A Marketers guide to Reddit: Authenticity and your Audience

In 2021, Reddit was a force to be reckoned with and the stats give evidence of the platform’s popularity and growth. The total number of posts went up 19% to 366 million, the total comments on the platform went up 12% to 2.6 billion and the total upvotes on posts went up 1% to 46 billion the past year. Reddit is considered one of the most popular platforms with more than 430 million monthly active users, mostly in the US.

Why is Reddit different?

First and foremost, Reddit is a forum website before it was an actual social media platform. Users have the ability to upvote, post, comment and publish content as with other social platforms.  As ‘likes’ are to Facebook, ‘upvotes’ and ‘downvotes’ are to Reddit. An ‘upvote’ brings content to the fore and a ‘downvote’ to the back, allowing more exposure for popular content.   

Reddit is among the most popular websites in the forum category, allowing users to interact in multiple close-knitted sub-communities called subreddits, divided into topics. Reddit has a ‘news’ tab making the platform diversify as a news channel at the same time. 

The website, which was created in 2005, was redesigned for the first time in 2018 to make it more appealing to new users and increase engagement from non-participating users. 

The platform explodes with content and users interact eviably, with content receiving high levels of engagement if it appeals to the audience. It can be quite confusing at first to the new user, with all the different levels of content, multiple tabs and high engagement. 

The Reddit audience

A survey of US adults was conducted in 2021, 36 percent of respondents who indicated using Reddit were aged between 18 and 29 years old and older users report lower engagement levels. This means that the Reddit audience who will engage are younger.  Reddit is community based, with a high level of focus being on community involvement and quality content.  Young adults of today are tech-savvy, connected and informed. 

Tips on how to market on Reddit

Host an AMA 

Ask Me Anything (AMA) sessions are a big part of Reddit. This is where users can ask anything they want to a person. Someone will post what they are and users can ask any question they want to about what they do.  One of the most popular AMA’s for 2021 was:

I’m Bill Gates, co-chair of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and author of “How to Avoid a Climate Disaster.” Ask Me Anything.

The AMA received 14,3 k comments and was 66% upvoted.  Leveraging this kind of engagement for your brand can be beneficial. 

Understand your audience

The key to effective marketing on Reddit is to effectively market to the young adults of today.  They are informed due to internet access, therefore respond to high quality content.  They are tech-savvy, therefore understand how to use the platform and they are connected, so community oriented.  They don’t respond well to outsiders trying to make a quick buck off them, they demand authenticity and a genuine relationship. 

To create a truly authentic message, you need to make sure that what you post is thought about.  Collaboration within your organization will make sure that the content you put out is a genuine reflection of your strategy and with a good social media management tool, like Vista Social, team collaboration is made easy. One can assign user permissions and create safeguards for ensuring that only the reviewed content is published to social networks. Add your team members and start easy and effective collaboration. 

A true understanding of your target market is essential for any strategy.  If you do not know who you are appealing to, you will most likely send the wrong message. Demographics, geographics and behaviour all direct your strategy and message.  Perhaps it’s time for you to get some research done on your target market?  You will find great marketing agencies with research capabilities at Agency Vista. Don’t worry about costs, if you have a great understanding of your market you will save in the long term. 

Deliver high-quality content

The Reddit audience has been online most of their lives, they have ‘seen it all’ and need new and fresh content to spark action. If the content is great, they engage, if it’s not they don’t. 

Take a look at Subreddits and find the right ones for your audience 

The top five most viewed topics of the year are cryptocurrency, gaming, sports, weddings and health and fitness. Find the right topic for your business and deliver authenticity.  

The most popular post in 2021 was from the subreddit r/wallstreetbets.  This subreddit has been the source of major stock market moves of the past few years. This is the power of great content. 

 IRL and URL is trending

IRL (meaning in real life) is how, as described by Reddit, content goes from URL (online) to IRL (in real life).  Online discussions on Reddit have affected real life situations, like in the previous r/wallstreetbets example where the stock markets were influenced by conversations online. Weddings were IRL cancelled due to the pandemic and people took to URL to discuss their experiences, feelings and to celebrate those who did still manage to tie the knot.  Make sure your content is topical and relevant, and perhaps your online message will influence a real life situation. 

Create communities

Make sure to respond to messages and comments straight away, form a relationship with your audience and you will soon have a thriving community.  As you value your work and business, you are using Reddit for your marketing so you are part of the community and that should be valued.  Be authentic and your audience will appreciate that authenticity and respond. 

The Reddit of the future

In 2020 Reddit acquired social media and TikTok competitor, Dubsmas. In April 2021 Reddit revealed it will launch a social audio platform, called Reddit Talk. In 2021 Reddit extended their online communities reach into the real world, with ITL to URL. Going from strength to strength, as a marketer a real understanding of your audience and an authentic message will enable you to have success on Reddit now and into the future. By far the best social media management tool to use for Reddit is Vista Social. Firstly because it is pretty much the only social media platform that enables brands and agencies to manage Reddit and secondly because it offers a powerful set of tools to manage Reddit channels and messenger conversations.  Remembering that creating communities and authenticity is vital for your Reddit strategy, the right messenger tools can make or break it.  On Vista Social, you are able to manage subscribers and comments as a team, enabling faster response times and therefore better community building.

You are also able to manage multiple Reddit channels and simplify Reddit content creation and profile posting, upping your Reddit game and ensuring success for your strategy.  Building communities is a challenge and few understand what it takes to achieve such benefits.  Make sure you are willing to do what it takes to succeed and that you have the right tools to do it.

To build thriving communities and achieve success with your Reddit marketing strategy, try out the Vista Social Social Media Management platform.  It offers great functionality and works out well, even offering a free starter plan, which some other platforms have now retracted.