pilot testing of ads in Fleet within the US. This might mark the entry of full-screen vertical ads to the platform, bringing it in better competition with other platforms like Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat, Facebook, etc.

Much like what happens on Instagram, the Fleet ads would be displayed in between Fleets of individuals a user follows, and these would be in 9:16 format. There could also be a call-to-action by adding a “swipe up” link in their ads. However, unlike Instagram and TikTok, which permit ads up to 120 seconds and 60 seconds respectively, Twitter is sticking to best practices and would allow video ads of up to 30 seconds.

However, the microblogging site has not yet disclosed the frequency with which users would see ads when swiping through Fleets and has only said that because it monitors how users engage with these ads, it might innovate, test also to adapt this feature.

Meanwhile, for advertisers, the location is offering the quality ad metrics that it already does, including impressions, clicks, website visits, profile visits, etc. Moreover, for video ads, video views, 6s video views, starts, completes, quartile reporting, etc would be a part of the metrics to assist advertisers understand the duration that they're ready to hold the eye of the audience.

At present, only 10 advertisers within the US are being involved within the pilot testing, including players in tech, retail and dining.