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Reddit Advertising: Results of a 1-Week Campaign

47 points by tyler-b 12y ago

grimtrigger 12y ago
Not sure if this problem is fixed, but Reddit requires each day of the campaign to have the same numbner of impressions. So if monday has 100 impressions available, tuesday has 100 impressions available, but wednesday has only 1 impression available... then a Monday-Tuesday-Wednesday campaign can only be for 3 impressions. A shorter campaign (Monday-Tuesday) will give you access to 200 impressions. The "0 impression" number in your post might be because one day out of that huge timeframe is completely bought out.
- boredinballard 12y ago
  Yup, I had this same issue before. Changing my campaign dates around would allow me to do a campaign. Sometimes I would have to start the campaign a couple weeks out.
- tyler-b 12y ago
  Thanks for explaining this! I'm definitely going to check some shorter timeframes and see if I can find any open slots.
quaffapint 12y ago
At least he was doing the smart thing and not trying to directly sell to reddit users. Not that reddit users don't buy stuff, but they're no on reddit looking to do so. It takes much less effort (and no going to find your wallet) to sign up for an email list. I always find it amazing that people are shocked and annoyed at the advertising platform when they didn't direct sell 1,000 copies of their software on their twitter advertising campaign. With sites like this and twitter, etc, don't direct sell - sign them up for lists and do the occasional sales pitch in your emails.
- shiftpgdn 12y ago
  That CTR is still ridiculously small. I feel like ads on Reddit are beyond useless due to the cynicism of the user base + the high prevalence of adblock.
  - tyler-b 12y ago
    Have you seen better results from AdWords, Facebook or another source? Any tips you want to pass along will be appreciated ;)
    - shiftpgdn 12y ago
      I've had okayluck with ultra well targeted Adwords ads, better than reddit. I've done site takeover style ads with buysellads.com which has worked out pretty well but it's expensive and hard to do when you're just starting out.
  - 1ris 12y ago
    But the price seems OK.
  - VLM 12y ago
    "the high prevalence of adblock" I didn't know reddit had ads until this HN story. Interesting.
    - freehunter 12y ago
      The only ads I see on reddit (outside of AMA and some fairly suspiciously-timed posts about a certain brand that happens to be releasing a new product) are either at the top of the page as a sponsored post, or ones at the side about some ridiculous Lambeosaurus or "instead of an ad, here's a penguin". Seriously, what's the deal with how much advertising they do for /r/dinosaurs? Am I the only one seeing this?
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
cm2012 12y ago
I find that any useful subreddit always its inventory bought out - and its a pretty small amount of inventory available in the first place.
- tyler-b 12y ago
  Someone on Twitter made a similar comment and asked the reddit ads team if they would ever consider implementing any type of bidding system (I don't think they've responded).
  - cm2012 12y ago
    Yeah, I asked personally and they told me the same thing. I also subscribe to the subreddits I would advertise on, and see any ads related to the category maybe 1/500th of the time (I don't use adblock). I've never seen it on the subreddit itself, which has over 20,000 subscribers.
- yalogin 12y ago
  As someone who has no knowledge of this space - what does it mean inventory being bought out? You can no longer place your ad on that subreddit anymore? Why would this happen?
  - nazgul 12y ago
    Say the subreddit generally only get 5,000 page views a month, with one ad space per page. Once someone purchases those 5,000, it's gone -- they can't sell the inventory to someone else because it's all bough. Often too traffic will fluxate; so, for example, they may have estimated 5,000, but only 2,000 page views (and thus ad impressions, since one for one in this example) come in that month -- if someone bought 5,000, they'll have to stick around for 2 1/2 months, blocking other advertisers for that time. And I suspect that on many of these subreddits having even 500 impressions available is overreaching. That's a bit simplified but hope it helps.
    - yalogin 12y ago
kevando 12y ago
Does anyone have insight whether creating Reddit ads can hurt your chances of trending as an organic post?
- jedberg 12y ago
  They have no relation to each other.
tehwebguy 12y ago
I've been advertising my League of Legends convention on reddit for a few weeks using the League related subreddits (leagueoflegends, leagueofmemes, loleventvods, leagueoflegendsmeta) The result? The CPM is low and the CPC has hovered between $0.09 and $0.20, but so far reddit ads have accounted for 0 of our sales (out of a few hundred tickets so far). Location targeting would be amazing, but you can't target a subreddit and a location at the same time. Our ads will steadily change to increase the sense of urgency as the date approaches (X days left, Y tickets left), it will be interesting to see how it plays out.
- tyler-b 12y ago
  Do you have any links/screenshots you could share?
  - tehwebguy 12y ago
    Sure! With these three I went a few different routes, they are all in the main leagueoflegends subreddit (which is one of the most active on the entire site, it's unreal). First is fairly basic and talks about our host, the price and the fact that early bird tickets are on sale. The second focuses on some of the LCS teams that will be there doing meet & greets. The third is about activities like cosplay, live music. http://i.imgur.com/6l0focB.jpg http://i.imgur.com/6l0focB.jpg http://i.imgur.com/CLDa84O.jpg http://i.imgur.com/CLDa84O.jpg http://i.imgur.com/sBvwU2N.jpg http://i.imgur.com/sBvwU2N.jpg
- pokpokpok 12y ago
  advertise through streamers!
  - tehwebguy 12y ago
    Definitely! Some have already talked about the event a few times while they were live.
- Nowyouknow 12y ago
  Target a location subreddit? For example /r/chicago. Or are you looking to target redditors that are subscribed to overlapping subreddits? So /r/technology + /r/chicago?
taylorbuley 12y ago
The "insufficient inventory" issue is one I see a lot in Google's DFP as well. Not a large enough `n` for inventory prediction, I suppose.

