← The Digiday Podcast
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- [00:00]
A
Foreign.
- [00:10]
B
Hello. Hello and welcome to another episode of the Digiday Podcast, a show for anyone wondering if their TikTok for you page looks different. I'm Kamika McCoy, senior marketing reporter here at Digiday.
- [00:22]
A
And I'm Tim Peterson, executive editor of video and Audio Digit Media. Ko Are you feeling like your for you page is looking different these days?
- [00:30]
B
You know, my doom scrolling has not changed. There's been, there was a period of time where like I kept getting older videos which I think Oracle and the powers that be said, oh, just a glitch. No worries as the power of, you know, changing of guard happens. But so far no changes on my end.
- [00:51]
A
Yeah, that's like in the sci fi movies when you have a clone of a person and they seem like the normal person, then just they do like of those neck jerk things randomly and they're just like, oh, sorry, that's just crick in my neck. Don't worry about it. I'm the same old person that I always was.
- [01:06]
B
Yeah, nothing to see here.
- [01:07]
A
But it does sound like. Yeah, but it does sound like nothing to see here maybe is even more apt description. So we had Crystal Scanlon, senior platforms reporter at Digiday, on the show this week just to talk about TikTok US. And now that we're coming up on almost two months since the formation and I guess launch relaunch, I don't know how we're supposed to describe it, but of TikTok us, how things are going. It feels like it had gotten pretty quiet on the Tick Tock front feels.
- [01:39]
B
Yeah, which I'm, I'm glad that we've got Crystal here to kind of explain things for us. She did a really good job of kind of breaking down like what has happened and what. Crystal's playing chess, not checkers. What stage that sets for Tick Tock as we go forward. So while I'm doom scrolling, she's. She's doing the. The. The Lord'.
- [01:57]
A
Yeah. And I wonder if part of the reason why it feels like things have gotten quiet on the TikTok front is because they've gotten so loud on the ChatGPT front that that is kind of the platform that at least for me, is taking so much attention these days and has been so active. So obviously ChatGPT launched ads in February after announcing ads in January, and the news just keeps rolling. So we had the CMO of the Not Worldwide on the show last week to talk, you know, because they're one of the first ChatGPT advertisers and in Last week's episode, that episode, we also Talked about how OpenAI had struck a deal with Criteo for Critio to start helping OpenAI fill some of that oh so precious ChatGPT inventory. And then also last week, the information reported that OpenAI had talked with the Trade Desk about also getting in on the action and helping OpenAI to fill that ChatGPT inventory. Now, the OpenAI does not have an active deal with the Trade Desk, according to the information report. They've just held early talks, but it's super early for ChatGPT ads. The fact that OpenAI is already talking about bringing a DSP in the mix to programmatically sell these ads surprised me.
- [03:18]
B
I would say the same. And here's my bigger question. What, what is, what is OpenAI gunning for here by having this partnership with Money.
- [03:27]
A
Money. Kimiko wants money. As much as it can get. As soon as possible, please.
- [03:35]
B
I feel like all of this keeps coming down to their burning through cash quickly because they've already got the partnership with Critio. Now they're looking to maybe ink something with the Trade Desk. What does the Trade Desk get out of this? They've gotten a flogging in the headlines for a while here.
