Meta is reportedly paying BuzzFeed millions to generate content as engagement falls for both

Which T. Swift song are you?... Meta hopes it won’t get “Anti-Hero.” The social titan is paying BuzzFeed millions of dollars to help it attract more creators to Facebook and Instagram, the Wall Street Journal reports. Refresher: BuzzFeed is the publicly traded media company famous for viral listicles and quizzes like “what your favorite chicken-nugget shape reveals about your personality.”

• Deal: As part of a reported $10M deal reached last year, BuzzFeed is said to be helping to generate creator content for FB and Insta — and training creators to grow their presence.

• Reel: It’s part of Meta’s strategy to boost engagement as creators flock to TikTok, whose users grew 18% last year. Meanwhile, FB’s growth stalled and Insta grew less than 3%.

Your favorite condiment will reveal your biggest fear… Meta, which reports earnings next week, has been struggling with slowing growth and shrinking profits. BuzzFeed has been losing money and its stock is down over 60% since it went public in late 2021. Like Meta, it also announced job cuts last year. But both are investing more in creators.

• Human creators: Last year Meta said it would stop paying news publishers to feature their content and would reallocate the $$ to growing its creator biz. And BuzzFeed announced it would double its creator network.

• AI creators? Yesterday BuzzFeed said it would leverage ChatGPT maker OpenAI to help it churn out quizzes and other content. FYI: CNET — which was called out for publishing AI-generated articles riddled with errors and even plagiarism — said it was halting its use of AI for content generation.