Whether or not you find yourself on Reddit, and you aren’t completely sure what it’s about, you’ve probably heard of it in some capacity. And until a few years ago, it was likely in a negative light.
However, Reddit has recently become more mainstream with over 430M monthly active users—and advertising opportunities have been a byproduct of increased user volume. Needless to say, if your brand goals are capturing more eyeballs, chances are some relevant eyeballs are looking at Reddit.
Why would Reddit be a fit for my brand?
Reddit presents awareness media opportunities due to the nature of how the platform works. Reddit is a platform that facilitates discussion on specific topics—meaning, users are actively raising their hands and identifying what particular subjects interest them. With impending targeting flaws across third-party vendors with cookie challenges, and platform changes to Facebook, this type of contextual targeting is valuable.
It also stays current. Third-party audiences have ambiguous refresh rates, and even first-party data can be out of date unless there is a recency or loyalty metric assigned to it. However, Reddit is constantly adding or removing communities based on their level of interest. This means you can always find relevant and current audiences based on your contextual target needs.
The most intriguing part of Reddit is the level of specificity available for targeting, especially for B2B clients. Any target, no matter how niche, is likely available on Reddit. Take my Reddit interests for example. They range from broad topics like /r/NFL, and get as narrow as /r/AdOperations. Believe it or not, I’ve seen more relevant ad-tech ads on Reddit than I have elsewhere on the internet.
Along with its niche targeting is expansive reach. The collective viewership of sports enthusiasts’ topics on Reddit is larger than leveraging website visitation, or third-party audience interests for brands like ESPN, MSN Sports, Sports Illustrated, or Yahoo Sports. This can apply to any topic, be it fashion, gaming, wellness. You name it.
Reddit can work, but like anything, it isn’t perfect
While the audience is there, there are some drawbacks when considering adding Reddit to your media plan. First and foremost is how it’s implemented into media strategies. it should be evaluated strictly as a mid- to upper-funnel tactic. Their pixel technology is still relatively new. Though unsophisticated compared to other platforms, they are rolling out improvements. For example, they recently began passing back event metadata, which can help paint a clearer picture of a campaign’s return on ad spend. Additional features will come over time, but conversion campaigns remain limited for now.
Limitations also exist in campaign setup and verification. The user interface for ad creation is less intuitive than others. They are lacking a bulk upload feature, and the editing process can be time-consuming. On the verification front, Reddit currently only allows for click tracking, meaning you must trust their impression counts. Even Facebook now allows impression tags to be served, so Reddit is behind other walled gardens on this front as well.
Reddit is worth a test for an awareness campaign
Overall, Reddit is still in the early stages of developing its advertising platform, and that’s ok! At one point, so was Facebook and Google. However, there is no doubt that the eyeballs are there, and usage is only likely to increase—barring any significant changes to the platform. If you’re curious about how to leverage Reddit for your media strategy—please feel free to reach out and we will see if it makes sense for your business objectives!