On July 24, Elon Musk made the shock announcement that Twitter could be rebranding as ‘X’, with a brand new emblem and model id arriving shortly after that announcement. Shortly after, X.com began redirecting (302) to Twitter.com.
Any skilled search engine optimisation is aware of how perilous a significant web site migration could be, and Twitter.com has been accumulating authority for 17 years. Listed here are a few stats from Moz’s Area Overview software:
These are numbers most websites may solely envy, with practically 12M rating key phrases on Google.com alone. Over time, X.com may get well many or a lot of the non-branded rankings, however what concerning the fairness in searches for the Twitter model?
Model search: It’s difficult
In response to our information, there are 8.4 Million searches a month in the US only for the phrase “twitter” (and that’s most likely a conservative estimate), however model search goes far deeper than that. Contemplate the Google outcome for simply the letters “tw”:
Not solely does Twitter rank #1 for simply “tw”, however Google is sending sturdy model indicators, together with expanded sitelinks and a Data Graph entry. Whereas many potential websites and searches start with “tw”, Google has decided that Twitter.com is — in their very own lingo — the dominant interpretation. That is spectacular even by large-brand requirements.
One thing distinctive to social networks is that folks additionally pair different search phrases with the community’s identify. So, we see many searches for distinguished figures and types, akin to:
We additionally see brand-like indicators for matters paired with the phrase “Twitter”, distinguished Twitter personalities (even with out the model identify), inquiries like “Twitter search” and “Twitter login”, and official spinoffs, like “Tweetdeck.” Even common memes can return brand-like indicators.
As well as, Twitter qualifies for a novel, carousel-style format just like the one under:
This type of prime actual property on Google outcomes could carry over to the X model, however that’s completely at Google’s discretion and will rely upon the energy of the brand new model.
Quantifying Twitter’s model energy
Throughout the roughly 12 Million search queries Twitter ranked for in Moz’s information, we examined simply those that acquired 150+ searches per 30 days and the place Twitter ranked on web page one, which left us with about 600,000 distinctive queries.
We analyzed these 600K queries for model indicators and ended up with 10,149 search queries. Whereas this may occasionally not appear to be rather a lot in comparison with 12 Million, it represents an enormous affect of the Twitter model. All instructed, these 10K queries drive over 18 Million searches per 30 days.
The issue for ‘X’ is that the overwhelming majority of those brand-like searches reference Twitter or related model phrases (like “tweet” and “Tweetdeck”) instantly. To recapture this search quantity and visitors long-term, ‘X’ must attain a stage of name consciousness the place searchers are actively on the lookout for phrases like “Taylor Swift X” and “Fortnite X’.
The complicated historical past of X.com
X.com at present ranks for no key phrases in our databases, attributable to various long-term points. It doesn’t take plenty of math to let you know that this drives zero model searches. This case will undoubtedly change, however X.com faces one other problem — it has been used to accommodate various websites (with a number of house owners) and likewise has redirected to Musk’s wider model portfolio. To know X.com’s greater than 25-year historical past, you really want to see it.
The early years (1995–2000)
Utilizing the Web Archive’s Wayback Machine, we are able to seize a little bit of this complicated historical past. The X.com area was initially owned by Dave Weinstein, who launched the positioning in 1995 or 1996, in fairly typical mid-Nineties trend:
Sadly, the record of stuff that Rob Walker may need is misplaced to the sands of time.
In 1999, Elon Musk purchased the area for the primary time (he would later re-buy it from eBay). Right here’s a screenshot from early 2000 of the unique X.com on-line banking web site:
Till the current rebranding of Twitter to ‘X’, this 2000-era web site was the one one to ever home the X.com model as initially envisioned.
The PayPal years (2000–2011)
On account of a rocky interval at PayPal after the merger of X.com and Confinity, the X.com model gave technique to varied PayPal manufacturers. Within the spring of 2000, the positioning was briefly rebranded as “X-Finance” after which “X-PayPal” (proven under):
By the autumn of 2000, Musk was ousted as CEO at PayPal, and this web site was rebranded as simply “PayPal” in early 2001. This endured for some time, with X.com finally redirecting to the PayPal web site. The ‘X’ model was nowhere to be seen at this level.
In late 2007, X.com was resurrected as PayPal Labs (captured right here in 2008):
PayPal Labs endured for some time, adopted by a handful of PayPal experiments, together with this “X.com weblog” that seems to don’t have anything to do with the ‘X’ model (display shot from July 2009):
These look like the one two posts the X.com weblog ever had, till it was changed in spring of 2010 with the PayPal-X Developer Community (to not be confused with X-PayPal):
In summer season of 2011, this web site was changed by a brand new three way partnership of eBay (which had acquired PayPal in 2002), PayPal, and Magento referred to as “X-commerce”.
X.com[merce] (2011–2014)
X.commerce, a play on the X.com area, housed “a brand new enterprise in commerce” that sought to combine the eBay, PayPal, and Magento developer communities:
X.commerce went by various iterations, surviving till February of 2014. At that time, eBay appears to have given up on the X.commerce enterprise and redirected X.com on to eBay’s company web site (ebayinc.com).
The Boring hat (2017–2023)
In July of 2017, Elon Musk repurchased X.com and changed the home-page with simply the letter ‘x’. Quickly after, X.com redirected to The Boring Firm, however to not the home-page — to a web page to purchase a hat:
Roughly a yr later, this was changed by an below building web page paying homage to the late Nineties, whereas residing unironically in 2018:
This web page quickly returned to the letter ‘x’ on a white background. Notice that the essential ‘x’ web page contained no HTML supply code in any respect nor any clues concerning the nature of the ‘X’ model or web site. It was actually only one character. This endured till July of 2023, when X.com was 302-redirected to Twitter.com, which is its present standing as of this writing.
The lengthy, unsure street forward
The unusual historical past of X.com — no matter my private emotions — is an search engine optimisation and branding nightmare. X.com has been used and abused by varied house owners and has spent years simply being the letter ‘x’ on a white web page, with completely no clues as to the model’s function.
Throughout this time, X.com has constructed roughly zero on-line model fairness and ranks for nothing. Briefly redirecting to Twitter.com is a short-term answer, and presumably Twitter.com itself will completely redirect to X.com sooner or later. I’ve no information of Musk’s plans — that is the one cheap approach for X.com to grow to be the everlasting dwelling of the ‘X’ model.
At that time, X.com dangers dropping a considerable portion of the ten,149 Twitter-branded search queries and 18 Million searches per 30 days beforehand mentioned. Reclaiming these searches and the ensuing visitors is not only an search engine optimisation job, however would require constructing the ‘X’ model within the minds of shoppers to the purpose that they routinely seek for celebrities, manufacturers, and matters mixed with ‘X’ or X-related phrases.
The long-term success of X.com is anybody’s guess, however because the ‘X’ model is moved to X.com, I predict — based mostly on my experiences with even reasonably troublesome related transitions — a considerable lack of search visitors for no less than 3-6 months. Given the ability of the present Twitter model and the lengthy, unusual historical past of X.com, losses may simply final over a yr.
