Creator Economy Scoop: Social platforms are begging to stand out

While Reddit has long been considered a safe haven from social media marketing, the platform’s latest report found that 79% of people would be interested in seeing brands share information about their products.

Beyond using Reddit as a marketing channel, CeraVe proved during the Super Bowl this weekend that it is also an unmatched social listening tool. Ogilvy tapped creators to convince consumers that Michael Cera is behind the brand leading up to its Super Bowl spot, and the agency told Adweek that old Reddit threads speculating the actor’s tie to the skincare brand planted that seed. Here's the rest of this week's scoop: 

Even the NFL needs creator marketing  

There’s no shiny display of consumer attention quite like the Super Bowl, but even the NFL can borrow marketing tactics from the creator economy. YouTube committed $2 billion per year in 2022 to secure the rights to the NFL Sunday ticket, which jumped from 2 million to 8 million subscribers for this year’s game. Beyond using top creators to promote the package, NFL and YouTube have implemented a “helmets off” strategy that features lifestyle content like “Creator of the Week,” where viewers experience the game through the eyes of a new creator every week.

Snapchat says its not like other social media 

Snapchat is hard at work to convince consumers that it is nothing like its social platform counterparts. The brand’s first Super Bowl ad, dubbed “Less social media. More snapchat,” debuted during the Grammy’s but ran in a 30-second version during the Super Bowl. Snapchat argues that while other platforms force users to get caught up in engagement and fake friends, the Snapchat universe revolves around the joy of lighthearted filters and real connection. 

While Snapchat isn’t skimping on its marketing budget, the company also announced last week it would lay off 10% of its global workforce, which equates to around 500 employees. 

YouTube’s CEO sets his 2024 intentions

Neal Mohan is confident that the growing impact of AI will only facilitate more human creativity. In his letter, the CEO confidently expressed that creators are more than just content machines, and should instead be treated like “next-generation studios.” To bolster these careers, he said the platform is looking into ways for creators to diversify their revenue streams through avenues like channel memberships. 

Mohan also said he’s committed to protecting the integrity of his platform by controlling for false information throughout the election and rolling out AI detection labels that alert viewers when “the realistic content they’re seeing is synthetic.” 

As Mohan asserts that “YouTube’s next frontier is the living room and subscriptions,” TikTok is similarly bidding for new consumer use cases. Following consistent findings around the use of the platform as a search engine, the platform is testing a search shortcut that users can add to their home screens and an engagement tool called “Sub Space,” a chat-like feature for creators and their paying subscribers. 

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