- [03:50]
A
Exactly. And so you want. If you're, if you're a kid who's getting a little bullied in school, the best thing that can happen is the cool kid comes around and starts like, puts their arm around you and is just chilling with you in the cafeteria. That's what you want. That's basically what this is. Trade Desk, as we've talked about on the show, has had a really tough year plus at this point, and it didn't have. Well, it had a good Q4 earnings report, Q4 of 2025, but it forecasted a softer than analysts had expected, Q1, which is not what you would want to see if you're one of these analysts. So its latest earnings report did not instill a lot of confidence in investors, it seems. There was also the Ad Week report recently about WPP and Dentsu exiting Open Path, which is the Trade Desk kind of SSP workaround to inventory. So also not a good look if you're the Trade Desk, although Trade Desk has been very vocal or Trade Desk employees have been very vocal on LinkedIn about that report I've seen. But Trade Desk getting access to OpenAI inventory, potentially, again, there is no deal in place. But if it's the first and for some time the only DSP potentially with access to OpenAI inventory that's big feather in its cap because its primary competition is Amazon DSP and Google's DSP DV360. One of the biggest things that Google's DSP has going for it is it's the only DSP with access to YouTube inventory. That's what makes it so that Google, just about every advertiser has to be using that dsp, not necessarily exclusively, but at all. And Trade Desk doesn't really have that. It doesn't have that exclusive inventory. It doesn't have exclusive data in the same way that like a Google and Amazon certainly does with its shopper data. And so if it can get some exclusivity with OpenAI like it had in the past with Walmart, that's going to be helpful for the Trade Desk to have. So good for the Trade Desk if it, if it gets this deal. Now, one of the not good things could be if Trade Desk had these early talks with OpenAI and then a week from now, a month from now, a few months from now, it can OpenAI says that they have a deal in place with Amazon's DSP or Google's dsp that's not going to be good for the Trade Desk. But if Trade Desk comes out with an actual deal as opposed to just deal talks, that's going to be good for the Trade Desk.
- [06:41]
B
Well, maybe I'll find that while I'm doom scrolling on my on my TikTok video by Tim Peterson explaining all of it.
- [06:49]
A
Yeah, yeah, so we'll have to see how things go on the ChatGPT for. I mean this is just the story that keeps going and they're going so fast. Normally you get like a crawl walk run with platforms that are new to advertiser. We certainly saw that with Netflix was probably the most recent example that I can think of. Sam Aldman seems to be like, no, I did my stretch and I'm just that kind of person who let me do my strides. I'm not interested in a light jog to warm up. My muscles are ready.
- [07:19]
B
Jesus Christ. I will tell you, as a high school sprint runner myself, you run out of steam pretty quick. We'll see how long Altman can keep this up.
- [07:28]
A
Yeah, so we'll see about that. And then we'll also see about TikTok, which I don't know. I felt like I came into this conversation with Crystal thinking. It's been pretty quiet. Even like some of the agency execs that I've been talking to recently were just like, yeah, things were looking pretty Rough in mid to late January, Reach was down and all of that, but everything's bounced back and it's felt business as usual. But Krystal shared some things that she's been hearing where, like, okay, on the surface, maybe business as usual, but under the surface, it's like that duck where the feet are just going, going, going.
- [08:06]
B
Absolutely. Now that we've made it to the other side of band talks, it'll be interesting to kind of hear what Crystal has to say about what she's been hearing from from media buyers and agency execs. So with no further ado, we'll get to it. Foreign.
- [08:26]
A
Welcome back to the show.
- [08:28]
C
Good to be back.
- [08:29]
A
This is our annual TikTok episode because I feel like each March on the show, Kimiko, we're talking TikTok.
- [08:36]
B
I feel like last. This time last year, we had a lot to say. This year it's been all quiet on the western part. What does it say? It's been quiet. Too quiet.
- [08:47]
C
I mean, it is and it isn't. I guess to an extent they're probably just behaving as any other platform at this point because they don't have a legal battle anymore. So they can really just double down and focus on just what they're trying to do, which is get ad dollars and creators and build and build up their user base rather than having this whole massive gray cloud over them that never seemed to go away until January, just gone.
- [09:11]
A
Yeah, because, I mean, that's exactly the thing. January 2025 was when the first ban was kind of enacted and then quickly overturned. A lot of upheaval and then many questions about, okay, what now? We had, I lost count, three different postponements. And then in terms of, is a deal going to be struck, is TikTok US going to be spun out, or is ByteDance going to hold its ground? Then last fall, I believe it was last fall was when the Trump administration announces, we got a deal. We got a deal, everybody. We got a deal. China was quiet about all of that, leading to questions up through the holidays into this year of like, okay, but is China actually going to sign this deal? Because that seems important. Eventually, China finally signed the deal and mid January, TikTok US got spun out. That same time was the Alex Preddy killing by ICE agents in Minneapolis and a technical outage that led to a mass freakout of, okay, TikTok US is here and people feeling like the algorithm is different, that there's a suppression of content. TikTok US again, blame that on technical glitches. But it was a whole other January upheaval for TikTok and now we're in March and it just feels like everything's gone really silent on the TikTok front.
