If you’ve been on Twitter today, chances are you’ve seen some of your favourite Twitter users sharing screenshots of an email they received. Some Twitter users received an email that indicated they had received a payout
Earlier this year, Twitter CEO Elon Musk indicated that content creators would be able to earn a living on the platform, thanks to revenue earned on the platform. Back in April, the focus was on Subscriptions, but last month, Musk announced that X/Twitter was going to start paying creators for ads served in their replies. The first payment block was $5 Million in total.
As promised, he delivered, with many happy Twitter users sharing their new income from Twitter’s Ad Revenue split. Some creators have reported large payouts.
Journalist, Tech Entrepreneur, Futurist – Brian Krassenstein reported he received US$24,305 from a total of 2.1 Billion impressions since February 2023.
The Shibetoshi Nakamoto (@BillyM2k) account which has 2.1 Million followers and mostly posts memes, shared that he received $37,050.
If you know other accounts with higher earnings, please leave a comment below.
So now we know there’s some big money available, let’s understand who’s getting it. The official @Twitter account that posts rarely, posted today detailing the steps required for creators to be eligible for the Ad revenue split.
How to get paid to use Twitter
It seems today’s first payment is a little different than the norm, with Twitter sharing that Creator Ads Revenue Sharing will be available in all the countries where Stripe supports payouts. That doesn’t mean they are today, but is good news for Twitter users across the globe as the list of locations is quite extensive (and does include Australia). Twitter goes on to say that they are rolling out to an initial group that will be invited to accept payment.
How you can become eligible
To be considered eligible for creator ads revenue sharing you must:
- Be subscribed to Twitter Blue or Verified Organizations
- Have at least 5M impressions on your posts in each of the last 3 months.
- Pass human review for Creator Monetization Standards.
What you’ll need once you are approved
- A Stripe account. We work with Stripe for payouts and are rolling out to our first batch of creators who have already signed up for Creator Subscriptions.
- Adhere to our Creator Subscriptions policies.
Where to apply
We will soon launch an application process for ads revenue sharing.
Creators will be able to apply for both Creator Subscriptions and Creator Ads Revenue Sharing by accessing Monetization in their settings.
What about techAU?
I joined Twitter in February 2008 and since then have posted hundreds of thousands of times. I’ve now got 50.5k followers and 45 subscribers.
Unfortunately, I did not get a surprise email or notification from Twitter today. When Twitter Blue was first introduced, I recognised the opportunity to subscribe, rather than complain as many others did that the once free service is now charging for functionality. Being a Verified Twitter Blue Subscriber, the first criteria was out of the way.
The second criteria is to have at least 5M impressions on your posts in each of the last 3 months.
In April 2023, @techAU had 4.2M impressions, in May that was 15.8M and in June it was 7.1M. This means I fell short of getting a payout likely due to the April month being 800,000 impressions under the limit. Had this been an average of 5M across the 3 months, I would have qualified.
So without the bonus today, I look forward to being part of the program in the future and having a revenue stream from subscribers and ad revenue will encourage me and others to share more content, engage more in replies and ultimately increase the use fo the platform.
Elon is a creator too.
As we know, Elon Musk is a prolific user of the platform and regularly posts and replies on Twitter. This means even though Elon is a content creator and meets the criteria, he qualified for part of the Creator Ads Revenue Share program.
Right now, Elon Musk has 147.8 Million followers on Twitter, with many of his Tweets receiving Millions of impressions. Twitter user Jay wondered if Elon would get a payout too. He just replied indicating that his share was donated back into the payout pool.
Given Musk is among the richest people on the planet and he’s the owner of the platform, he doesn’t exactly need the dollars, so this makes sense he would pocket the slice of the creator fund. What isn’t clear is if this share went back into being distributed as part of the payments sent today, or if it is now a new pending balance to be distributed in the future.
