Twitter Brings Ex-Amex Exec Aboard

The Twitter executive saga continues as the company said on Tuesday (Jan. 26) that it has named Leslie Berland as the new chief marketing officer in the wake of a management shakeup over the weekend that left several of the company’s top spots vacant.

Bloomberg reported that Berland had been senior vice president of digital partnerships at American Express, with a 10-year tenure at the payments giant focused on advertising, sponsorships and other facets of media presence. In her latest four years there, she had been part of an advertising campaign that had as one of its features “a heavy presence on Facebook, Twitter and Apple’s iAd mobile platform.” The appointment caps a search for CMO that had been going on for months. A dedicated CMO, noted the wire, takes the advertising directives away from the chief financial officer.

[bctt tweet=”The appointment caps a search for CMO that had been going on for months.”]

The announcement follows the well-publicized ouster of four key roles this past weekend, among them Twitter’s heads of product and engineering. Bloomberg, citing unnamed people familiar with the company’s plans, said that Twitter will name two people to its board sometime this week.

The challenge before CEO Jack Dorsey and his reconstructed team is to reignite growth at Twitter and to grab the attention of people in order to engage them beyond the 140-character barrier that has been the firm’s hallmark. In recognition of those challenges, Goldman Sachs said that it has lowered its target on the firm to $28 from $40.

Bloomberg noted that Twitter wants to make the process of using social media easier for newer users. One issue may be that the company, which has been plagued by slowing growth from users, is not intuitive enough in design that it can be used with aplomb as people navigate the site. There’s now a service in place for people who do not have an account with Twitter.