- [10:52]
C
Yeah, I mean every single person that I've spoken to and like even throughout the entire of this whole legal battle that they've had, even during it, it almost became a running joke that when I'd ask, okay, so what's going on? Like, is anyone saying anything about the band? It was almost laughable up until the point that the deal got actually signed because no one believed anything else was going to happen. Now it's almost like the mood is still exactly the same, like nothing to see here, still business as usual, very much TikTok, that's what they're known for. But just now they just don't have the gray cloud over them. It's just all very much. They are geared towards just focusing on getting more money through their door.
- [11:32]
B
That's so there was so much, from my perspective, like as an avid doom scroller myself, in fears of, especially with Oracle, right. The, the Ellisons and Trump's allies I guess is a good way to call them that they were going to upend the entire platform and that was going to have a trickle down effect for users fleeing the platform and that was going to be a trickle down effect for advertisers not wanting to be on the platform. But what's interesting is to your point, Crystal, they've been kind of heading, what is it, business as usual, which has been for them, advertisers and users alike. What's kind of been the hearing of. Of. Of what you've been talking to others about what dollars are they going for here? What's their plan of action?
- [12:15]
C
So it seems in general like they've got a few kind of plans in mind. I mean, I've obviously definitely seen they've still got the typical incentives, but that's nothing new. Platforms across the board do that just at different times of the year. Whether it's just. Just when it's the beginning of Q1 because it's a fresh year, and then all throughout the year other. Regardless, the one thing that is definitely more interesting this year is from certain conversations I have had, it's become clear that TikTok is no longer just doing that scattergram, just going after any old dollars anymore, just from anywhere that they can possibly get. Which in some respects it makes sense. Like they don't have to anymore prove the fact that they have a right to be in the U.S. they want to be in the U.S. and there's a good reason for them to be in the us but now they are definitely wanting to make sure that they go after independent agencies. And in particular agencies, they are assigning reps to them based on their Meta billings rather than their TikTok billings, which seems quite interesting. So it would tell me even from that, they obviously see Reels, as do any of the other platforms. Reels is a clear main competitor because Reels is doing really well. So Zuckerberg himself even said it earned up to or it created an annual run rate of 50 billion, and that was Q3 last year. So in that regard, they are their main, probably front runner as a competitor. Now, at this point, did that surprise
- [13:38]
A
you that they're targeting meta budgets as opposed to, say, YouTube budgets or other kinds of budgets that they could have been trying to go after directly like that?
- [13:48]
C
In some ways, yes, Only because I've always kind of pictured YouTube as kind of like almost the top of all of them. Just, we know it's like the king for monetization for creators. It's kind of been there, done that, it's got everything under its belt. But with regards to Meta, we also know the history of meta. Like if they can't copy it or get it, then they'll buy it. Like that whole situation going on. But I think what I find quite surprising, whilst it's obviously not front, I'm not hearing this directly from TikTok reps. They would never say it to me directly. It feels quite interesting that they're not being quite coy about it anymore. Like when even there was the issue of whether they would be banned or not. And we were talking about who is going to be the benefactor of them literally having no more TikTok in the U.S. a lot of the apps at that point were just kind of being very careful with how they were positioning themselves in terms of, oh, if a certain app isn't around anymore, you can come over here. They would never outright just say the name, which is the Voldemort of apps. Yeah, and like now it just seems like them. I mean, other platforms are definitely becoming more obvious in general, but the fact that they're no longer even concerned about saying the names outright, it's just they clearly are. We're going after Meta and we don't care who knows it behind the scenes,
- [15:10]
A
are they? What chance do they like? When you're talking to the agency execs, how willing are they or clients to give up some of their meta budgets for TikTok. Because, I mean, TikTok I feel like has come a long way when it comes to performance marketing. That said, Meta alongside Google or Amazon, the gold standard when it comes to performance marketing. So I would think Meta has a pretty solid hold on those budgets.
