Morning Consult: Only 25% of Americans like Facebook's new name

Facebook has announced its new corporate name, Meta, and a new logo as part of a strategic shift to focus on the Metaverse. Initial public reaction to the rebrand has been muted, according to new data from Morning Consult.

• Facebook's net favorability rating rose by 16 points, with 55% of U.S. adults saying they have a favorable impression of the social media giant and 39% saying they have an unfavorable impression.
• However, they are not fans of the name Meta. 25% of adults have a favorable impression of Meta, while 40% of Americans dislike Meta. 34% of respondents have no opinion at all.
• 32% of people had a favorable impression of the logo after seeing it. The same proportion of people (30%) were dissatisfied with it, and 37% of the respondents had no opinion on it.
• 44% of Gen Z respondents had a favorable opinion of the logo, while 31% had an unfavorable opinion, resulting in a net favorability of 13%.

Facebook has said it wants to attract more younger users as part of its transition to the metaverse.

• Zuckerberg has a net approval rating of -32% in the U.S. Fifty-four percent of adults have an unfavorable view of him, while 22% have an unfavorable view.

• Meta may be going all in, but most consumers haven’t spent money on the Metaverse yet: 68% of respondents said they weren’t interested in virtual and augmented reality projects using Meta.

What the numbers say

• About half of Americans (51%) said that if they had to guess, they would say Meta changed its name to distance itself from negative media. The company has been under scrutiny following the leak of internal documents, which became known as "The Facebook Papers." 44% of consumers said they had heard of those leaks.