In late February, Reddit filed its official registration with the SEC ahead of its bid to go public, revealing new details about its ambitions as an ad platform.

“Advertising is our first business, and advertisers of all sizes have discovered that Reddit is a great place to find high-intent customers that they aren’t able to reach elsewhere,” co-founder Steve Huffman wrote in a letter contained in the filing. With that said, he added, “advertising on Reddit is rapidly evolving, and we are still in the early phases of growing this business.”

By the numbers:

• Ninety-eight percent of Reddit’s 2023 revenue of $804 million came from its ads business.
• In Q4 2023, the platform counted 267.5 million weekly active users globally, 131 million of whom are in the US. (For comparison, TikTok shared last March that it had reached 150 million monthly active users in the US.) In its S-1, the company also described two other revenue opportunities, including licensing its data, like its recently announced deal with Google, as well as commerce opportunities, although the company shared few details about this in the filing.
• Reddit, which has never turned a profit, posted a net loss of nearly $91 million last year.

Pulse check: How is Reddit’s advertising business doing in the eyes of marketers and experts? Buyers and analysts told Marketing Brew that they see the platform as nice-to-have, but that it is not an essential part of their media plans, like Meta or Google are.

“They’ve always been solidly in the second or third tier of social networks,” alongside Snap, Pinterest, and X, Brian Wieser, a former GroupM exec who’s now author of the industry newsletter Madison and Wall, told Marketing Brew.

Continue reading here.—RB

Influencer marketing is important. You know it, we know it. But just how important is it?

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When rumors that Walmart might acquire TV purveyor Vizio began circulating online in February, one predominant question was: why? The retailer already has an expansive retail media network, not to mention its own line of TVs (called Onn) and a preexisting partnership with Vizio competitor Roku.

Late last month, the rumor was proven true: Walmart is buying the company for approximately $2.3 billion. Marketing Brew turned to a few streaming analysts to get their takes on what the acquisition could mean for Walmart’s ad business and the CTV space as a whole.

Stake your claim: Walmart may be able to compete even more with other lower-priced TV sets by allowing “Walmart to prioritize [Vizio’s] products,” according to a report from research firm MoffettNathanson.

Beyond the devices themselves, Vizio brings with it a plethora of existing advertiser relationships that Walmart could potentially benefit from.

• The TV manufacturer grew its direct advertising partnerships by 32% year over year in the most recent quarter, inking deals with 117 net new partners, Vizio reported in its Q4 2023 earnings. It also has content partnerships to supply its WatchFree+ streamer, including agreements with Magnolia Pictures, Paramount, and BBC Studios.

To grow its ad business, Walmart will likely look to leverage Vizio’s SmartCast and grow its user base, Dan Rayburn, conference chairman of the Streaming Summit at NAB Show, said. (SmartCast is Vizio’s CTV operating system that recommends content to users based on their personal viewing habits.)

Ads sold through Walmart’s retail media network could stand to become more lucrative through the Vizio acquisition, Jeremy Goldman, senior director of marketing, commerce, and tech briefings at Insider Intelligence, said.

“That connected data tied to a user profile can be very beneficial in having highly targeted advertising,” Goldman said, “and the more targeted advertising is, the more you generally charge for it.”

Read more here.—JS

Each week, we spotlight Marketing Brew readers in our Coworking series. If you’d like to be featured, introduce yourself here.

Elina Vilk is CMO of Hootsuite. She was previously CMO of WooCommerce. Prior to that, she served as head of global small business marketing at Facebook, and she held marketing roles at PayPal and eBay.

What’s your favorite ad campaign? I personally love Febreeze’s #Noseblind campaign—a perfect example of customer-driven innovation. Febreeze hired a number of agencies to do a deep analysis of why sales were dropping. They found that most consumers only use Febreeze before company comes over. Febreeze took those customer insights and packaged that customer behavior into their #Noseblind campaign, which ultimately increased their sales. People resonated with the campaign because it was true to when and why they use the product.

What’s one marketing-related podcast/social account/series you’d recommend? One leader that I admire and follow on social media is Simon Sinek. He’s devoted his career to inspiring people to do the things that inspire them—ultimately leading to a better culture and a better world. I love his approach to encouraging leaders to think about the why versus the what behind their organization.

Continue reading here.

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Mergers and acquisitions, company partnerships, and more.

• United Talent Agency acquired JUV Consulting, a consultancy focused on Gen Z, forming a new entertainment marketing practice called Next Gen.
• Blue Diamond Growers, an almond processor and marketer, partnered with the Big Ten to become its “official snack.”
• JetBlue and Spirit Airlines terminated plans for a merger shortly after losing a federal antitrust lawsuit.