Each holiday season gets bigger and bigger on social media. This year is no exception.
As feeds are flooded with Black Friday and holiday shopping content, breaking through will be harder than ever. That means brands and creators may have to get more creative this year.
Advent calendars are a case in point: These holiday staples, popularized by chocolate brands, have taken on a new life with social media. Beauty companies in particular have embraced them, promoting mini samples of products through unboxing videos on TikTok and Instagram. More recently, retailers like Amazon and luxury brands like Dior have also released advent calendars, sometimes at exorbitant prices (Dior’s most expensive one costs more than $8,000).
The number of creators who made content mentioning advent calendars on social media was up 16% from October 1 to November 18 compared to the same time frame last year, according to data from influencer marketing firm Traackr provided to Scalable. (If that seems early to you like it does to us, consider that 43% of US consumers planned to start their holiday shopping by September, per LTK.)
But advent calendars may be losing their novelty among social media users: Engagement fell 31% and video views dropped 35% year over year, per Traackr, which pulled data from more than 170,000 creators. It’s too soon to say how these campaigns will translate to sales.
Holiday gift guides also seem to be reaching a fever pitch: 93% of creators plan to create a holiday gift guide this year, according to a survey from creator marketing company Fohr.
This frenzy of holiday content is competing with normal posts from friends and family, as well as a proliferation of AI-generated content that’s more recently been flooding feeds.
It’s also competing against a backdrop of continued economic uncertainty and a desire to detox, both digitally and in terms of spending. That could make it even harder for brands and creators to convince social users to click buy. (For more on this, tune into our podcast, publishing Thursday).
Despite the challenges, the overall outlook for creator-driven holiday shopping is strong. Adobe predicts an increase of 14% in online holiday shopping revenue driven by affiliates and partners, which includes influencers. Last year, affiliates and partners accounted for 17.6% of total online holiday shopping revenue.
Adobe also expects the share of online revenue attributed to traffic from social ads to rise by a whopping 51% year over year, compared with just 5% in the 2024 holiday season. Check back to our newsletter next week to see how things fared.
In other news….
The Round Up
Spotify is planning to raise subscription prices in the US in the first quarter of 2026, following price hikes in other markets, The Financial Times reported.
Twitch is the latest app to be banned for teens in Australia under new legislation that goes into effect by Dec. 10. Its competitor Kick, an upstart livestreaming site, was also recently added to the list of banned platforms. Some major apps, such as Pinterest and Roblox, aren’t included in the ban, which targets under 16 year olds. Read more about what’s at stake for tech companies and creators here.
X users have found that many prominent right-wing accounts, which purported to be based in America, are located outside of the US, including in Russia and Nigeria. This follows the rollout of a new tool on X that shows the location of accounts.
Palo, a new creator startup that offers AI planning and idea generation, analytics and community features, raised $3.8 million in funding from Peak XV’s Surge, a startup accelerator and seed funding program. Jay Neo, one of Palo’s co-founders, is a creator and former content strategist of short videos for MrBeast.
Meta Matters
Meta Platforms halted internal research that purportedly showed that Facebook usage impacted people’s mental health, according to an unredacted legal filing.
Facebook will now allow users to use nicknames when posting in Facebook Groups, rather than with their profile photo and real name, making the experience more similar to Reddit.
Senators Josh Hawley and Richard Blumenthal sent a letter to the FTC calling for an investigation into Meta for allegedly profiting from fraudulent ads. In 2024, Meta estimated it would earn $16 billion from scam ads, such as illegal online casinos and fraudulent ecommerce sites, in 2024, according to internal documents cited by Reuters.
Today in TikTok
TikTok bought the naming rights to the ICC Sydney Theatre in Australia and renamed it the TikTok Entertainment Centre. It’s the first time the social media app has nabbed the naming rights for a venue anywhere in the world. The venue has hosted performances from major stars including Bob Dylan, Queen and Elton John. The timing is certainly interesting as TikTok faces Australia's upcoming social media ban for teens!
TikTok Shop, known as a destination for cheap products, has gone high end. Sellers are now offering luxury items for thousands of dollars, including pre-owned designer handbags from brands including Hermes and Chanel, Bloomberg reported.
ByteDance’s valuation rose to $480 billion in a recent share auction, more than double the TikTok parent company’s valuation as of last September, per Kaya’s reporting.
Talent Tracker
Charlotte Tansill is joining Publicis Creative US as president of social, creator and earned, a newly created role. Previously, she was president of PR, social and influence for North America at Ogilvy. Tansill will start on December 4 and be part of Publicis Groupe’s US leadership team.
Becky Van Dercook joined CAA as an agent in its TV news department. She previously was a CBS News producer and also helped manage communications for Jack Schlossberg, JFK’s only grandson who recently announced plans to run for Congress.
Creator Moves
Michael Burry, the “Big Short” investor known for calling the housing bubble before 2008, launched a newsletter on Substack focused on stocks, market and economic trends. Burry has also been a skeptic of the current AI boom.
The move comes after he shut down his hedge fund, Scion Asset Management, earlier this month. “The current market environment is contentious and running hot,” Burry wrote, adding “I am not retired. This has my full attention.” An annual subscription to his newsletter costs $379.
Big Number: 60%
That’s the percentage of creators in the US and UK who say they have broken industry standards when using generative AI in their content, according to new data from Billion Dollar Boy and Censuswide. That includes mislabeling or not labeling AI-generated content and sharing misinformation.
While that number may seem shocking, it says just as much about the state of AI governance as it does about creators. For one, industry-wide standards for AI in content creation are still evolving: Most brands and platforms require at least some level of disclosure, but their policies can vary widely and the rules aren’t clear cut.
And while some states have passed AI-related legislation, there is currently no federal law that regulates AI usage in the US. This creates a confusing landscape of disparate frameworks and policies, meaning that some mistakes and missteps aren’t necessarily deliberate.
