Heading into September, Cannes seems a long time ago – not least because the idea that Elon Musk was actually trying to encourage advertisers back to X (formerly Twitter) sounds like some kind of rosé-induced fever dream. The X owner suggested the social media platform was “worth trying out,” a retreat from seven months earlier when he told advertisers to “go f—” themselves.
But according to the latest survey from Kantar, advertisers do not consider X to be worth trying out. The research firm asked 1,000 senior marketers globally about their spending plans for 2025. A net 26 percent of marketers said they plan to reduce ad spend on X in 2025, citing brand safety concerns and poor perceptions around innovation and trust as major causes for the pullback.
Through the (brand safety) floor
The findings follow a tumultuous year for the social media company, which lost half its ad revenues in 2023. Brand safety and trust are at the heart of the advertiser exodus, according to Kantar’s Media Reactions 2024 report; just 4 percent of marketers think ads on X provide brand safety. By way of contrast, 39 percent considered Google to deliver brand-safe environments.
The survey comes in the wake of Musk’s lawsuit against GARM (the Global Alliance for Responsible Media), whose Brand Safety Floor was considered the industry standard, prompting the initiative to shut down. Musk’s move followed a pattern of threatening or taking legal action against groups that report hate speech and mis- and disinformation on the platform, including the Anti-Defamation League, Media Matters and the Center for Countering Digital Hate.
Against this backdrop, trust in ads on X have only decreased under Musk’s leadership. In 2022, 22 percent of marketers considered ads on X to be trustworthy, down to 12 percent in 2024. X ads also deliver the lowest attention, in the view of the marketers, undermining any potential positive trade-offs in brand safety.
The other point Musk raised in Cannes was in improving the effectiveness of ads using AI, claiming that X was “making a lot of progress.” But again, only around 5 percent of respondents thought X ads were innovative.
“Advertisers have been moving their marketing spend away from X for several years,” said Gonca Bubani, Global Thought Leadership Director – Media at Kantar. “The stark acceleration of this trend in the past 12 months means a turnaround currently seems unlikely. Marketers are brand custodians and need to trust the platforms they use. X has changed so much in recent years and can be unpredictable from one day to the next – it’s difficult to feel confident about your brand safety in that environment.”
At the other end of the spectrum, TikTok was considered the most innovative advertising publisher, and YouTube the most trusted. New entrant Netflix was also considered among the top three most brand-safe environments. The full ranking of digital media brands by marketers’ preference was as follows:
- YouTube
- Intagram
- Netflix
- Spotify
Out of step
Kantar also surveyed views on other digital advertising trends, including AI. The research suggested marketers could be out of step with consumers when it comes to GenAI; where 71 percent of marketers said they are not bothered by AI-generated ads, 41 percent of consumers said AI-generated ads bother them.
But ad receptivity in general is on the rise, according to the report, with 47 percent of consumers reportedly receptive to ads, up from 24 percent in 2020. Ad receptivity grew by 9 percent in the last year, suggesting the introduction of ads on more channels (particularly video streaming services) could be normalising advertising for more consumers.
And the study revealed significant generational variation in the preferred ad experiences on the different platforms. According to Kantar, Gen Z prefers ads on Amazon, Facebook and Google; Millennials and Gen X favour Snapchat; and Boomers opt for TikTok.
“To thrive in today’s fragmented environment, brands have to do more than understand shifting cultural and media dynamics – they need to care about their creative quality and make sure they’re customising it for the right environment,” said Kantar’s Gonca Bubani. “That means finding opportunities to stand out meaningfully, meet consumers in their diversity, and connect with audiences in more authentic and impactful ways.”
