Will he, won’t he? At the time of writing this, Elon Musk has just threatened to walk away from a $44bn dollar takeover of Twitter citing that he has been unable to conduct his own due diligence on spam and fake accounts.
Ever since Musk first made his offer in mid-April 2022, the question of how Twitter users might feel about the possible takeover has been under speculation.
If it were solely up to Twitter users, would they want Musk to buy the social media platform? And how have the controversies surrounding the takeover affected popular sentiment? In other words, using Twitter, can we gauge whether Elon Musk has an indicator of social license to operate (SLO)?
We used Symanto technologies to conduct a voice of customer analysis on almost 100,000 Tweets over April and May 2022.
Read on to discover what we found.
The Study
For our voice of customer analysis, we looked at 98234 Tweets between April 14th (the day Elon Musk first announced his interest in buying Twitter) and May 31st 2022.
We analysed volume over time, total net sentiment and net sentiment over time as well as key psychographic indicators such as customer loyalty and personality traits.
Elon Musk x Twitter Timeline
In order to better understand our findings (namely our time-sensitive findings), it’s important to be aware of their context. Here is a timeline of relevant events during the timeframe of our study.
Psychographics
Personality traits
61% of Twitter users in our study had an emotional profile. That is to say, they’re feelings (as opposed to objective facts) drove their opinions as expressed in their Tweets.
Customer loyalty
24% of users in our study represent Twitter loyalists. These are users with a strong positive sentiment and high emotionality. At the other end of the spectrum, 7% of users are “at-risk” of churning, expressing high emotionality and a strongly negative sentiment.
Net Sentiment
The majority of Tweets are neutral, meaning that they neither clearly support or reject the deal. A net sentiment score of +23% suggests that, overall, more people are in favour of the deal than are against it.
Volume of Mentions and Net Sentiment Over Time
The following graph shows the volume of posts and Twitter net sentiment between April 14th and May 31st 2022.
The peak in the volume of Tweets corresponds with the April 25th announcement that Twitter had accepted Musk’s offer. Interestingly, the details and controversies (such as the accusation of stock manipulation) did not generate anywhere near as much conversation as the announcement itself.
Individual announcements, however, (Trump returning to Twitter, free speech, the accusation of stock manipulation etc.) did polarise and find clear supporters and opponents that impacted sentiment.
Do Social Media Voices Constitute an Indicator of Social Licence to Operate (SLO)?
From the perspective of the Twitter community itself, it would appear that Musk does have an indicator of SLO. The majority of Tweets are neutral, but the number of Tweets in support of the deal outweighs opposing voices. Although there is some controversy, on balance, the general consensus seems to be that people are in favour of Musk’s takeover.
It appears, however, that Musk’s main consideration, at least at the moment, is the number of legitimate Twitter accounts and daily users. We’ll have to wait and see what happens next.
Run a Voice of Customer Analysis With Symanto
You can run your own voice of customer analysis to help you gauge the sentiment of your customer base or wider community on a topic of your choosing.
Our technologies will provide you with a detailed report of the net sentiment, volume of mentions, psychographics and more. With these valuable insights, you can make informed, data-based decisions about your business strategy moving forward.
To try it out for yourself, get in touch or book your free personalised demonstration.