- [15:40]
C
Yeah, I think it definitely is kind of case by case in that regard. I think for the Meta advertisers that are just feeling that they've oversaturated on that platform, they've probably got more chance to actually get those dollars because they're almost looking for another platform anyway. But if it was just a. Do you fancy just giving us your Meta budget? I would be very surprised at this point, even now. Yeah, I would be very surprised if anyone moved any substantial amount unless they were potentially a brand that was built on TikTok, unless there was some form of additional partnership, maybe they had like Shop built into it and there was almost like somewhat of a guarantee that they could really make up Those dollars on TikTok in some way that they would be losing potentially from Meta.
- [16:31]
B
You and I have talked about this before and I think there was a time when other alternative platforms, right, third party platforms or tertiary platforms were kind of like coyly positioning themselves as like, oh, meta might be banned. You can spend some dollars over here. Do you get the sense that they kind of have shifted their tone or that, you know, advertisers are shifting their dollars? Because I imagine like TikTok's back in the room. They're. And they're, you know, they're, they're going after those adults. So what does that mean for like Snap or a Pinterest?
- [17:01]
C
I think now every conversation I had, there's definitely a bit of a shift in the sense that they're no longer just focusing on, hey, this may not be here, let's just move your dollars over to somewhere more reliable because they can't use that narrative anymore. It's kind of dead in the water even. It was still dead in the water even when it was happening and it was a live problem. But I think just now it comes across as all of the platforms are just really trying to prove that they can deliver on, on their roi and the fact that they are more transparent than the others, that they are more brand safe than the others. Even X, for example, albeit completely different, Platform X is still positioning itself as a very brand safe platform that has brand suitability. It's got the tools, it's got the partnerships and everything that's obviously trying to discredit the Old narrative that they used
- [17:48]
A
to have the narrative completely when Grok posted like non conventional sexualized images. Yeah, sure, yeah.
- [17:57]
C
The ever growing gift that keeps on giving with that platform. But yeah, so I think like you've obviously got Grok, not Grok, you've got X doing that, you've got Snap at the moment. They're obviously focusing on being a lot more performance focused. So that would obviously indicate they're trying to go kind of not obviously they can't yet go toe to toe with like Meta's advantage plus, but you've got Tech talk Smart plus as well. So I think they're almost just trying to get their ducks in a row now, these other platforms so that then they are in a position so that if and when any of these advertisers are wanting to move dollars from their tried and true platforms then they've kind of, they're basically a place that is more than ready to go.
- [18:37]
B
Do you get the sense that TikTok is humble about this? I know you said they're kind of like buried head in the sand or is it kind of like, you know, we don't have to because I've heard. So for instance, like Google knows it's Google, right? They don't necessarily have offer like steep discounts or anything like that. You're going to show up. Has TikTok kind of taken the same approach or is it like, hey, we're back.
- [19:00]
C
I would say kind of a bit of a twofold situation here. Like I think through all of last year to me they were definitely slightly on the more overly confident considering there was like a big law situation, legal situation that could basically force them out of the country, let's be honest. But I'd say now it's more of a quiet confidence. They already knew they were never going to get banned. They knew it was going to be a thing. So to some it would seem a bit arrogant at the time. It's obviously played in their favor because, well, look where they are. They're still here like a year later and they are more than kind of carrying on, ready to go. I would say as much as they are like heads down, they're definitely not shy about it because I mean they're coming out with the big guns, they're putting on events. They're still acting as if this, this whole thing was almost like all in our heads and just a bit of a dream for the last year, like it never actually existed, gaslit by TikTok.
- [19:56]
A
And I guess as much as we're Talking about, like, things being business as usual with TikTok US. There was one big move that TikTok US had initially made since its formation in January, and that was the move to have TikTok shop sellers have to like, handle fulfillment on their own. And our modern retail counterparts have done Alison Smith in particular a great job reporting on this. But that was something where TikTok made this announcement, pissed off a lot of TikTok shop sellers. There was such a backlash that TikTok walked it back a bit, if I'm not mistaken. They're not walking it back entirely. They're just going to be giving folks more time to change up their fulfillment processes to get on board with this. At the same time, the fact that they made that change feels really significant in light of what you were saying around going after independent agencies, going after meta dollars, basically going after performance marketers. Exactly the kinds of TikTok shop sellers you would think, or the types of advertisers who would also be TikTok shop sellers.
