Meta has a message for the public: Don’t forget about TikTok and YouTube.
After Meta’s surprise settlement of up to $18 billion in a teen addiction lawsuit on Wednesday, the company is going on the offensive to shape the narrative with a series of ads on social media and in print newspapers.
The advertisements, which Meta began running as a paid ad on its own platforms starting Wednesday, call for the two rival social media platforms to “join us in supporting teens.” The ad links out to Meta’s website announcing the settlement agreement.
“We want to ensure teens benefit from this new industry standard, but we cannot do it alone,” the blog post reads. “These protections will only be truly effective if we work with our peers — TikTok and YouTube — to put the same measures in place.”
Screenshot/Instagram
It’s true that Meta’s Instagram and Facebook apps aren’t the only social media apps under scrutiny for how teens use them. It’s also true that Meta’s messaging is a useful public relations strategy in the wake of a year fraught with legal battles.
Mark Borkowski, a UK-based public-relations consultant, called Meta’s advertisements an attempt at “reputational jujitsu.”
We asked PR pros, including Borkowski, what they made of Meta’s latest move.
A potential win-win for Meta
“This is actually quite a clever move from Meta,” Sam Gauchier, a brand and communications consultant, told Business Insider. “They’ve put TikTok and YouTube in a position where almost any response benefits them.”
If TikTok and YouTube follow suit, Meta can take credit for the public pressure it exerted on the two platforms, Gauchier said. If the platforms don’t, Meta could benefit from appearing to be the good guy.
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“On paper, Meta’s taking a ‘shared responsibility’ approach,” comms consultant Michael Draznin said. “It’s designed so Meta keeps a perceived industry leadership role either way.”
Motivation is in the eye of the beholder
A key part of Meta’s settlement agreement is implementing limits for how teens use apps like Instagram. Teens will be limited to 2 hours a day on Meta’s apps, have access blocked at night, and get adjusted notifications. The apps will also add more parental controls.
If teens are barred from using Instagram for hours on end, where will they go instead?
Borkowski said that Meta has a “clear commercial interest in ensuring competitors inherit the same costs and constraints.”
Ad dollars could flow to TikTok and YouTube instead, Forrester principal analyst Kate Winick said.
Meta said that teens account for less than 1% of its overall revenue and that, on average, US teens spend about 1 hour a day on Instagram. Meta will also pay an additional $5.3 billion — on top of the baseline $12.7 billion — if TikTok and YouTube agree to implement product changes for teens and make their own settlements of $5.3 billion each.
Still, perception is the name of the game in PR.
“Had they first taken accountability, shown real humility and started to make progress on their agreements, I think a stronger public push for the rest of the industry — not just singling out TikTok and YouTube — could have helped them rebuild a bit of trust with parents and the public,” PR consultant Sarah Gooding said. “Instead, their letter came off as self-serving and insincere.”
It’s going to be a marathon, not a sprint
This isn’t the first time Meta’s reputation has been in hot water. It often takes time, and ultimately, substantial changes to shift public opinion about a brand.
Borkowski said that “the proof will be in the pudding” in how much Facebook and Instagram actually change.
Meta’s strategy isn’t a surefire path to redemption.
“Could it backfire? Of course,” Forrester’s Winick said. “We’re talking here about a company that has an immense amount of public sentiment already against it.”
That said, calling for industry changes — especially by putting rivals in the spotlight — could force social media companies to get on the same page.
Winick said that Meta’s biggest PR win will come “if they can make consumers stop and think and say, ‘You know what? It’s not just Instagram that’s the problem.'”