There’s an unexpected, yet not surprising, storm brewing in the Twitter-verse. Elon Musk, known for his spontaneous and at times destabilizing decisions, has ignited a clash of titans within the realm of social media and advertising.
This time, his aim is focused on Twitter, a platform he recently took over, with ramifications that might just thwart the ambitions of new CEO Linda Yaccarino.
A move that rattles the advertising sphere
Just this past Saturday, Musk declared a temporary limit on the number of tweets users can consume daily. This measure, ostensibly designed to curtail rampant data scraping and manipulation, carries a hidden undertow that threatens to undermine Yaccarino’s goals.
Users have already reported hitting an impervious wall, unable to view tweets, including those from corporate advertisers. This has left them staring at blank screens in frustration and advertisers questioning their investment in the platform.
Yaccarino, once an advertising luminary at NBCUniversal, stepped into the role of CEO only last month. Her mission: to mend bridges with advertisers who had distanced themselves following Musk’s takeover of Twitter.
Now, this new restriction imposed by Musk appears to be more of a barricade than a bridge, presenting an unexpected hurdle in Yaccarino’s endeavor.
Musk’s move: A distress signal for Twitter’s future
This cap on tweet consumption isn’t just bad news; it’s a remarkably damaging blow to both users and advertisers. Mike Proulx, Research Director at Forrester, noted this move amplifies an existing deficit in advertiser trust.
This chasm that Yaccarino is tasked with bridging just widened, and her industry credibility alone might not suffice to reverse the damage.
Equally vocal about the matter, Lou Paskalis, the founder of AJL Advisory and ex-marketing chief at Bank of America, posits Yaccarino as Musk’s “last best hope” to restore ad revenue and salvage Twitter’s value.
However, the imposed tweet limit seems to contradict her ability to do so. It’s a move that signals Musk’s inability to allow Yaccarino to rescue Twitter from its self-inflicted wounds.
Initially, unverified accounts faced a limit of 600 daily posts, with newer unverified accounts capped at 300. Verified accounts, conversely, could browse 6,000 posts a day. However, Musk increased these limits just hours later, signaling an uneasy calibration of his new policy.
This cap, according to Jasmine Enberg, Principal Analyst at Insider Intelligence, may potentially be “catastrophic” for Twitter’s ad business.
The platform’s appeal to advertisers is already dwindling, and this latest measure won’t make the task of convincing them to return any easier. Olivia Wedderburn of TMW Unlimited, went as far as advising her clients to cease investing in Twitter immediately.
Ultimately, Musk’s decision comes as Twitter has started requiring users to be logged in to view tweets, a “temporary emergency measure” to fight data scraping, as Musk referred to it.
While the imposed restrictions appear to be effective in blocking third parties from data scraping, according to Kai-Cheng Yang, a researcher at Indiana University, it’s at the cost of disengaging Twitter’s active users.
This measure, in its attempt to solve one issue, may inadvertently birth a new set of problems for Twitter – problems that Yaccarino might find increasingly difficult to overcome.
