I’m going to say something bold: Sponsored posts can be annoying.
I don’t want to see a brand in my feed, especially if it’s a brand I’m not even following. No matter for Tumblr, though.
On April 20, the blogging platform launched Tumblr Blaze for all users over 18 in the U.S. The feature is a way for users to increase the reach of their posts, which show up as a sponsored post to a random broader audience, depending on how much money people spend.
For $10, you can get 2,500 impressions; $25 gets you 7,000 impressions; $65 gets you 20,000 impressions; and $150 gets you 50,000 impressions. Impressions are the number of times a post is shown to other users, and those users can be anyone in the U.S. who “might or might not follow you.”
Tumblr doesn’t offer a way to target your audience with the new tool, so it’s all random.
Tumblr already has a paid subscription service called Post+, and has tried out plenty of other payment services (paid ad-free browsing, a subscription product, and a tip jar).
None of the money-making attempts have helped bounce the platform back from banning porn in 2018, but Blaze is a bit different than the other paid services Tumblr has launched.
Because there’s no way to target anyone in your post, it’s rendered nearly useless for the typical commercialized users of sponsored posts — and it pretty much incentivizes shitposting.
One user tweeted that they “got a sponsored post that was the entire bee movie script.” Tons of users are just paying for more people to see pictures of their pets.
It seems like Tumblr might have found the secret to getting people to pay them money: shitposting.
