X’s Ad Business Improved Under Departing Ceo Linda Yaccarino, But It’s Still Tough Times Ahead

Former NBCU advertisement exec Linda Yaccarino’s tenure astatine X whitethorn person been reasonably short — conscionable 2 years from commencement to decorativeness — but she did negociate to make an effect connected nan societal network’s advertisement business, caller information from advertisement intelligence patient Guideline shows. Yaccarino will beryllium leaving X successful a amended position pinch its advertisers than she recovered it, it says.

In nan U.S., advertisement spending was up 62% year-over-year successful nan first half of 2025, Guideline notes. In addition, Yaccarino antecedently claimed that 96% of X’s advertisers returned to X arsenic of May 2025.

However, it took clip for X’s advertizing business to move around, and it remains a turbulent business.

Yaccarino’s departure could person a important effect connected X’s profitability, arsenic nan institution is obscurity adjacent fresh to trust wholly connected different gross streams. Its X Premium subscriptions, for example, only relationship for a mini information of its business, and it hasn’t yet launched its broader ambitions astir an X Money payments service.

Yaccarino first joined X successful June 2023 aft spending astir 12 years astatine NBCUniversal, wherever she had been president of world advertizing and partnerships. At nan time, X (then called Twitter) was facing a captious advertizing downturn.

Many of nan first cuts to advertisement walk were prompted by Elon Musk’s takeover of nan web successful October 2022. With cuts to Twitter staff, including its Trust and Safety division, misinformation and dislike reside proliferated — which advertisers wanted nothing to do with. Reuters noted that 14 of nan 30 apical advertisers stopped each their advertizing connected nan platform, and 4 advertisers had reduced their spending from 92% to 98.7% astir that time.

Guideline’s information recovered that 89% of Twitter/X’s U.S. advertisement dollars were eroded successful nan 2 years betwixt Q3 2022 and Q3 2024. (These declines had really begun successful Q2 2022, aft it was revealed that Musk bought a 9.4% liking successful nan company, nan patient told TechCrunch via email.)

By early 2023, reports surfaced that much than 500 of Twitter’s advertisers had near nan platform, and fourth-quarter revenues dropped by 35%.

Citing soul documents, The New York Times reported that nan societal network’s U.S. advertisement business was down 59% from a twelvemonth earlier, from nan 5 weeks betwixt April 1 and nan first week of May 2023, reaching $88 million. Its play income projections were besides down by arsenic overmuch arsenic 30%. X past tried luring advertisers backmost pinch advertisement credits.

There were hints that Yaccarino was moving down nan scenes to repair things, though.

A twelvemonth aft she joined X, nan Times reported that 65% of advertisers had returned, citing recordings of soul meetings astatine nan company. In August 2023, Yaccarino claimed that X’s operational tally complaint was adjacent to “break even.”

Image Credits:Bryce Durbin

But nan business worsened again that twelvemonth pinch an advertiser boycott.

In November 2023, brands including Apple, Disney, and IBM paused their advertisement spending connected X in nan aftermath of Musk’s endorsement of an antisemitic post. The societal web was already connected way for a astir 55% year-over-year diminution successful worldwide advertisement spending, according to eMarketer estimates, and this boycott threatened to worsen nan business further.

Musk had besides been a situation for Yaccarino during her clip pinch nan company. The X proprietor and SpaceX exec famously told X advertisers leaving to “go fuck yourself,” calling their departure a shape of blackmail. When cursing astatine them didn’t work, X sued instead, saying theirs was an “illegal boycott.” (The suit was expanded successful early 2025 to see much advertisers, specified arsenic LEGO and Shell.)

The threat of litigation worked — companies including Verizon and Ralph Lauren resumed advertizing connected nan level aft receiving ineligible threats, The Wall Street Journal reported successful June 2025. The World Federation of Advertisers (WFA) besides suspended nan operations of its Global Alliance for Responsible Media (GARM) nonprofit aft nan suit was revenge against it.

Guideline’s information besides indicates that X has seen accrued U.S. advertisement walk since December 2024 — nan first clip since Musk bought nan company, it says. From Q3 2024 to Q4 2024, spending was up 37.7%, influenced by nan U.S. statesmanlike elections.

During Yaccarino’s time, X besides made moves to guarantee much marque safety, partnering pinch adtech companies DoubleVerify and Integral Ad Science (IAS) to pass them if ads were placed astir inappropriate content. It besides offered brands devices to set nan sensitivity of wherever their ads were displayed connected nan app, wherever much “relaxed” advertisement slots would costs less, and those pinch higher information concerns would salary more. Later, X introduced ways for advertisers to tally their ads adjacent to a curated group of contented creators.

None of this has stopped X from being a arguable level pinch respect to advertisement safety.

This week, for instance, nan site’s AI bot Grok went disconnected nan rails aft experiencing antisemitic outbursts requiring X to return it offline. Now, alternatively of facing different advertisement crisis, Yaccarino is leaving — though her determination was reportedly made anterior to nan Grok incident.