When you think of social media, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn all come into mind. They are some of the biggest networks today and all follow a similar protocol.
But did you know Reddit is also a social media networking site?
Reddit receives more than 245 million visitors per month, 54% of Reddit users are American males aged between 25-34 years old and offers advertising options for businesses.Several brands have already been marketing on Reddit and seen great results, but their self-servicing platform was pretty lacklustre for small and local businesses to get a foothold in the market.
But all that’s about to change as Reddit recently updated their self-service platform and revamped their auction-based ad system that makes it much easier for smaller businesses to advertise.
In today’s article I’m going to tell you what’s new and whether Reddit is the right choice for your business.
Changes to Reddit ads system
Reddit made 3 major changes to their auction system, they were:
Reducing minimum spend – Reddit has reduced the minimum spend of an ad campaign from $20 to just $5. This allows you to test out several Subreddits for much less than before offering greater flexibility in testing the most profitable Subreddits for your business.
Minimum CPM reduced – CPM to serve ads has dropped from $1.50 to $0.20 which is a massive improvement. Certain Subreddits were simply not targeted enough to justify spending $1.50 as the minimum amount.
Reddit also removed the minimum CPM limit when targeting by country ($2) and city ($5).
Wider targeting – In their previous model your ads would only been served to users who were currently viewing a Subreddit. Reddit’s newest changes will serve your content to users who have subscribed to the Subreddit or previously visited it before to increase your advert’s reach.
All in all, ads are now much cheaper and easier to serve than before.
Should you use Reddit?
Reddit isn’t for everyone, it’s not like Facebook or Twitter which are universal social media platforms. They have a very distinct user base which you can see from the stats provided by Ignite Social Media. I already mentioned it’s a male dominated platform, with the United States and Canada taking the lion’s share of the audience base:
The typical salary of a Reddit user is on the higher side making it a great medium to target your audience:
Cross reference the data in the link I provided above and see if the Reddit audience overlaps with your current customer profile when deciding to give Reddit a shot.
Advertising objectives on Reddit
Reddit currently offers you 3 different ad units to choose from, they are:
Sponsored links – these are quite similar to page post objectives on Facebook and allow you to post a link leading back to your website. When you post a link in a Subreddit the users can upvote or downvote your content based on how valuable they found it. Sponsored links pins your post to the top of the subreddit:
Display Ads – is what you would find on Google and other display networks. However, using display ads you cannot link back to your website, instead you have to link users to a specific thread on a Subreddit where they discuss the context of your banner.
To setup display ads you need contact the Reddit ad team directly as this option is not on their self serving platform.
Sponsored Q&A – Reddit is most well known for running its “Ask Me Anything” threads where its users ask an authority in the Subreddit, well, anything. You can choose how long you would like your Q&A to last (anything from a few hours to a few days) and once the sponsored Q&A is finished, it’s removed from the top of the Subreddit but users can still comment and ask questions.
Links from a sponsored Q&A post send users to a thread and not your website.
Summary
Reddit hasn’t changed its layout in years and to the naked eye looks like a dated social media site. For a large percentage of American males, it’s their go-to place for news, advice and information.
I’ll bet none of your competitors are using Reddit or even know its ad capabilities, allowing you to reap all the riches it offers.
Nick Bridges
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