- [21:07]
C
I suppose in a way they probably just see themselves almost like, well, they're their own version of Amazon and like, that's who they're clearly competing with when it comes to TikTok shop. I think the whole situation about the seller situation that went on in January, was it January or was it February? What I'm even saying it now.
- [21:21]
B
February.
- [21:22]
C
Yeah. That situation that went on in February I thought was quite amusing, just in the sense that it was literally everyone. My whole entire LinkedIn feed was literally people posting this announcement from TikTok saying, completely outraged by it. So it clearly got enough traction for TikTok to make a change. I mean, whether or not, like I say, the people, whether or not advertisers could do something like that over something else that they didn't agree with and then TikTok would walk back. Other decisions is still yet to be kind of seen. But it shows that clearly, as much as they are confident, they don't want to, like, how do I say it? They don't want to upset people, shall we say, because they ultimately, they still need their money.
- [22:03]
A
Right. That said, they were still pretty aggressive in making that move in the first place with such short notice. So I guess it indicates some willingness to rock the boat with their revenue
- [22:16]
C
streams, I suppose, in one sense, as far as they were concerned, well, we're here in the US now. You can't shift us. So in that regard, we're gonna act like we're here. We've got nothing to be concerned about anymore. That's all behind us. And it almost kind of gave a sense that if they thought that was all that was stopping them or holding them back versus actually there are genuine problems, like logistical problems that could create more issues as to you having more business on your platform, I don't think they necessarily thought it through, or at least not the timescale, because even some of the comments I was seeing, it could completely wipe out certain businesses if they orchestrated that straight away. But they obviously recognize that they still need those independent businesses already, because without it, I mean, that is literally what has built TikTok shop to the scale it is at the moment.
- [23:08]
B
Do you get the sense that TikTok is almost, or reaching like too big to fail at this point? They didn't end up getting banned. They're still here in the US they made the major announcement for TikTok shop. Right. And even with pushback, they. They didn't like double down on or anything like that, but they didn't renege either. And then also they're expanding to push toward, you know, independent agencies and things like this. So do you think that they're kind of gunning for that and what's the likelihood that they'd get there, in your opinion?
- [23:40]
C
I would say I don't necessarily think that they're being arrogant. I think they're being incredibly confident. Because, I mean, it wasn't, I think, was it back in 2024, early 25? I was meeting with Blake, who was part of the TikTok team at the time, and even back then, he very boldly said to me, we envision that Smart will completely close the gap with Meta's Advantage Plus. And that was way back before the ban was even finished. And over with the fact he could say it. And with that level of confidence, I think they can see who their competitors are and where they need to actually take the money from. They probably see themselves very much as a tier one platform. It's a matter of time and when they'll get there, as opposed to an if they'll get there. I think the only thing that's probably holding them back is it's very hard in this industry when you have a whole set of practices that, you know certain platforms that are very dominant and very reliable. It's very hard to get the masses to move from those platforms because why would you give it up for something that you can't guarantee? And that's the issue that they're probably coming up against right now.
- [24:50]
A
Do you have a sense on whether Smart plus has Closed the gap with Advantage Plus. Also, can we please eliminate the pluses? Says the person who works for a company who has Digiday Plus.
- [25:03]
C
I've not heard anything in the sense that, oh my God, this is nearly on par. I'd say it's closing, but it hasn't closed it. I don't know in terms of how long that will necessarily take, because to get that, that would require people to literally bring their dollars away from Advantage plus to see if they can match it potentially. And I think that's definitely the struggle because I mean, in one respect you've obviously got with Advantage plus on Meta, as much as it is like it's so it delivers, it produces all the results anyone wants. I literally don't have a single conversation where people don't tell me about how irritating it is to have the entire platform have so many bugs. But you'd think something like that, that becomes so annoying over time and more problematic than anything else that that would deter people from using the platform. But it's almost just become part of the course of using the platform because, well, and it's annoying, but we need to use it because it gives us the results that we need. TikTok is probably fortunate in that it hasn't got the bugs and things like that, but also it's a much newer platform. What probably is going in their favor is they managed to build it to the scale it is in far less time than Meta, I think did with theirs. So they can clearly move quicker. But that's also probably as a result of, I think years ago they were literally hiring how many ex meta execs at one point. So it's almost like, as you've seen with any of the other platforms, once a bunch of execs from one platform move to another, you almost see the platform playbook almost play out in their new playing ground, just under a different name.
