Every time it seems like Elon Musk has done just about all he can to dent Twitter’s reputation, he manages to surprise us. Ever since the billionaire acquired the social media platform for $44 billion in 2022, he’s been making questionable choices about how to lead the ailing company to prosperity in an increasingly crowded and competitive arena.
Those include firing a majority of his staff, making people pay for blue check marks, and blocking the accounts of those he disagrees with. That’s in addition to strings of questionable sentiments that he personally continues to tweet, blurring the line between business leader and an elitist too far removed from reality. Within a year, more than half of Twitter’s top 1,000 companies ceased advertising on the platform.
Now, in July 2023, he’s decided to rebrand the company and he has launched a new logo: X.
That’s right…just an X.
The little blue bird we all know, recognize, and love has flown the coop, to be replaced by a sterile letter in black and white. Just “X.” It’s reminiscent of Musk’s spacecraft company, SpaceX, and it’s also a nickname for his son, X Æ A-12 (that’s not a typo, it’s actually his son’s full name…somehow, the nickname is, actually, better).
Maybe we’re numb to these abrupt and nonsensical decisions from Musk, but we can’t help but wonder how this will affect the company’s reputation. Or will it?
From a marketing standpoint, rebranding and redesigning your logo should be a chance to start fresh, to depart from your past, to make sure your company’s presence to the wider world best reflects what it really is—and what it really stands for—as efficiently and transparently as possible.
And for Musk’s Twitter, a full rebrand to “X” might be doing exactly that.
Twitter CEO Linda Yaccarino, who took on the role weeks prior to this news on June 5, said that the rebrand represents “the future state of unlimited interactivity — centered in audio, video, messaging, payments/banking — creating a global marketplace for ideas, goods, services, and opportunities.”
Its designer, meanwhile, said that the X was intended to be as good a logo as Nike’s or Apple’s.
What do you think? Is the rebrand accurate to the current company? Does the design for the logo hit the mark? Have you already moved over to Threads?
If you’re thinking about archiving your account on Twitter (sorry, X); starting over again on its competitor, Threads; or even pursuing a full rebrand yourself, the team at Mad 4 Marketing is here to help you find the right path forward—so that even if you’re staying up all night baffling over Elon Musk’s decisions, you never have to question your own.