Recently updated: May 25th, 2023
It’s all over the news and almost every one of us now knows that Elon Musk has bought Twitter. On 25th April 2022, Twitter accepted the bid of Elon Musk to take over the social media company for $44 billion. Elon Musk is far and wide famous for being the richest man on the planet and is the owner of Tesla, Space X, and now Twitter as well.
Elon Musk said that Twitter is the digital town square where vital matters related to the future are debated. He has taken a pledge to overhaul the current content moderation tactics of Twitter and promote free speech – which is, of course, the basic right of every human being. Since Twitter is considered an important part of social media marketing, it is natural for digital marketers to ponder upon what changes they can expect from this change in ownership and how it is going to affect their strategies.
It’s been only a week since Elon Musk has taken over Twitter, and many digital marketers and brands are already witnessing major fluctuations in their number of followers. Now, everybody is asking what changes can we expect on Twitter and how those changes are going to affect the brands that are on Twitter? Let’s find out.
What Changes to Expect Now Twitter Is Owned by Elon Musk
Content Moderation Rules Are Expected to Be a Bit Relaxed.
As Elon Musk calls himself a “free speech absolutist” and criticizes what he sees as excessive content moderation on online platforms. He made this belief as a foundation to explain why he wants to take over Twitter. According to Elon Musk, social media networks like Twitter should not delete comments that look offensive but are legal. He believes that if some tweet is in a gray area, it should exist.
While a significant number of experts are criticizing him for his vision of freedom of speech and forecasting that Twitter will become a platform for hate speech, the vice-versa is also true. Too much content moderation often prevents victims from exposing those who stay in the limelight while doing shady things behind the screen. It will also provide content creators and digital marketers more freedom to put forward their views, messages, and analysis openly, resulting in more diverse content and more perspectives than we are used to.
Still, it is yet to be seen how Twitter will be seen in the upcoming years under the new ownership.
Introduction of Edit Button So That People Can Alter Their Tweets
Right from the start, Twitter didn’t provide any way to edit tweets and correct them.
Musk advocates that people should have a way to change what they had said in their tweets. But this proposal has given rise to a heated debate among students, journalists, and other users of the platform.
A lot of people are thinking that an edit button on the Twitter platform would be greatly abused by people. Bad people can use it the wrong way to cover up their abuse and harassment. However, if safeguards will be put in place, this problem can be solved to a great extent.
Most of us have heard about the possible abuse of the edit button on Twitter. Now, let’s see the bright side of this proposed feature.
In essence, an Edit button on Twitter is something that we all want because, with the auto-typing and auto-dictionary feature, mistakes have become far too common for smartphone users. It’s going to help all kinds of businesses and brands that use Twitter for marketing purposes by being more forgiving for unintended mistakes and giving a way to correct them right away.
Any kind of mistake in a message impacts how people perceive a business, brand, or individual. We know that most brands scrutinize their messages, but there have been many examples where big brands and celebrities receive immense criticism for silly mistakes. And there are many great examples of tweets that have gone horribly wrong.
For instance, U.S. Airlines learned the importance of double and triple checking their messages and links the hard way when their account’s publisher replied to a customer complaint with a link to a pornographic image. Now, imagine the embarrassment the U.S. Airlines had to face at that time.
Big celebrities, like Selene Gomez, Cameron Dallas, Harry Styles, Justin Bieber, Taylor Swift, Miley Cyrus, and the list goes on and on, who have tasted the pain that comes from typos. They all could have surely used the Edit button if there would be one.
When you research in-depth, you will find that it’s common for people to make the goofiest and cringe-worthy mistakes. Another thing that makes it even worse is – the tweets that have typos or silly mistakes caused by copy and paste problems look like they have been infinitely re-tweeted, making a business or individual even more infamous. Even though there is an option to delete tweets, an edit button can save the reputation of many brands and personalities.
No Advertisements, Resulting in Generation of More Organic Content
Now, that’s a huge change for digital marketers and brands that rely on paid promotions to attract attention and improve their bottom line. As Twitter has become a private company, there is less pressure to continually grow the revenue that comes from advertisements.
Elon Musk has proposed a subscription model, and Twitter has already taken a step in this direction last year. It introduced Twitter Blue as a premium service that costs only $2.99 a month. Its users enjoy additional features, for instance, an Undo button that allows them to recall their tweets even before they are sent.
Musk proposed Twitter Blue to be cheaper and to accept Dogecoin cryptocurrency for subscription payment. He believes that if people are paying, they shouldn’t have to see ads.
What it means for digital marketers is to focus more on creating posts and messages that can gain attention without being posted as sponsored ads. It will surely the shift from paid content to quality organic content.
That’s all from us. Let us know what you think about the changes that have been proposed by Elon Musk to Twitter.
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