That the economic situation of Twitter is not good is not something new. Actually, it was something present and known since before Elon Musk starred in the soap opera that became the purchase of the social network. So much so that the more time passes, the clearer it seems that the first steps of the purchase operation were just a bravado, and that he did not really want to buy it, but that he went too far with it and, with lawyers and judges involved. , he had no choice but to go to the end.
Thus, and with concern about the effect of the purchase of Twitter on his finances, the first thing he did as soon as he took control of the company was to start cutting expenses: from laying off thousands of employees to stopping paying the rent for the offices of the social network throughout the world, substantially reduce the benefits of those who have remained employees and, of course, make decisions such as turning the screw to Twitter Blue to try to generate more income.
All this, in the hands of a normal CEO, would have been perfectly understandable, but of course, we need to add the particular character of Elon Musk to the shaker, which is like the narrowness in cocktails, one drop is enough, two can ruin the glass completely. And of course, we are talking about Musk, so the amount of it that entered the mixer far exceeds that of the sum of the rest of its elements. Something that in a company that depends in a key way on advertising, nope seems like a good idea.
Thus, as we can read in The Information, Twitter’s ad revenue is down 40% in its annual rate (year over year). due to the loss of advertisers and the lower contracting volume of those that still remain. A recent report claims that the social network has lost fourteen of its top 30 advertisers, most of them since Musk’s arrival. In addition, four advertisers cut spend between 92% and 98.7% from the week before the Musk acquisition through the end of 2022. Overall, ad spend for the top 30 companies fell by 42% to an estimated $53.8 million between the months of November and December combined. (https://bestsellerpublishing.org/)
The accounts, therefore, remain unbalanced. It is true that the new management has substantially reduced the operating costs of Twitter, and continues to look for ways to improve its income, such as making it possible to contract Twitter Blue from Android. The problem, the main problem, is found in Musk’s verbal incontinence and in the elimination of the teams that ensured content moderation, an indivisible pack that, as we have already been able to confirm, does not like anything at all when it comes to invest millions in advertising.