• by Laurie Sullivan , Staff Writer, Yesterday

Anthropic and SpaceX have made pledges to redistribute the wealth generated by their companies. The redistribution of wealth is poised to change the ways media buyers buy media, and I also believe it will impact brand loyalty.

The distinction is between an audience that changes naturally and an external event changing the speed, scale or direction of that change. 

In today's Data & Programmatic Insider column, I explained how technology -- especially AI -- will change brand loyalty.

Wealth distribution also will determine if and when customers return, and recommend the brand. It can also determine how long their loyalty lasts.

Experienced stock buyers will look at the company's balance sheet and make a stock purchase, but kids who grow up and become brand loyalists will invest in the company by making a stock purchase because they like and believe in the brand. 

I began thinking about this as discussions around the possibility of stock donations started on Sunday when Anthropic posted in a blog that it plans to commit 5% of its shares to a new public benefit fund that will make charitable donations or direct money to specific populations to "invest in the public benefit."

The Anthropic "Public Benefit Fund" -- a new entity with a structure that increases the stake as the company grows -- will donate 5% of the company's shares, subject to stockholder approval.

An additional 2% will be added at the board’s discretion for every 50% increase in the company’s value above a set baseline.

"As a public benefit corporation, most of our work in pursuit of our mission takes place inside the company: research relevant to AI safety and interpretability; applied biomedical research; discounts on Claude for nonprofits and scientific institutions. These activities have both a public benefit component and for-profit value, so we house them directly in the company," the company explained.

Then that same night, Elon Musk announced a massive stock donation in a post on X. "Next year, I will give one of my SpaceX shares to every kid in America," Musk wrote. "This will be the first of many."

SpaceX shares traded at about $146 when the market closed on Friday, and rose to $149.89 in early Monday morning trading. 

Musk’s proposal was thin on details, and he did not clarify the meaning of "every kid in America."

Media buyers have always had to adapt to shifts as people grow older, children become consumers, income changes, technology alters behavior, and new generations develop different expectations. 

While audiences will always change over time, wealth redistribution may accelerate the change, although it would not be the underlying reason that audiences evolve.

Some might ask the question: If audiences are always changing, why should media buyers care about billionaires or a trillionaire distributing wealth? The timing of audience changes can be as significant as the changes themselves.

The eventual, resulting audience may be similar, but the change may occur two years earlier than anticipated.

The consumer also may acquire more wealth than expected -- especially in the case of Musk donating one share of SpaceX to children because that one share could help to change the kids' thinking later on when it comes to investing in other stocks and bonds. 

Rather than just buy the brand's product, the shareholder would invest in stocks of the companies to demonstrate their loyalty.

The media-buying strategy then would change. Advertisers may need to adjust their way of thinking to look not only at the products consumers buy, but also the stocks they keep. It would require an adjustment in budgets, inventory, creative, and customer acquisition strategies.

This would change the mindset of kids who will turn into adults. Media buyers will need to think more closely about how a person's investment portfolio heavily influences their daily purchasing habits, and vice versa. When a consumer owns shares in a company, they often develop a psychological and financial loyalty to that brand.

Another important consideration is that money doesn't necessarily change the audience, but it can change what that audience can afford, what it considers, and when it makes a purchase.