Musk’s X Social Media Platform Discontinues Promoted Accounts Advertising
In a recent development, X, previously known as Twitter, has stopped allowing advertisers to promote their accounts within the platform’s timeline to gain new followers. This pivotal decision, communicated through an email to advertising clients carries significant implications for both X’s revenue model and the advertising landscape on the platform.
Promoted accounts, often called “Follower Objective” ads, constitute a substantial revenue stream. Advertisers have long employed these ads to enhance their presence on the platform and effectively target specific audiences.
The decision to eliminate promoted account advertising reflects X’s dedication to optimizing user experience by prioritizing diverse content formats. The shift is not solely motivated by financial considerations, as the impetus stems from X’s product group. Notably, the abruptness of this decision has caused the client team limited time to pre-inform advertisers.
Promoted accounts, characterized by their appearance as text-based posts within the platform’s timeline and equipped with a “Follow” button, have long served as a staple in X’s advertising arsenal. Nevertheless, they lack the dynamic multimedia capabilities such as video that X aims to leverage.
This alteration aligns with X’s overarching strategy to embrace novel content formats and products, even if their immediate impact on revenue is still being determined. While Follower Objective ads constitute only a fraction of X’s overall advertising revenue, this discontinuation coincides with reports of a considerable decline in the company’s ad earnings. Notably, X’s profitability remains elusive, and revenue struggles have reportedly led to payment challenges with vendors and bills.