How bad is the digital ad market? For small firms like BuzzFeed, Vox Media and Bustle Digital Group, digital ad revenue has shrunk so much that their best-performing ad business is now the one tied to live events.
Media executives say sales of ad sponsorships tied to live events is outperforming the rest of the ad business, in part due to pent-up demand from the 2020-21 period when most live events were shelved because of the pandemic. Several digital media firms, including BuzzFeed, Vox Media and Literally Media, which owns the meme websites Know Your Meme and Cheezburger, are now expanding their event businesses.
