4 ms·

I don't intend to be mean, but I think your statement is trivially disprovable: $4.8B annual revenue, even if every advertiser spent $1M annually, that's 4,800

I don't intend to be mean, but I think your statement is trivially disprovable: $4.8B annual revenue, even if every advertiser spent $1M annually, that's 4,800 advertisers who all require inside reps. If each rep can handle 100 clients (unlikely; that's less than 1 hour / month attention), they would need 480 inside reps alone just to keep ad agencies happy.

nemo44x 4y ago
No they don’t all require inside sales reps. Most advertising can be automated. 95% of clients can self serve. They ran this website 12 years ago with the same number of users and like 200 people.
- neurostimulant 4y ago
  Who the heck willing to drop millions without having access to sales rep at all? Even Google, known as the king of self-service, still has account managers for large ads, workspace and gcp customers.
  - MichaelZuo 4y ago
    Advertisers who see even better click-through rates per dollar spend.
- mikeyouse 4y ago
  It was 1,000 people and 50% fewer users -- and notably, no revenue. If you think they're going to be able to keep any substantial portion of that $4.5b in revenue by telling advertisers to self serve...
- tedunangst 4y ago
  12 years ago twitter had $7 Million in ad revenue.
- fzeroracer 4y ago
  Both of your statements are just absurdly wrong that they're not even worth engaging with. 12 years ago we didn't have stuff like GDPR or CCPA or any number of data compliance laws that require a full team around to prevent getting fined into oblivion.
  - nemo44x 4y ago
    Why did you engage then? And no it doesn’t require a full team, lol. Literally you just need to delete the user data. A single button makes you compliant.
- lm28469 4y ago
  > Most advertising can be automated. I don't think you ever worked with advertiser directly at that scale, I worked in a company that did on a smaller scale and it was hell on earth, no way to automate that, we had 10 people just for them and they were overworked
zuminator 4y ago
4800/100 = 48, what am I missing?
- nemo44x 4y ago
  He’s just another guy making up bullshit jobs.
  - edmundsauto 4y ago
    In some sense, all jobs are bullshit jobs. But I have to ask if you're doing ok - this isn't an appropriate response to my Fermi estimate.
- edmundsauto 4y ago
  Yes, good catch! Add in maybe 20% for management and it's still a manageable amount of headcount. The $1M/advertiser does a lot of the lifting here - so I looked into it a little more. In 2016, Twitter had 130k advertisers[0], some can self-serve but many need inside sales reps. Fermi estimates are crude, but the point is there are many non-engineering functions that are absolutely critical. Many HN folks seem to think like Elon, that these roles are unnecessary. I disagree. [0] https://www.marketingdive.com/news/twitter-increases-number-of-advertisers-90-year-over-year/413732/ https://www.marketingdive.com/news/twitter-increases-number-...

nemo44x 4y ago

No they don’t all require inside sales reps. Most advertising can be automated. 95% of clients can self serve. They ran this website 12 years ago with the same number of users and like 200 people.

neurostimulant 4y ago
Who the heck willing to drop millions without having access to sales rep at all? Even Google, known as the king of self-service, still has account managers for large ads, workspace and gcp customers.
- MichaelZuo 4y ago
  Advertisers who see even better click-through rates per dollar spend.
mikeyouse 4y ago
It was 1,000 people and 50% fewer users -- and notably, no revenue. If you think they're going to be able to keep any substantial portion of that $4.5b in revenue by telling advertisers to self serve...
tedunangst 4y ago
12 years ago twitter had $7 Million in ad revenue.
fzeroracer 4y ago
Both of your statements are just absurdly wrong that they're not even worth engaging with. 12 years ago we didn't have stuff like GDPR or CCPA or any number of data compliance laws that require a full team around to prevent getting fined into oblivion.
- nemo44x 4y ago
  Why did you engage then? And no it doesn’t require a full team, lol. Literally you just need to delete the user data. A single button makes you compliant.
lm28469 4y ago
> Most advertising can be automated. I don't think you ever worked with advertiser directly at that scale, I worked in a company that did on a smaller scale and it was hell on earth, no way to automate that, we had 10 people just for them and they were overworked

zuminator 4y ago

4800/100 = 48, what am I missing?

nemo44x 4y ago
He’s just another guy making up bullshit jobs.
- edmundsauto 4y ago
  In some sense, all jobs are bullshit jobs. But I have to ask if you're doing ok - this isn't an appropriate response to my Fermi estimate.
edmundsauto 4y ago
Yes, good catch! Add in maybe 20% for management and it's still a manageable amount of headcount. The $1M/advertiser does a lot of the lifting here - so I looked into it a little more. In 2016, Twitter had 130k advertisers[0], some can self-serve but many need inside sales reps. Fermi estimates are crude, but the point is there are many non-engineering functions that are absolutely critical. Many HN folks seem to think like Elon, that these roles are unnecessary. I disagree. [0] https://www.marketingdive.com/news/twitter-increases-number-of-advertisers-90-year-over-year/413732/ https://www.marketingdive.com/news/twitter-increases-number-...