Small and medium-sized business are jumping on the chance for advertising on X (formerly Twitter) as a wave of big advertisers are leaving.
The smaller business believe they’ll be able to reach a wider audience and maybe even buy ads on the cheap.
“I’m no longer competing with the big guns,” one business owner said. “All the top investors and high-profile business people I want to reach are still on the platform.”
Major advertisers including Disney, IBM, and Comcast have removed hundreds of millions of ad dollars away from X over controversies surrounding antisemitism.
The drop in ads is also becoming a major problem for Elon Musk’s company. While X is attempting to grow business lines, 75% of revenue still stems from advertising, and 80% of advertising revenue comes from large businesses advertisements.
Reports suggest the company is set to bring in $2.5 billion in ad revenue, which is less than the $3 billion projected, and a serious miss from the $4 billion made last year.
“We want to do MORE for small and medium sized businesses. With X, we’re now positioned to become a single interface for SMBs.”
A spokesperson noted that small and medium businesses can easily purchase ads without needing an agency, aren’t committed to a long-term contract, and can spend whatever amount they like.
One advertiser said some amount of hate speech on the platform is “inevitable,” however, he said the reinstatement of conspiracy theorist Alex Jones made him question spending for ads. “I’m furious at Elon… why would he do that?”
Last month, Musk told advertisers to “go f**k themselves,” even though he hinted without them, the company would go belly up.
According to users of X, they’ve seen a bunch of random advertisers lately.
“I’ve gotten the most random ads – Invest Qatar, The Investor’s Edge, NextAfter – I’ve never heard of any of these. Seems like they’re scraping the bottom of the barrel,” said one user.
