Twitter's revenue growth slowest since 2013; quarterly losses decline

Twitter has reported a 20% rise in revenue at $602m (£458.67m; €547.35m) for the second quarter, which is its smallest quarterly gain since 2013. The company's revenue growth has been on the decline for eight straight quarters.

However, the social media giant also reported a decline in quarterly losses. For the second quarter, its losses stood at $107m, which is an improvement over the $136m loss it incurred during the same period last year.

The dismal results come in even after the California-headquartered company witnessed a rise in new users on its microblogging site. For the most recent three-month period, Twitter claimed to have added three million new users, up 1% from the previous quarter. This takes the total number of users who log on to the site – at least once a month – to 313 million.

These numbers are extremely low when compared to Mark Zuckerberg's Facebook. According to The Wall Street Journal, since Jack Dorsey's return as CEO in July 2015, Twitter added just nine million monthly users, while Facebook's saw 164 million signing up on the site during the same period.

In a letter to shareholders, Twitter said that demand from advertisers declined more than the firm had expected. It also acknowledged that advertisers preferred other social media companies as compared to Twitter and blamed its premium pricing for hurting its appeal.

While the company did not promise to reduce advertising prices, it said that it would move into direct-response advertising, mobile video and other new segments. Anthony Noto, CFO at Twitter said, "We need to tap into other parts of the advertising budget, specifically the online video advertising budgets." According to another report, Twitter said it is planning to introduce new tools for advertisers, going forward. These are expected to include, "accurate audience verification, reserved buying, and reach and frequency planning and purchasing".

With regards to the next quarter, Twitter's outlook was bleak as far as advertising revenue is concerned. It said this business may decline or even come to a halt in the third quarter.