Reddit named best digital media owner to work with by IPA
Reddit is the best digital media owner to work with, according to the latest survey of agencies and digital specialists conducted by the IPA in partnership with training and development company True & North.
Among respondents, 86% said their overall experience of working with Reddit was positive.
That is up 6.5 percentage points compared with this time last year and an increase of 1.6 percentage points from the last time the survey was conducted in autumn 2023.
In addition, Reddit was viewed as the best digital media owner when it comes to “understanding of the context the agency operates in” and “how best to support achievement objectives”.
The Digital Media Owners Spring Survey aims to understand which digital media owners deliver the highest levels of service.
Since the last study, Reddit went public and has continued to invest in its growing advertising business. The social media company’s total revenue grew 48% year on year to $243m in Q1. It has attracted interest from agencies looking for alternatives to traditional social platforms that “offer a slightly different reach”, according to Jellyfish vice-president of paid social and strategic partnerships, Eb Adeyeri.
How other digital media owners stack up
The IPA survey found five other media owners that achieved a positivity score of 80% or higher. They are audience platform company Mobsta (85%), social media platform Pinterest (85%), podcast group Acast (83.6%), contextual intelligence business GumGum (82.6%) and ad platform Blis (81.3%).
Meanwhile, Sky and ITV were the most broadly improved, with increases of 10 percentage points or more across five (Sky) and four (ITV) categories surveyed.
On the other end of the spectrum, Reach saw a decline of 10 percentage points or more across eight categories and TikTok saw a similar decline across five categories, including overall experience of working with the media owner. Reach was the most improved media owner in last autumn’s survey.
Overall, most major media owners saw a majority of respondents agree their experience with them was a good one, with notable exceptions for Twitch, Meta and Google. Meta and Google account for a disproportionate amount of the digital ad market.
That said, True & North founder and managing director David Clayton explained that scores generally dropped “across most metrics” compared with last autumn as client-facing teams felt increased pressured to deliver.
“Now more than ever, agencies and digital media owners need to form strong partnerships,” said Clayton. “The survey indicated that the biggest opportunity lies in proactively engaging in regular, high-value conversations and committing to improving transparency.”
Amy Lawrence, EssenceMediacom’s UK and global digital partner and IPA Digital Marketing Group chair, suggested that it remains important “agencies know which digital media owners are providing a consistently excellent service and are committed to working together effectively.”
She added: “It is heartening to see such high standards from so many media owners — particularly Reddit at this time.”