47 points by tyler-b 12y ago

Not sure if this problem is fixed, but Reddit requires each day of the campaign to have the same numbner of impressions. So if monday has 100 impressions available, tuesday has 100 impressions available, but wednesday has only 1 impression available... then a Monday-Tuesday-Wednesday campaign can only be for 3 impressions. A shorter campaign (Monday-Tuesday) will give you access to 200 impressions. The "0 impression" number in your post might be because one day out of that huge timeframe is completely bought out.

boredinballard 12y ago
Yup, I had this same issue before. Changing my campaign dates around would allow me to do a campaign. Sometimes I would have to start the campaign a couple weeks out.
tyler-b 12y ago
Thanks for explaining this! I'm definitely going to check some shorter timeframes and see if I can find any open slots.

quaffapint 12y ago

At least he was doing the smart thing and not trying to directly sell to reddit users. Not that reddit users don't buy stuff, but they're no on reddit looking to do so. It takes much less effort (and no going to find your wallet) to sign up for an email list. I always find it amazing that people are shocked and annoyed at the advertising platform when they didn't direct sell 1,000 copies of their software on their twitter advertising campaign. With sites like this and twitter, etc, don't direct sell - sign them up for lists and do the occasional sales pitch in your emails.

shiftpgdn 12y ago
That CTR is still ridiculously small. I feel like ads on Reddit are beyond useless due to the cynicism of the user base + the high prevalence of adblock.
- tyler-b 12y ago
  Have you seen better results from AdWords, Facebook or another source? Any tips you want to pass along will be appreciated ;)
  - shiftpgdn 12y ago
    I've had okayluck with ultra well targeted Adwords ads, better than reddit. I've done site takeover style ads with buysellads.com which has worked out pretty well but it's expensive and hard to do when you're just starting out.
- 1ris 12y ago
  But the price seems OK.
- VLM 12y ago
  "the high prevalence of adblock" I didn't know reddit had ads until this HN story. Interesting.
  - freehunter 12y ago
    The only ads I see on reddit (outside of AMA and some fairly suspiciously-timed posts about a certain brand that happens to be releasing a new product) are either at the top of the page as a sponsored post, or ones at the side about some ridiculous Lambeosaurus or "instead of an ad, here's a penguin". Seriously, what's the deal with how much advertising they do for /r/dinosaurs? Am I the only one seeing this?
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]

cm2012 12y ago

I find that any useful subreddit always its inventory bought out - and its a pretty small amount of inventory available in the first place.

tyler-b 12y ago
Someone on Twitter made a similar comment and asked the reddit ads team if they would ever consider implementing any type of bidding system (I don't think they've responded).
- cm2012 12y ago
  Yeah, I asked personally and they told me the same thing. I also subscribe to the subreddits I would advertise on, and see any ads related to the category maybe 1/500th of the time (I don't use adblock). I've never seen it on the subreddit itself, which has over 20,000 subscribers.
yalogin 12y ago
As someone who has no knowledge of this space - what does it mean inventory being bought out? You can no longer place your ad on that subreddit anymore? Why would this happen?
- nazgul 12y ago
  Say the subreddit generally only get 5,000 page views a month, with one ad space per page. Once someone purchases those 5,000, it's gone -- they can't sell the inventory to someone else because it's all bough. Often too traffic will fluxate; so, for example, they may have estimated 5,000, but only 2,000 page views (and thus ad impressions, since one for one in this example) come in that month -- if someone bought 5,000, they'll have to stick around for 2 1/2 months, blocking other advertisers for that time. And I suspect that on many of these subreddits having even 500 impressions available is overreaching. That's a bit simplified but hope it helps.
  - yalogin 12y ago

kevando 12y ago

Does anyone have insight whether creating Reddit ads can hurt your chances of trending as an organic post?

jedberg 12y ago
They have no relation to each other.

tehwebguy 12y ago

I've been advertising my League of Legends convention on reddit for a few weeks using the League related subreddits (leagueoflegends, leagueofmemes, loleventvods, leagueoflegendsmeta) The result? The CPM is low and the CPC has hovered between $0.09 and $0.20, but so far reddit ads have accounted for 0 of our sales (out of a few hundred tickets so far). Location targeting would be amazing, but you can't target a subreddit and a location at the same time. Our ads will steadily change to increase the sense of urgency as the date approaches (X days left, Y tickets left), it will be interesting to see how it plays out.

tyler-b 12y ago
Do you have any links/screenshots you could share?
- tehwebguy 12y ago
  Sure! With these three I went a few different routes, they are all in the main leagueoflegends subreddit (which is one of the most active on the entire site, it's unreal). First is fairly basic and talks about our host, the price and the fact that early bird tickets are on sale. The second focuses on some of the LCS teams that will be there doing meet & greets. The third is about activities like cosplay, live music. http://i.imgur.com/6l0focB.jpg http://i.imgur.com/6l0focB.jpg http://i.imgur.com/CLDa84O.jpg http://i.imgur.com/CLDa84O.jpg http://i.imgur.com/sBvwU2N.jpg http://i.imgur.com/sBvwU2N.jpg
pokpokpok 12y ago
advertise through streamers!
- tehwebguy 12y ago
  Definitely! Some have already talked about the event a few times while they were live.
Nowyouknow 12y ago
Target a location subreddit? For example /r/chicago. Or are you looking to target redditors that are subscribed to overlapping subreddits? So /r/technology + /r/chicago?

taylorbuley 12y ago

The "insufficient inventory" issue is one I see a lot in Google's DFP as well. Not a large enough `n` for inventory prediction, I suppose.