Tesla Inc (TSLA.O) CEO Elon Musk said on Tuesday that the automaker will experiment with traditional advertising to see whether it achieved results.
Musk called it “ironic” that he now owned Twitter as CEO of Tesla. The social media network is heavily reliant on advertisements, and he just hired advertising veteran Linda Yaccarino to lead it.
“I think I should say that advertising is fantastic and that everyone should do it,” Musk remarked during Tesla’s annual shareholder meeting in Austin, Texas. “We’ll do some advertising and see how it goes.”
It underscores his efforts to shore up investor confidence in the car maker’s prospects at a time when rising competition and a slow economy has forced Tesla to slash prices.
Since Musk acquired Twitter in October, advertisers have fled the social media platform, worried that their ads could appear next to inappropriate content after the company lost nearly 80% of its staff.
Musk has for years resisted the idea of advertising, tweeting in 2019 that he “hates advertising” and “We use that money to make the product great”.
But on Tuesday, he said many people did not know about the affordability of Tesla cars and their “amazing” features and functionality.