How will Elon Musk’s Twitter Move Impact Businesses? An Expert Weighs In

Elon Musk has recently announced he has struck a deal with Twitter, with the hopes to buy the platform for $44 billion (AUD61.5 billion). This comes after he acquired a 9.2 percent stake in the social media platform.

In a statement by Musk, he shared that Twitter is ‘the platform for free speech around the world’, but needs to ‘to be transformed as a private company’.

He has also previously tweeted out his disdain for Twitter ads, claiming they should be gone forever. “The power of corporations to dictate policy is greatly enhanced if Twitter depends on advertising money to survive,” he wrote in a since-deleted tweet.

Elon Musk | via CEO Magazine

So, if he does take over the platform, what will it mean for businesses moving forward? According to Sam O’Brien, CMO of Performance at Affise, an open-source platform could impact Twitter users in many ways, and lead to businesses migrating to other platforms.

“To favour a subscription-based model over advertiser funding would make Twitter less beholden to advertiser pressure, allowing businesses to advertise at a much cheaper price” he said. “However, the platform being less focused on advertising along with other controversial alterations to the platform could impact businesses and advertisers’ reach to their audiences, as users may choose to migrate to alternative platforms.”

It’s not just businesses that could be affected by the move, said O’Brien. “Financially, this could also impact Twitter as it would need to invest in significant amounts of its resources to reconfigure its tech stack, in order to switch off ads and data collection for a limited group of users paying to remove ads from their feeds,” he shared.

“Musk’s changes to curb moderation and promote free speech on the platform is also likely to impact Twitter’s commercial interests, having a negative impact on both active users and advertisers’ willingness to be present on the platform.”

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