- [26:37]
A
I wonder if at some point we start to see something stronger than fatigue from ad buyers with these AI powered ad tools like, you know, Advantage plus, because I know there was. You mentioned the bugs. Sometimes I wonder how much of these are like bugs versus features. Like there was an agency exec I was talking to at our Programmatic Marketing Summit in December who was saying how each day they're having to go into Meta's platform and check that things remain toggled off or toggled on as they would like them to be, because Meta just so happens to toggle things back on or toggle things off that are advantageous to Meta. Not advantageous to this person. This was a person who's managing a lot of local campaigns for advertisers and it seems like that's one of the hang ups with Advantage plus, is it just not as it's too brute of a tool.
- [27:39]
C
I suppose in one regard, I mean it kind of speaks to. What is it Zuckerberg that always said it like move fast and break things. So there's always going to be developers and engineers in the back end trying to tweak things, just thinking that they're just making some tiny little thing when actually it's probably completely crashed or done something to God knows how many people across the world. But at the same time it's going to impact a lot more people because a lot more people use that platform and, and like if you've got smaller advertisers in general, then the chances are they may not even look to any of the other like tier 2 platforms or even a TikTok depending on what they're going after because every single dollar counts for them. So they're only going to go to the top tier Googles and metas of the world to make sure that they can get the results with the few dollars that they do have. But I'd say, I mean TikTok could potentially get to that stage at some point. It's just a matter of time as to if others are willing to give it a shot and give it a shot at the scale.
- [28:35]
B
I'm curious how this all plays out in the end because in conversations that I've been having with media buyers, it's not just TikTok, it's not just Metta, but performance channels in general. They're starting to see diminishing returns and there's a lot of concern of like, am I getting the juice for how much I'm squeezing here? You know, that's why like brand awareness and things like that are becoming more important and trying to tie ROI to more brand metrics so less about like TikTok specifically and meta specifically, but like kind of how they shape themselves as performance marketing gets harder to do for some of these advertisers
- [29:13]
C
I think. I mean there was even someone I spoke to I believe last year and like they were very, very clear that because they were so fed up with everything to do with Google, they pulled everyone out of it and then they were just literally using other platforms and Google Shopping and then just pulled them out of performance max altogether for those very reasons.
- [29:29]
A
What kind of hit did they see?
- [29:33]
C
They found it completely fine. They Were like, I can literally get far better returns by not using Performance Plus. Because as much as these, I suppose it's a double edged sword, isn't it? Like from the platform side it's always we are doing these tools and creating these tools to make things easier for your lives and for what you're doing with your campaigns. From the advertiser side, the platform is never as much as they're on their side. They're not. The platform still has their own bottom line to reach and they're two completely different things. So it might, yes, you can always say, I mean obviously Meta and all the rest of them, they're not making these platforms for fun. They might be a high load of investment to start with, but the whole point of making them is because they know it's going to deliver thousands if not millions and billions of money through the course of several years afterwards.
- [30:24]
A
Yeah, I mean these get described as ad buying tools or ad buying platforms really. They're inventory management platforms, they're ways for meta, Google, all the others to yield management, really, maybe even more so than inventory management. How do we fill our ad slots as cost effectively for us as possible?
