Haven’t you heard? Reddit is an often untapped goldmine of advertising possibilities! Read more to discover how your business can grow its advertising portfolio to drive ROI.
What is Reddit?
Created in 2005, Reddit (dubbed ‘the front page of the internet’) is made up of over one hundred thousand active forums. Known as subreddits, these are topic-specific communities covering just about any interest, hobby and passion. Users can post, engage with, comment on, and vote on content. Community moderators oversee subreddits and each community often has its own rules, creating a mix of content and discussions tailored to different interests. The content is often diverse like any social platform; with text, images, video and external links being supported on the site. Individual users primarily interact with Reddit through usernames rather than accounts with personal information, and this anonymity helps to promote candid and open discussions.
Advertising on Reddit
Whilst Reddit Ads does allow for the ability to target keywords and demographics, as you may utilise with other social or PPC channels, the majority of ad placements are selected for specifically chosen subreddits. This allows advertisers to reach specific and relevant audiences based on their interests, locations, and behaviours. Because Reddit contains thousands of these topic-driven subreddits - often with people asking questions, seeking advice, or sharing news - it’s easy for opportunities to arise where businesses can promote relevant products and services, as well as understand and address consumer pain points and queries.
The selection of advertising placements on Reddit offers a lot of flexibility for advertisers and includes the following:
Promoted Posts
These ads appear in users’ feeds, and look and feel very similar to the organic user-generated content (UGC) on the site. Just like other UGC, users can upvote and downvote, as well as comment on promoted posts, allowing community interaction and greater engagement.
Display Ads
Banner-style ads that are shown at the top or side of the platform, allowing visual engagement whilst a user scrolls on the site.
Video Ads
Video ads are great for effective storytelling and communication; promoting high engagement, enhanced brand recognition and improved user experience.
Image and Carousel Ads
Multi-image or video ads that can tell an engaging story for increased interactivity with the ads.
Takeover Ads
Reddit also allows advertisers to dominate specific subreddit categories for an increased price, ensuring your placements are seen over competitors. This can be great to boost recognition and engagement in a short period of time.
Advertisers can take this one step further, paying to advertise on Reddit’s homepage for maximum visibility.
Product Ads
If you’re an e-commerce business with products to sell, the new product advertising offering on Reddit allows you to connect your store via a catalogue data feed to showcase products to relevant communities and Redditors.
“Ask Me Anything” (AMA) ads
Reddit’s new AMA-style ads let advertisers tap into the platform’s iconic ‘Ask Me Anything’ format, fostering authentic, real-time conversations with their target audience. This interactive approach drives high engagement, builds brand trust, and creates a dynamic two-way dialogue between businesses and the Reddit community.
Why Reddit should form part of your paid social strategy
Social platforms offer a lot of visual and engaging ad formats which can help bolster your brand’s recognition and messaging. Reddit is no different and takes this further, offering a wide range of native ad experiences that encourage interaction rather than just passive scrolling.
Whilst platforms like Meta allow you to target interest audiences, these categories can sometimes be vague and inaccurate, leading to inefficient spending and making it harder to reach specific audiences. Reddit combats this with its subreddit community targeting, reaching specific and relevant audiences for both B2B and B2C businesses, often with higher engagement and intent.
As Reddit is a newer option for advertisers, the market is much less saturated than others like Meta or LinkedIn. This gives brands a better chance to stand out and for their ads to make an impact. This lower competition also allows Reddit’s CPCs and CPMs to be competitive, offering a strong ROI; especially when targeting passionate, high-intent users.
As Reddit ads are designed to feel commonplace amongst user-generated content, the creative freedom is there for advertisers to take both humorous and serious approaches to content, making it ideal for a range of campaigns. User comments and voting allow advertisers to engage directly with audiences and receive community feedback.
Things to be aware of when advertising with Reddit
Understanding Reddit’s community culture and etiquette is crucial; poorly targeted or irrelevant ads may perform poorly. Reddit users can often be sceptical of overt advertising and may criticise ads they perceive as low-effort, irrelevant or inauthentic. Ensure research is taken so ads fit seamlessly within the communities that they are targeting.
While Reddit has a vast user base, it’s still smaller than other platforms like Facebook, Instagram, or YouTube, limiting reach. And even though Reddit continues to expand its advertising opportunities, it’s worth noting that compared to platforms like Facebook (Meta) and Google it still has fewer ad tools and analytics capabilities. Reddit ads should fit into a wider social strategy encompassing these other platforms for optimal results.
How to fit Reddit into your existing social strategy
Ad platforms differ in terms of capabilities and behaviours, and we can utilise different ad platforms strategically to accomplish a full-funnel social strategy.
Whilst most ad platforms have varying ad formats that can target users at different stages of the funnel, platforms like Pinterest and Meta tend to mainly support top-of-funnel activity due to their emphasis on visual and social content. Similarly, platforms such as Microsoft Ads and Google Ads are particularly great for targeting bottom-of-the-funnel users whose searches indicate they already possess high intent for products or services. Reddit places itself well in the middle of the funnel, with a wide range of ad formats available in targeted, highly relevant subreddit communities.
Still unsure on how to make the most out of Reddit Ads?
Our Digital Marketing team is made up of certified Reddit experts who are best positioned to help you understand how to achieve an effective Reddit advertising strategy. Get in touch with the team to explore the potential today.
