8 Things We Learned From Buzzfeed’s Disastrous Financial Results
Buzzfeed has not prospered in the AI era
Buzzfeed has issued its third-quarter financials for calendar year 2025, and things aren’t clicking like they used to back when the internet was mostly made up of big dreams, fun quizzes, and GIF-laden listicles.
The company posted a US$7.4 million loss for the three months (A$11.33m) with losses totalling US$30.5m (A$46.7m) for the first nine months of the year. Here’s what we’ve learned from these results.
1. Even When You Adjust The Earnings To Look Good, They Don’t Look Good
Total revenue dropped by 17% year-on-year, to A$70.88m, with the company’s net loss of A$11.33m a massive fall from a A$3.83m profit in the third quarter of 2024.
On the different measure of earnings (EBITDA – earnings before interest, tax etc), Buzzfeed posted an adjusted number of $753,000 — which is still quite dire when compared to the A$12.4m in adjusted EBITDA for the same period the year before.
During the earnings call, CEO Jonah Peretti explained this is no accounting trick, but instead a “direct result of the transformative work we’ve done to build a leaner, more resilient business model”. However …
2. Nobody Wants Advertising Dressed As Fun Content Anymore
‘Content revenue’ — which is defined by Buzzfeed as money “primarily generated from clients for custom assets, including both long-form and short-form content, from branded quizzes to Instagram takeovers to sponsored content” — declined by a whopping 33% year-on-year, accounting for just A$11m of its A$70.88m total quarterly revenue.
This is a sharp dive when compared to ‘advertising revenue’, which only dropped by 11% (to A$34m) and ‘commerce and other revenue’, which fell by 15% to A$26m.
The company’s revenue dive was put down to three factors, second of which was, according to company CFO Matt Omer “a decline in affiliate bonuses from our commerce partners” – you’ll never guess what the other two are. Omer also noted “muted demand for branded content partnerships” during the company’s earnings call.
They are trying, though. Currently, the front page of Buzzfeed include tabs for ‘Quizzes’, ‘TV & Movies’, ‘Videos’, ‘Tasty’ (a food vertical), ‘Shopping’, and ‘Walt Disney World Resort’.
The canny-eyed reader will have noted a commercial lean to that last tab, which clicks through to a dedicated advertising page for the theme park, with subtle integrated articles sporting titles such as: ‘Tiana’s Bayou Adventure Is Now Open At Walt Disney World, And Here’s Everything You Need To Know About “The Frog And The Princess” Themed Flume Ride’.
That’s a real title.
You’ll Never Guess Which Family-Friendly Corporation Paid For This Content
3. Traffic Is Down, Too
Total time spent across all Buzzfeed sites (in the US) dropped by 11.8 million hours during the quarter, from 80.3m hours in the third quarter of 2024, to 68.5 million.
10.7m of these hours are from Gen Z and Millennial audiences, which begs the question: who is responsible for the other 57.8m hours? Is Buzzfeed or Huffington Post suddenly trending amongst seniors? Did a “Which MASH Character Are You?” quiz go viral during August?
By the way, this traffic drop was Trump’s fault, as Buzzfeed saw “elevated news consumption during the presidential election cycle” in the same quarter in 2024.
4. Buzzfeed Doesn’t Need Social Media Or Search
This is an impressive stat. 63% of Buzzfeed.com traffic now comes from direct visits (people typing in the URL), internal referrals (page links), and app activity, which it says is “reinforcing reduced platform dependency”.
Considering that search referrals are dropping and social media algorithms are mysterious and ever-changing, this is great news for a publisher. However …
5. Huffpost Needs Better Headlines
Huffpost.com homepage pageviews and referrals account for 75% of the page’s total traffic, which suggests that people don’t click through to any stories after skimming the homepage. Huffpost (formerly The Huffington Post) is part of the Buzzfeed publishing portfolio.
6. Buzzfeed Investors Did Not LOL At The Results
Not surprisingly, when you post a loss, the market loses confidence in your business. Buzzfeed’s stock fell 28.23% on the day it presented its earnings, and has since fallen by 33.3% over the past five-day period.
7. The Revenue Decline Was A Result Of Damn Democracy
As Winston Churchill once quipped: “Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others.” As teased earlier in this listicle, there were three factors credited as driving Buzzfeed’s revenue decline: “continued softness in direct-sold advertising and content, a decline in affiliate bonuses from our commerce partners, and a difficult year-over-year comparison given the elevated engagement and spend during the presidential election cycle in Q3 2024.”
All those political advertising dollars were bolstering the bottom line during the back end of 2024, which paints a pretty picture for calendar year 2028, I guess.
8. Maybe Time Is A Flat Circle
When AI takes over and search and social media finally sink into the ocean, and all that’s left is the bare bones of a once dominant online civilisation, people will turn to their computers, type in one of a handful of website addresses they remember, and start mindlessly scrolling through ’35 Absolutely Fascinating And Rare Historical Pictures That Will Completely And Totally Transform The Way You Think About The Past’.
You’ll never guess what #17 is. Which is why you’ll have to click. You’ll all have to click!
Related Content
SUBSCRIBE
Sign up to our free daily update to get the latest in media and marketing.
