Reddit Announces Targeting, Measurement Updates

Good news for tech brands with audiences that skew male: Reddit has launched a couple of promising new updates, one for ad targeting and one to help measure the effects of the platform’s campaigns.

Reddit targeting updates

Let’s start with the targeting and why it could be impactful: Reddit announced a new, expanded list of Interest Targeting options for advertisers, who now have over 150 options (up from 62). Targeting these new interest groups allow advertisers to reach a relevant audience based on communities or subreddits they visit and topics they engage with. 

There are several intriguing new interest options for B2B, including personal finance, deals/marketplace, crypto, career planning, engineering, and programming. This opens up possibilities for Subreddit and community targeting, where I’ve seen really good engagement. If the community size isn’t large enough to target on its own, bucketing similar communities together as targets is great for reaching highly relevant audiences. 

You can even search by topic and get related suggestions from Reddit that can help you discover more target options, e.g. r/SaaS, r/startups, r/hubspot, r/DigitalMarketing, r/fintech.

This targeting joins keyword targeting (contextual-based, not intent-based) and custom audience/retargeting options that have proven to work well for B2B even though Reddit’s match rate tends to lag behind other platforms. 

All of these options give advertisers ways to get in front of truly engaged users – almost 65% of Reddit’s users visit the site daily while spending 16 minutes 10 seconds per session on average. 

Now for a look at an even bigger release – one that will help put the platform’s advertising potential in perspective.

Reddit first-party measurement updates

To me, these are the more exciting updates. Reddit is more of an awareness / education / engagement play and not built for direct response, and the new measurement tools will provide advertisers a ton of insight into Reddit’s actual value in moving users toward an eventual purchase or conversion on other platforms.  

The two measurement functions introduced are:

Reddit Brand Lift, which measures the impact of Reddit Ads on brand perception using a randomized controlled survey. It analyzes objectives like awareness, favorability, recall, and consideration.

Reddit Conversion Lift, which analyzes the next steps users take after viewing an ad on Reddit. It uses the Reddit Pixel, Conversions API, and/or Mobile Measurement Partner (MMP) to measure lift in conversion metrics like leads, purchases, app installs, etc. 

Why to test Reddit now

Reddit garners a relatively small percentage of advertising spend, but if you’re working for a tech brand and looking to get in front of passionate users who love consuming tech content, it’s a great option, particularly if you’re looking for alternatives to higher-CPC/CPM platforms. If you have any questions on how to get started with Reddit campaigns, let us know — we’re always happy to share insights.