Meta is prevailing in small-scale social media disputes

Micro dramas — short, serialized soapy stories designed for mobile viewing — are gaining traction in the US, but industry participants say one company already dominates the market for reaching viewers: Meta. Producers and app founders tell Business Insider that most marketing spend for micro-drama startups flows to Facebook, Instagram, and Reels, and that Meta is also receiving large amounts of free, episode-length promotional content on its platforms.

“What I hear consistently from apps is, Meta gets more than half of the customer acquisition spend by most micro drama apps,” said Hernan Lopez, founder of research firm Owl & Co. Lopez estimated global ad spending on micro dramas at roughly $1.5 billion, excluding China, where the format originated. Industry players also said some startups are directing as much as 75% of their marketing budgets to Meta’s properties.

Ads that double as episodes

Part of Meta’s appeal for micro-drama publishers is that its ad system allows long-form promotional clips. Several producers, including ReelShort, Flareflow, and ShortMax, have reportedly uploaded ad creatives as long as 20 minutes to Meta’s ad hub. Those long sequences can show multiple episodes for free, serving both as ads and as direct samples of a show’s content.

“We always use it with launches,” said Slava Mudryk, cofounder of GammaTime, a year-old micro-drama company. GammaTime spends about 55% of its marketing budget on Meta, Mudryk said, and the company deploys very long ads when launching a series or promoting a particularly strong story arc. “What we see is that this long sequence just brings people in to watch. And when it’s done, the desire to continue watching on the app is strong.”

Industry participants said those long ad placements give Meta an edge over rivals such as TikTok and YouTube, which they said do not offer similarly long ad formats. Executives also told Business Insider that Meta’s ad infrastructure and targeting capabilities make it easier to find paying viewers — an important factor for apps trying to convert free samplers into subscribers.

Who benefits — and who might lose?

Micro-drama startups pay Meta for customer acquisition while also supplying the platform with engaging videos that keep users on Meta’s properties — a combination some described as “the best of both worlds” for the company. When asked for comment, Meta declined.

Some app founders see a demographic advantage to advertising on Facebook. Ali Albazaz, whose Inkitt startup operates the micro-drama app Candy Jar, said Facebook’s older user base may be more likely to pay for content. “If the story is enticing enough, and grabs the user’s attention, that person who comes to our app has a very high likelihood of converting to a paid user,” Albazaz said.

But industry observers also warn of a longer-term tension: if micro-drama apps succeed at building paying audiences, they could pull viewer attention away from Meta. The situation echoes an earlier episode in which Meta sold billions of dollars of ads promoting TikTok as it entered markets — only to see TikTok become a major competitor.

For now, micro-drama companies appear to be placing their bets on Meta’s reach and ad tools to build initial audiences. Whether that strategy results in enduring platforms independent of Meta, or simply funnels an ongoing stream of content and revenue to the social network, remains an open question among the companies and investors working in the space.