UTV joins hands with IZEA for sponsored tweets in India

With social media marketing gaining acceptance and importance among marketers, IZEA Holdings, Inc, a global social media sponsorship company, has announced an exclusive partnership with Indian media and entertainment company UTV to bring their SponsoredTweets.com platform to India.

This partnership with help UTV to connect advertisers with IZEA’s international celebrities such as Kim Kardashian, Diddy, Nick Cannon, Lindsay Lohan as well as create new monetisation opportunities for the estimated 12 million Twitter users in India.

UTV’s exclusive roster of Indian celebrities, including Lara Dutta, Mahesh Bhupati, Anurag Kashyap, Rohan Bopanna, and Neetu Chandra, among others, will join the site and soon be available for potential Twitter sponsorship opportunities.

Commenting on the partnership, Sameer Pitalwalla, Senior Vice President, Interactive – UTV, said, “In just six months, UTV’s ability to monetise digital rights for celebrities has become unparalleled across platforms, be it via voice, video, web and now social media. IZEA’s SponsoredTweets.com is the ideal platform for advertisers, celebrities and users to connect and capitalise on their Twitter presence.”

Social media continues to see global growth with 1.5 billion visits to social networks per day. From 2010 to 2011 there was an 18 per cent increase in Fortune Global 100 companies using Twitter. The largest growth was in Asia-Pacific corporate Twitter accounts, a 68 per cent year over year increase.

Talking about the growth of social media, Ted Murphy, Chief Executive Officer, IZEA, said, “Social media is a global phenomenon. Our goal is to provide sponsorship opportunities to advertisers and social media publishers around the world. I am incredibly excited about our partnership with UTV. IZEA’s technology coupled with UTV’s expansive reach and celebrity roster can provide an incredible to advertisers and opens up a new market for our company.”