The Importance of Reddit in Marketing

In marketing, it seems that every day, there’s another certain platform that brings more results if an agency taps into it and uses that platform to its fullest potential. Well, today I’m going to be telling you about one such platform, why you as a marketer should be giving it more credit, and what you should be doing to use it correctly for your brand or your clients’. Which platform, you ask? Reddit.

Why is Reddit important?

It is the magnet which attracts discussion for all things viral on the internet. Reddit has 430+ million monthly active users, and gets more than 52 million visits each day. This goes on to tell us how the platform is one of the major online communities where millions of people engage with each other every day.

But the thing is, these numbers aren’t going to get you anywhere without understanding the platform first. Reddit claims to be the internet’s front page, this is because it primarily focuses on aggregation of social news. It’s basically part-web form and part-news site. Reddit’s users publish their content on the platform, then other users comment with either links, news or media relating to that content. These comments receive upvotes and downvotes from others. The most popular threads then rise to the top. Unlike other platforms, Reddit relies mostly on communities and threads. So when you open reddit, you receive a clear view of which topic is trending currently through the upvoted threads which rise to the top. These topics can be related to interests as well as on location. So the platform can be viewed as a news feed with various topics of interest, or one can submit their own content and become an active member of the Reddit community.

How can you utilize Reddit for marketing?

Like every other community, Reddit communities are protective of their space and do not appreciate it when brands and marketers hijack their subreddits for their own ends. There are a few common practices each marketer should begin with if they want to utilize Reddit for their own gain:

• Brand-new accounts which are only created for self-promotion are rarely trusted. In order to start your marketing journey, you must first become an active participant who understands Reddit and be considered a part of the community instead of being seen as an outsider.
• You should be contributing content 80 percent of the time, meanwhile, you should only be self-promoting the rest of 20 percent of the time.
• Original and genuine content can take you places. Such content is more well-liked, and makes your engagements more genuine, giving you a more active audience.
• Marketing tactics such as getting engagements from fake accounts and having paid sponsors can make your content seem insincere, thus reducing any trust that your Reddit audience previously held for you.

After noting down these basic rules, here are the best ways you can utilize Reddit for your brand’s marketing:

1. Set up TrackReddit

The foremost step is obviously to create your Reddit account. But the most important step after that is to set up a TrackReddit account. This can help you receive alerts regarding certain relevant keywords and phrases that are being used on Reddit. This can give you a chance to jump in and start a conversation about your own brand.

2. Listen!

On Reddit, you rarely get to ask for customer feedback or wonder what’s going on with competitor brands. Instead, all you have to do is sit and listen, as the platform has abundant conversations relevant to brands like you. You only need to listen to figure out what your brand’s winning at, whether it checks all the boxes, and what more you could be doing to become a better competitor.

3. Find user-generated content

Reddit might not be the perfect platform for customer photos and reviews. But it is a well-known fact that whichever product or service has gotten a good review on Reddit has made it big. Redditors giving good reviews to your product or service is enough social proof for your brand to be considered genuine.

4. Personal accounts seem more genuine

Your brand account might not be seen as sincere if it is not as active. But engaging with customers through your more active personal account can give your brand a more genuine audience. A non-corporate account is a great way to approach customers and potential audiences as it makes you seem more human.

Marketing on Reddit may seem tricky and too complicated. But if you’ve noticed, most of these tips are asking you to be genuine in order to connect with your customers in a more humane way. If you find these tips helpful, check out these important tools and content creation checklist if you’re going through a creators’ block.