Despite being the fourth most popular social media platform in the UK, digital marketing tends to centre around the usual suspects: Google, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn and YouTube. Reddit is often left out because its users behave differently from other platforms and because it hasn’t shaken off its perception as a forum for tech enthusiasts and memes.
In fact, Reddit can give business owners insights into the market, such as what frustrates their audience, as well as invaluable SEO and advertising opportunities.
Let’s go into the reasons why you should use Reddit as a small business owner.
What is Reddit?
If you’re not already a user of Reddit, it’s a great platform to find communities of like-minded individuals. There are over 100,000 communities (known as subreddits) on Reddit, ranging from r/unitedkingdom (with over 1.1 million weekly visitors) to more niche communities such as r/medievalenglishcoins (2 weekly visitors).
Users are anonymous, only going by their username, and they don’t have to upload a profile picture; instead, they have an avatar that they can customise to look however they want.
Users can join as many subreddits as they want. Usually, users will find communities related to their hobbies, sports teams, geographic location and any other interests that they may, or may not, want other people knowing about.
Within these communities, users pose questions, post about recent events or share pictures about whatever is relevant to the subreddit (if you want a good laugh and to see some amazing dishes, check out r/ratemydish).
These posts are then upvoted or downvoted depending on how well it is received and other users may comment on the post, either agreeing, disagreeing or offering feedback, which in turn can also be upvoted or downvoted. These votes contribute to a user’s “karma” which, while a largely arbitrary score, can affect the groups they are allowed to post in.
So that’s an overview of the platform. But how can small businesses benefit from using Reddit?
How Reddit can benefit small businesses
Market research
Whether you’re making a business plan or gauging the market for a new product, Reddit communities are a great opportunity to listen to your audience and find out what they like and what they dislike.
Quite often someone will ask a question about a product or ask for recommendations for a café in an area and the responses can be eye-opening about what users value.
In this respect, “lurking” can provide inspiration for changes you might not have considered before as well as get feedback you might not have received on other platforms.
It’s important to take these insights with a pinch of salt and know the limitations of any market research on Reddit. Don’t base any business decisions solely off a Reddit post – instead, use it as a springboard for further research.
Active engagement
Many users go to Reddit to learn, research and troubleshoot. They value authenticity and respect an honest opinion put forward in a pleasant, respectful manner.
If you spot a post that you can contribute to meaningfully, whether it’s advice on setting up a new business or your experience with an accountancy software provider, for example, commenting within the first hour or two of it being posted can build your credibility in the online community which, in turn, can lead to sales in the long-run – especially if the thread you commented on is cited by Google.
Brand discovery
You’ve probably noticed that when you Google something a Reddit thread appears. This is because in 2024 Google paid $60 million (£44.7 million) for access to Reddit’s library of user-generated content for its AI training and search indexing, which looks set to be expanded.
The result is that Reddit dominates Google Search results and you don’t need to be a user to view a thread. This means if you are mentioned on a popular thread or are one of the top comments on the thread you’ll reach an audience far beyond Reddit users.
However, this is hard to influence as you can’t control what people say, and trying to orchestrate an optimal thread/comment for brand discovery is likely to get you downvoted into oblivion.
Paid advertising
If you’re looking to go beyond market research and want to use Reddit as an advertising tool, Reddit Ads can help.
In just a few easy steps you can create an account and set up a campaign, deciding what your budget will be and which keywords and communities you’d like to target. You can choose from a wide range of ads, including:
- Promoted posts
- Display ads (banner)
- Video ads
- Carousel ads
- Text ads
Each ad type has different benefits. Promoted posts allow you to engage with users (although this comes at its own risk), while display, video and carousel ads will act as billboards in between posts and comments. Text ads are ads which look like a post are most likely to generate clicks.
And with over 100,000 communities on Reddit, including niche, typically hard-to-reach communities, you can put your business in front of new audiences and spark a conversation among users that drives sales.
Sounds great, right? Well, sort of.
Reddit users can be hostile towards lazy promotions and overt advertisements. Unlike on other platforms such as TikTok, where unless a user feels particularly aggrieved by an advert and reports it most will skip past the ad, on Reddit, where ads are intrusive to the user experience, businesses risk their ads being downvoted or ‘ratioed’ (when comments outnumber votes) if it doesn’t sit right with Reddit users.
The solution is to create ads that aren’t overtly salesy and target relevant audiences. Consider the tone of your copy and how jarring your display ad’s colours might be within the Reddit experience. It’s estimated that around 80% of people use dark mode on their phone, so dark blues or blacks probably won’t stand out much, while white backgrounds blare out on a screen.
With this in mind, Reddit Ads is best if you want to raise brand awareness and achieve a high number of targeted impressions. Impressions is the easiest goal of a paid social campaign as all it relies on is being seen rather than your audience taking action, although this does mean any subsequent website traffic or sales lacks tracking attribution.
Final thoughts
Small business owners should create Reddit profiles to research, learn and engage with other business owners online. Reddit is an invaluable tool to gauge public opinion (to a degree) and find out what is valued by customers and what frustrates them.
Businesses that provide solutions and services for hobbyists and collectors, whether that’s Warhammer, model trains, antiques, coins, or painters may find Reddit Ads a useful tool to increase brand awareness for their product. Podcasters or influencers can also benefit from ads targeted at specific audiences.
If you’d like to see how many users you could reach with paid ads you can sign up to Reddit Ads for free using the link below. There’s no obligation to create a campaign and you can play around with your budget, keywords and communities to see if it’s right for you.