- [30:49]
C
And when you think now it's gotten to the stage, most of them have a whole full rounded suite of this AI campaign platform, so to speak, but not everyone does. Snap is on the way to it. It's got a version of it, but it certainly hasn't got anything in the way of a Smart plus. Specifically, it's got the different tools. Anytime that I've spoken to any of the platforms about this, because I spoke to Reddit about it, I've spoken to Snap about it before, pretty sure I even spoke to TikTok about it before they even launched theirs. It's always a case of that to be able to build something like that, you need to have enough users to bring in enough advertisers to have enough funding to be able to take on such a hefty project, to build something like that which will pay off in the end without all of those ducks aligning, they are never going to be anywhere near it. So that's why you tend to see all of the smaller iterations, initial features, all brought out initially and introduced and then at some later on stage, when they have enough of them together, they pull them all together and it's this rebrand of some form of plus max, whatever they want to call it because they all have quite generic, very similar names. But yeah, I think that's pretty much what typically has been happening. So Far I think like yeah, Snap's probably the most recent one really I guess that it's on the way there but it's not got anything that's like a direct like for like I guess tick tock.
- [32:12]
B
Even being part of these conversations says a lot about where it's at in terms of like ad in advertisers minds right on the same tiers like a meta and Google. And given that they're gunning for those dollars and I guess their next for their next act will be less ban and more about, you know, can I convince performance marketers, brand marketers and advertisers in general to cough up some of those meta dollars and share them over this way?
- [32:37]
A
Yeah, I mean and that's the conversation we were having around TikTok 2, three years ago before the like executive order to ban it was TikTok had moved into that tier was becoming like fixture in budgets. It was in the must buy was proving itself on the performance marketing. So maybe we just after the, I don't want to call the ban a distraction but after all the attention on the ban and kind of how that put things in a holding pattern, now it seems like it's back to business as usual for TikTok.
- [33:13]
C
Well I suppose as well with these platforms, the whole point of them where it really, really is effective, like it can work for any advertiser of any size, but the ones that really benefit from it are the small to medium businesses because they don't have a lot of resources. And it's been proven time and time again that having a lot of those on your platform gives you a consistent, completely consistent stream of revenue that literally you don't have to kind of worry as much about the business because you're kind of almost taken care of. Even Zuckerberg recently during his latest earnings, he openly admitted that basically it's advertising that's going to be fronting all of the cost of their AI projects going forward. And AI is such a big part of the conversation now with any of these platforms. So it doesn't surprise me in any shape or form that in some respects it takes a while to get one of these platforms, but when you have it, it's kind of almost guaranteed revenue. So if you then come out with a new feature or something that doesn't do as well, you're still going to be okay on your bottom line and
- [34:15]
A
it creates that pricing pressure for all the other advertisers of like look, if you don't want this inventory, we got people who are going to buy it. Also, like, the price just went up because we have all these people who
- [34:25]
C
want to buy it, literally, or as like with one person I did speak to, they were literally telling me how it's quite amusing how every 18 months or so with Meta, when their CPM goes really high the way that then it. Obviously advertisers will complain about it, but then the way it gets reduced, Meta will open up some form of a placement somewhere and suddenly it all reduces. So it's just a very secular movement at this point.
- [34:48]
A
Yeah, Meta has been kind of genius with managing its ad load over the years. Especially, like one of my favorite parts, weirdly, of Meta's earnings reports is looking at how pricing has trended and then how inventory, like impressions have trended. And that dynamic has been really interesting to map over the years now, I guess. Well, TikTok's not reporting publicly, but I'd be really interested to look at TikTok's numbers.
- [35:15]
C
No, I think that would be the interesting thing because, I mean, I don't know, could they. I mean, obviously they're very separated now in the US I don't know if there's. Would that. Could there be a capability where the US side goes public and the rest of it doesn't? Because if it's still technically part of the same company with this government, wow, Anything's possible. Yeah, it's the dream, I guess.
- [35:39]
A
Well, Kristal, I think I have a much better understanding of what's going on with TikTok, and that as quiet as TikTok seems to have been, it hasn't been silent as much as it may seem. So thanks so much for joining Kimiko and I back on the show.
- [35:55]
C
Give it three months. You know, who knows where TikTok will be?
- [35:58]
B
Well, as Lil Wayne once said, World G's move in silence like lasagna. So we'll see.
- [36:14]
A
Thanks for listening to this episode of the JJA podcast. If you enjoyed it, please leave us a rating and a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you're listening. Get more from Digiday with our daily newsletter sent out each weekday morning. Visit digiday.comnewsletters to sign up.