After disregarding the worries of major advertisers, X is shifting its attention to smaller brands, gaining support among niche businesses and promotions as it strives to meet its revenue targets.
This is a bold goal, considering that X’s top 50 advertisers alone spend close to $1 billion per year on in-app promotions, while X is currently on track to generate less than $2 billion for the full year.
This leaves X with a significant gap to cover, but with the big players staying away, it seems like there isn’t much of a choice.
As part of X’s revised SMB plan, the platform is expected to introduce a new, lower-priced tier of its Verification for Organizations package, which currently comes with a $1,000 per month price tag.
According to a post from X News Daily, X is working on a new, stripped-down “Basic” version of the offering, which will offer fewer features but will still provide brands with a gold checkmark, priority support, Premium memberships (and blue checks) for staff profiles, and access to features like job listings.
It appears that the Basic version may also come with ad credits of an as-yet-to-be-determined value, which X hopes will motivate more brands to invest in its service.
Clearly, subscriptions are the direction that X is aiming brands towards in an effort to decrease its reliance on ad revenue and bring in more direct income to support the business. So far, X has struggled to generate user sign-ups for X Premium, with fewer than 1% of X users taking the premium option. But with the promise of increased reach and ad credits, maybe more brands will consider this route.
However, it seems that X’s leadership may be overestimating the potential value of the app.
X CEO Linda Yaccarino, who’s been assigned to maximize the app’s revenue potential, recently shared a post which highlights the reach X can provide for brand promotions.
Upon closer inspection, the example actually showcases the discrepancies in X’s view data, and magnifies how misleading X’s view data can be.
It’s also not a great example of X’s algorithmic targeting.