Reddit provides brands opportunities to generate viral traffic, gain market insights, and build engagement. Brands can use sponsored links to promote content or conduct question and answer sessions through the "IAmA" subreddit. Examples include IKEA generating over 1.5 million views with a Valentine's Day offer and Barack Obama's 2012 "IAmA" becoming the highest rated post that year. For brands to succeed, they must understand Reddit's culture, find relevant subreddits, monitor for insights, and submit high-quality, engaging content.

1. REDDIT FOR
BRANDS
A quick guide to how your
brand can be using Reddit.

2. The rise of citizen journalism has forced news outlets like CNN
and The Guardian to take a new approach to news reporting.
Reddit is at the forefront of this movement,
allowing users to be the creators and breakers of news.
This is the future of the news as we know it.

3. WHAT IS REDDIT?

4. 55 million 110 million
unique monthly visitors* vs unique monthly visitors#
Reddit is growing 200% YoY, and currently averages half the
unique monthly visitors of Yahoo (the world’s #1 news site^).
* Unique monthly visitors according to Reddit http://en.reddit.com/about/ (Updated 3/18/2013).
# eBizMBA Rank: http://www.ebizmba.com/articles/news-websites (Updated 3/18/2013).
^ Ranked by the number of monthly unique visitors according to eBizMBA Rank (as above).

5. “Read it on Reddit”
Reddit calls itself “the front page of the internet”.
It is a social content sharing and news aggregator site.
Known for its simple user interface, Reddit provides the latest
for what's new and popular on the web.

6. How it works
Reddit is essentially a giant bulletin board
where content is crowdsource curated.
— Users provide all the content via links or self-posts.
— Submissions are ranked by users through
up-voting and down-voting, determining
their position on the site.
— As a result, the front page is constantly updated
with fresh content.
— “Karma” points reflects how much good
the user has done for the Reddit community.

7. Subreddits
— A subreddit is a user-created and moderated
subsection of Reddit that is tailored to a specific topic.
— There are currently thousands of subreddits covering
every topic under the sun, from memes, politics to
highly technical scientific discussion.

8. WHAT’S IN IT FOR BRANDS?

9. Opportunities for brands
Viral and syndication potential
— With Reddit’s massive reach, it has the potential to spread
your brand and website virally across the internet.
Market insights
— A great crowd-sourcing tool for marketers to conduct
market research and collect honest consumer insights.
— Useful tool for customer support.
Brands can take advantage of Reddit’s unique community
to gain valuable insights and generate buzz.

10. Sponsored links
— Sponsored links work like Google SEM.
— These tools are available to all members of Reddit.
— Submissions can be promoted, displaying on top of Reddit’s front page. As a
brand, this can generate high volumes of traffic to your website.

11. IAmA
IAmA is a Q&A subreddit platform where a Reddit user identifies himself by submitting
a Reddit titled “I am ____ Ask me Anything”.
This prompts the community to ask questions and engage in open discussion.
It’s great for brands because it builds engagement, social ‘cred’, and is controllable.

12. EXAMPLES OF PEOPLE
& BRANDS USING REDDIT

13. Using Reddit – IKEA
For Valentine’s Day, IKEA Australia came up with a
funny offer (published in the announcements
section of the newspaper) – a free crib for babies
born 9 months from the 14th of February 2013.
This is a demonstration of the power of quality
content, which has resulted in viral sharing.
This post on Reddit received over 1.5 million views
and 1000+ comments within a day of posting.

14. Using IAmA – Barack Obama
Obama used AmA on Reddit to answer questions about
topics like the White House beer recipe, his work-life
balance and the influence of money in politics.
It was so popular that it made the site inaccessible for
many users during the 30 minutes that Obama was live.
This IAmA post became Reddit’s #1 post of the 2012,
bringing in 5.6 million page views and generated over
24,000 comments.
On a side note, the photo of Obama answering
questions on his laptop has become a web meme.

15. Using IAmA – Bill Gates
In February 2013, Bill Gates hosted an AmA session on
behalf of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
He covered topics such as his work at Microsoft, his
philanthropic work, the latest Microsoft products etc.
The session generated over 29 thousand comments
and high media coverage.
The IAmA section is now an important stop for the
publicity of celebrities and brands.

16. WHERE DO YOU START?
– FOUR SIMPLE STEPS

17. Step 1. Step 2. Step 3. Step 4.
Understand Find your Monitor
Submit
the Reddit relevant your
to Reddit
Community Subreddits Subreddits

18. — Reddit promotes anonymity and free speech.
Step 1.
— Blatant advertising is negatively received by Reddit’s
organic community.
— Reddit can be activated via genuine social causes i.e.
SOPA blackout, school bus monitor, r/suicidewatch.
Understand — Understand the ‘Reddiquette’ rules of conduct.
the Reddit
Community

19. For marketers, a relevant subreddit is a focus
Step 2. group on steroids.
— Feedback and opinion from Reddit users is a
great source of consumer insight that can
drive research & development and future
marketing campaigns.
Find your
relevant — Unbiased questions that are not directly
about the brand work best.
Subreddits
— Since users are anonymous, sentiment is
seen as honest and accurate.

20. — Businesses can create subreddits that are
Step 2. devoted to their brand. For example,
Coca-Cola, TopGear and Xbox.
— If your brand fits with pre-existing Reddit
behaviour and culture, create a subreddit.
Find your — Xbox utilise this platform to provide
relevant customer support.
Subreddits

21. Due to the segmentation of
Step 3.
communities provided by the Subreddit
structure, very specific demographics
can be observed and engaged.
Actively monitor Subreddits related to Monitor
your brand to gain honest insights into
your
customer perception
Subreddits

22. How to get submissions noticed
Step 4.
1. Value exchange 2. Headlines 3. Get Karma 4. Popular media 5. The right
— Provide genuine — Choose your — Contribute — Images. Subreddit
and relevant title carefully. quality and — GIFs. — Successful
content. — Provide context relevant links — Memes.
content needs
and be regularly. — Personal stories.
to be targeted
descriptive. — Leave
to the right
— Keep it factual comments on users.
and opinion other users’ Submit
free. posts.
— Avoid aggressive
to Reddit
phrases such as
“AMAZING”,
“vote this up”.
Amount of visits, comments and votes
= Traffic, links, social signals, branding, feedback, followers, conversations...

23. THANK YOU!
For more information please email
tim.evans@dtdigital.com.au or jackie.bowker@dtdigital.com.au
dtdigital.com.au
facebook.com/dtdigital
twitter.com/dtdigital