• by Ray Schultz , August 9, 2023

BuzzFeed had a poor second quarter, its revenue falling by 27% YoY to $77.9 million.

Advertising revenue fell by 33% to $35.4 million, and content revenue by 22% to $31.5 million. In addition, commerce and other revenues declined by 17% to $11 million. 

The media company suffered a net loss of $27.8 million, versus $23.6 million in the same quarter last year. 

Planned strategic and organizational changes “have been fully executed, putting our rich library of IP and scaled, owned-and-operated properties at the center of our operating model to create innovative, audience-driven content,” says Jonah Peretti, BuzzFeed Founder & CEO.

Peretti continues, “In response to consolidation and share gains across the major platforms that continue to impact audience traffic to our content, we are laser-focused on our strategy to drive traffic directly to our owned-and-operated properties.”

In April, BuzzFeed announced it would close BuzzFeed News, a move accompanied by an overall 15% staff cut, affecting around 60 employees in the news division and 180 throughout the company.

The company has introduced “new AI-assisted content formats to increase engagement and offer innovative advertising opportunities to our clients, rapidly expanded our creator network to participate in the rise of vertical video, and prioritized destination news content to grow our HuffPost front page audience,” Peretti says.