WHAT'S THE FREQUENCY, META?

“Who understands these things? I didn’t and I don’t now.” - Dan Rather on when he was asked while being mugged, “Kenneth, what is the frequency?”

The other day, Insider Intelligence published a digital time spent vs. ad spending graph. It’s remarkable, yet absurd, how Meta has a ~2.5x ratio of digital time to digital ad spend. So much so, it’s not even worth talking about others listed in the graph seen below:

Advertisers are jamming 2.5 times the baseline ads per digital minute into the scrolling feeds of Facebook and Instagram. How could that be?

Do Meta audiences demand that much attention? 

Does it really take that much share of audience time for Meta platforms to “work?” 

Do so many advertisers need to scream into the scrolling wind over and over again to drive an absurd frequency level?

Why? Why?!  TELL ME WHY!!!

Since the graph can't tell me why, guess I'll have to uncover it myself.

To start, let’s evaluate from a few different perspectives of the competition (YouTube), trust (consumer & advertiser) and audience (generational use). Each view gets three bullets (for brevity; maybe).  Then we’ll see where we land and go from there. Cool? Cool. Here we go!

Why is Meta’s platform getting so much over-investment from advertisers while YouTube isn’t? 

• Ad Format: Text and images are so much easier to build so Meta platforms are baseline whereas YouTube becomes a phase 2 when video ads are produced
• Performance Media: Sorry, YouTube & Hulu. Video isn’t clickable so you lose the Performance game. TikTok & Snap haven’t solved for measurement as well either, so anything incremental gets tossed Meta’s way (even if it’s predominantly a walled-garden, self-serving measurement solution).
• Celebrity-led vs Creator-built: Instagram is to Celebrity as YouTube is to Creator, so Instagram usually gets the nod when building a celebrity-aligned campaign.
• Tally: 3 votes for “Pro-Meta”

Why is Meta’s platform trusted as a safe haven for advertisers when it’s not trusted by consumers? Didn’t Twitter lose 90% its value due to a similar set of issues?

• Job Security: The old saying used to be no CMO got fired for running in the Wall St. Journal. Same thing applies here though replaced by Meta, Google and Amazon in 2023/24.
• Twitter Replacement: Instagram, Facebook and now Threads, offer real-time environments without needing a different platform. Though Twitter is a very different audience, most advertisers won't go back to X due to trust issues.
• Lawsuits: Consumers have moved beyond distrust and into action. For example, 1,200 parents filed a class-action lawsuit against social media companies at the end of last year. Yet while that’s one of many lawsuits against social companies, brands won’t boycott Meta like they did back in 2020 (to little effect).
• Tally: 2 votes for “Pro-Meta”; 1 vote “Against”

Why is Meta the go-to for advertisers when younger audiences are not as captivated by Facebook and Instagram and feel addicted?

• Gen Z's go-to isn't Facebook: Per Pew, “When asked about what app they used "almost constantly," teens, 19% of them, again pointed to YouTube as their most-used platform. TikTok was second in this category with 16%, followed by Snapchat with 15%, Instagram at 10% and Facebook at 2%
• Gen Alpha is growing up on YouTube & TikTok: YouTube is the go-to for young kids content given the programming from the likes of SuperAwesome, Moonbug and other kids content channels. A study also reaffirms that the under-18 group looks to TikTok and YouTube more than any of the other platforms on a daily basis.
• Addiction is a Bad Thing: A majority of teens, 54%, said it would be hard to give up social media, and 36% of teens felt they spent too much time on social media, according to Pew.” Meta’s history of stickiness at all costs is well documented, including a former employee stating that Facebook is as addictive as cigarettes.
• Tally: 0.5 votes for “Pro-Meta”; 2.5 votes “Against”

Summary Tally: 5.5 “Pro”; 3.5 “Against” 2.5x investment

Is Meta deserving of continuing its dominance with a 2.5x ratio?

Pro Argument: Meta gets the money because it’s easy and no one questions marketers when they say they’re running on Facebook and/or Instagram. Given the self-reported nature of performance, it’s also easy to show Meta hits media KPIs. Add to that the over-servicing of brands by the army of Meta salespeople and there’s a complete package of incentives to consistently shift money to Meta. This habit will not end as long as Performance reigns supreme.

Against Argument: If marketers are following eyeballs and time spent, the younger generations will not use Meta’s platforms nearly as much as the older ones do today. Kids grow up with TikTok and YouTube, watching and engaging with from the earliest of ages, then using Snap and Instagram to fill in some of the social gaps as they get older. So if advertisers are trying to engage with Generations Z or Alpha, it will happen without Facebook. And then there’s the lawsuits to consider regarding the safety of adults and children, let alone brands.

Final Verdict:

Meta will be challenged by competition in less than a generation for time spent and while Instagram will stay strong among adults, they won’t own Gen Z like Millennials and Gen X before them.

Add in more & better brand choices coming soon for advertisers with growth in ad supported CTV, an Apple ad network and a Podcasting resurgence, and there’s a lot stacked against Meta to continue monetizing at this pace.

While Meta is an important piece of the mix, it’s for these reasons that I don’t believe Meta is worthy of advertising revenue that’s 2.5x time spent.