O Twitter is expanding its business and announced the acquisition of Revue, a platform that allows the creation of newsletters. The Dutch startup is used to create, monetize and publish email newsletters with a wide range of content.

Twitter's idea is not to integrate the two services into the same platform, but to allow writers and journalists who create newsletters to connect with their audience in a simpler way through the social network.

“Our goal is to make it easier for them to connect with their subscribers, and in the meantime, help readers better discover writers and their content,” said Product Lead Kayvon Beykpour and VP of Publisher Product Mike Park said: “We’re thinking about a lot of ways to do this, from letting people subscribe to newsletters from their favorite Twitter followers, to new settings for writers to host conversations with their subscribers. It will all work seamlessly within Twitter.”

Twitter’s purchase of Revue should also allow newsletter creators to increase their monetization options. Currently, when a paid newsletter is created, subscribers pay a fee and the platform keeps a percentage of that fee. That fee is expected to be reduced by 5%.

New line of business

The product heads of the Twitter also clarified that they will not interfere with the content published in Revue, keeping the service running independently. “The Twitter team will focus on improving the ways writers create their newsletters, build their audiences, and get paid for their work.”

In November 2019, Twitter attempted to acquire another newsletter service, Substack, which operates in a similar way to Revue. After the acquisition failed, the social network changed its target and focused its efforts on another company in the sector.

The amount of Revue's purchase by Twitter was not disclosed. At the time of its creation in 2015, the developers of the newsletter service raised around 400 thousand euros from investors. Currently, according to the The New York Times, the platform team is very small, consisting of just 6 employees.

Image: Montage on image of Geralt (Pixabay) and promotional image of Revue