What Does Elon Musk Twitter Acquisition Mean For Brands and Advertisers ?

For a few years now, Twitter's toughest business challenge has been convincing advertisers that it's a safe place to invest. Before the breakthrough, the service was fast, but also a very unpredictable platform: depending on the moment of the day (and with no clear rational link), your ad could have appeared next to a funny meme or a neo-Nazi tweet. For many marketers, this was a reason to stay away from it in order to protect brand reputation.

To try and solve this problem, Twitter’s strategy so far has been to adopt a far too stringent content and account filtering, opting for an extreme moderation.

A company that once considered itself "the free speech wing of the free speech party" now aggressively controls the words. As it became safer for the brands to navigate through a more moderate and more controlled content, advertising revenue increased. Last year, Twitter earned $ 5.08 billion, a 37% increase compared to the previous year.

Considering Twitter’s current set up for brands and advertisers, Musk would not be the best of allies. His decisions are therefore, not driven by profit gain objectives but mainly by the will of bringing change within the company and its current set up.

He seems quite interested in changing Twitter's product and policy, even at the expense of profits.

Below are the main changed about Twitter that Elon Musk twitted he wants to change :

· Remove advertising on Twitter subscriptions

· More freedom of expression

· Ability to edit tweets (feature that is coming anyway)

· An open algorithm

· A more decentralised social network, in the users’ hands

For Musk in fact the moderation of content ands Twitter’s attempt to control the freedom of speech has been a reason of strong critique, despite the better profits coming from it, thanks to a major trust that brands and advertisers had in the platform. While he was buying the shares, Musk clearly said that "to not adhere to the principles of free speech fundamentally undermines democracy. For this reason, Musk is stepping into a conflictual first interaction with the company's stakeholders as he is pushing for a rollback of content moderation.

Advertisers want convenience and, without it Twitter’s revenue will be impacted as brands might decide or might have to abandon Twitter for the second time, not to take any risk on brand perception.

Musk, on the other hand, wants Twitter to go back to its roots, to open, unfiltered debate and to free-wheeling confrontation.

In short, the richest man in the world has decided to shell out a few dollars to have his own, tailor-made social.

Clearly, Elon is willing to keep his roots on Earth, before taking another flight to who knows what other planet!