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It’s rare for corporate brands to become so intertwined with everyday conversation that they become verbs. It’s rarer still for the owner of such a brand to announce plans to intentionally destroy it.
On Sunday, in the middle of a quiet summer weekend, Elon Musk decreed that Twitter’s product name would be changed to “X,” and that he is getting rid of the bird logo and all the associated words, including “tweet.”
Musk’s move wiped out anywhere between US$4 billion and US$20 billion in value, according to analysts and brand agencies.
“It took 15-plus years to earn that much equity worldwide, so losing Twitter as a brand name is a significant financial hit,” said Steve Susi, director of brand communication at Siegel & Gale.
Musk, whose company has already declined significantly in value since he purchased it for US$44 billion in October, announced the change on Saturday night. By Monday morning a new black “X” logo, designed by a fan over the weekend, began to appear across the site. New chief executive officer Linda Yaccarino outlined the company’s vision for X to become a site for audio, video, messaging, payments and banking.
Analysts and brand agencies call the product’s renaming a mistake. Twitter is one of the most recognisable social media brands, said Todd Irwin, founder of brand agency Fazer.
Bird decals adorn small businesses and websites worldwide, alongside Instagram and Facebook logos.
Twitter’s popularity has also made verbs like “tweet” and “retweet” part of modern culture, used regularly to explain how celebrities, politicians and others communicated with the public, said Joshua White, assistant professor of finance at Vanderbilt University.
X will require the company to rebuild that cultural pull and linguistic consensus from scratch.
But that may be part of the motivation, so users stop comparing Twitter post-takeover to what it was before. — Bloomberg
Online Reporter