Twitter’s New Business Plan Marks Shift to Video, Commerce

Elon Musk and new Twitter CEO Linda Yaccarino shared a platform vision heavy on creator-commerce partnerships as well as video, which has grown vertical engagement to “more than 10 percent” of user time on the social service. The duo said on a video call with investors last week that the company is pursuing collaborations with entertainment figures, politicians, media publishers and payment services, and that Twitter is securing “money transmitter licenses” in each of the 50 U.S. states as part of Musk’s vision to turn the service into a super app.

The slideshow also touted “Tucker on Twitter,” a brand exclusive featuring former Fox News host Tucker Carlson. The presentation marked the first time Yaccarino faced Twitter investors after officially starting her new job June 5, according to Reuters.

Yaccarino was chair of advertising for NBCUniversal but left to join Musk in reinvigorating the social platform he purchased in October for $44 billion. It then spiraled into paroxysms “of chaos, including layoffs of thousands of employees, criticism over lax content moderation, and an exodus of many advertisers who did not want their ads appearing next to inappropriate content,” Reuters writes.

Yaccarino offered investors assurance that ad spending in prime categories (including consumer packaged goods, health and financial services) is now up by roughly 40 percent, year-over-year.

While some ad-buying firms issued “pause” recommendations to their clients shortly after Musk took over, the presentation included a slide indicating the sanction had been lifted by all major ad-buying agencies, with “well-known brands including Warner Bros, Mondelez, McDonald’s and Walmart” resuming advertising after initial pauses.

But Gizmodo reports that not everything is going smoothly, writing that “Twitter ran ads from household-name brands like Disney, Microsoft, and The Telegraph newspaper alongside neo-Nazi propaganda” just last week.

Speaking Friday at what The Wall Street Journal described as “an at times raucous audience” at a tech conference in Paris, Musk said Yaccarino understands advertiser concerns and “will do a great job” addressing them.

Asked about the impact of artificial intelligence, Musk said it is “probably the most disruptive technology ever” and warned it “could have ‘a potentially catastrophic outcome,’” WSJ writes.

While in France, Musk met with President Emmanuel Macron and had lunch with LVMH Moët Hennessy CEO Bernard Arnault, who is currently second to Musk on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

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