AI and Reels are driving ad ROI, says Arun Srinivas, Head of Ads Business at Meta India

Aside from digitization over the last decade and Covid-19, our apps have provided the right content and engagement. Users are spending more time on the platform even though it’s not COVID today. If you look at the habits of any user, they’re checking our platforms on the go, between meetings. So they engage with what we call snackable content through the day. That’s how users/consumers are really living their lives today. And therefore, businesses find it valuable to advertise and catch their attention when they are seeing content.

We have large, medium and small businesses across our platform. I think we have industries ranging from e-commerce, CPG, gaming, financial services, auto, etc. If you look at it in terms of revenues globally, e-commerce is our biggest vertical. Then there is CPG, gaming and retail.

AI is the heart of the algorithm. It has played a significant role in terms of two things. It’s showing people the content they like to consume, which is increasing our engagement levels and time spent on the platform. For example, three years ago, if I wanted more content on cricket, I’d have to choose the people to follow and I only get their content. Today, more than half the content we get on Instagram is not people we follow. More than 50 per cent of the content people see on Instagram is AI recommended, and Reels make up over 50 per cent of the time spent within the app. It’s a virtuous cycle because you are consuming what you like and end up spending more time.

So, businesses find it a natural port of call for them to really tap into their audiences. And AI technology is getting better be it for audience selection or creativity. For example, somebody might be buying shampoo and somebody else might ask what are the ingredients in it. Based on the AI can actually figure out who is spending more time on ingredients versus benefit, etc. Over time, it optimises in terms of better click throughs, etc.

There’s a lot of stuff which is constantly changing. GenAI is already there. We have over a million advertisers in the globe who used GenAI creatives last quarter. They’ve all seen a higher click through rate than non-GenAI creatives. It’s again a boon for small businesses. I can just say visualise a cup of coffee in my balcony, it’ll generate an image right away. So the cost is saved, you don’t have to brief an agency, do a shoot, etc. So it really empowers many businesses to go live with this.

I would say our priorities right now are clearly focused around user behavior or emerging technologies. We are finding a way to funnel that to our advertisers, so that then they leverage these well enough to build it into their business plans and get ROI and growth. We work with businesses to almost share the trend so they can work with a creator as an additional voice. Let’s say if Myntra has sales and they want to increase the sale awareness and the sale value from Gen Z, they will collaborate with Instagram creators and place it before the right audiences. Through this, we’ve seen higher click-throughs and higher sale value happening there.

Another trend we’re seeing is messaging. Over 90 per cent of people are messaging a business almost once a week. If you go back to pre-Covid times, most of us were chasing the call centres for updates. WhatsApp has brought in a lot more efficiency in terms of day to day utility.

We have already shared our statement on CCI. That’s the only statement we have on this.