Reddit’s global expansion highlights untapped international revenue potential

The news: Reddit's global expansion efforts are gaining significant momentum, as company executives outlined in a recent EMARKETER interview.

• The platform reports a fourfold increase in daily active users across markets where it has implemented machine translation.
• International users represent 50% of Reddit's audience, but these markets currently generate only 17% of revenues, highlighting progress and opportunity.

Why it matters: Reddit's transformation from an English-centric platform to a multilingual community hub represents a strategic shift in social media dynamics. The platform's machine translation initiative now facilitates cross-language participation in Spanish, French, German, and Portuguese, with plans to expand into 30 additional countries and languages in 2025.

"Taylor Swift has fans around the world. Why should those fans not be able to experience the Taylor Swift community if they can't speak English?" explains CMO Roxy Young said in explaining the benefits of translation. She also noted that Reddit ranks as the “sixth most searched term on Google" as of September 2024.

The platform's international approach focuses on several areas:

• Community engagement across language barriers enables users to contribute in their native tongues while reaching global audiences through automatic translation.
• Strategic market selection prioritizes regions once Reddit’s audience reaches 10% of the local internet population, with India, the UK, Philippines, and Brazil emerging as growth leaders.
• Revenue opportunities are expanding through cross-border advertising, particularly for European brands targeting US audiences.

Jim Squires, executive vice president of business marketing and growth, emphasizes the revenue potential: “Opening up those native languages and bringing that value to countries around the world will then create opportunities for advertisers to be part of those conversations.”

Our take: Reddit's international strategy presents a significant opportunity to close the gap between its global user base and revenue generation. Achieving this will depend on several factors:

• The platform must balance tailoring to local markets and preserving authentic community interactions.
• Investment in localized advertising teams could accelerate the monetization of international audiences.
• Enhancing navigation and search capabilities can improve user retention and advertiser appeal.

Building on the strong adoption in Europe and beyond and focusing on revenue growth is viewed “as one of the big opportunities as we head into 2025." Squires said.

Markets like India present immediate potential due to high English proficiency combined with strong user interest in topics like cricket and Bollywood. Meanwhile, enhanced translation tools could unlock growth in non-English speaking markets, though Reddit acknowledges that operating as a truly global company requires developing fresh capabilities in serving moderators, consumers, and advertisers.