The message TikTok conveys to Meta is: if you don't accept our advertising fees, your competitors will.
Meta took a tough stance this month, preventing ByteDance – the parent company of TikTok – from placing ads on applications under Meta. What is the reason for this? Meta's explanation is quite straightforward: they don't want to "show ads from a competitor that aims to draw people away from our applications."
TikTok is now shifting this portion of advertising spending to other platforms.
According to the placement allocation estimates provided by analysis company Sensor Tower to CMO Insider, since the ban took effect on October 8th, TikTok has shifted its advertising budget to other platforms such as YouTube and Pinterest.
From October 9th to October 16th, the proportion of advertising expenditure by TikTok directed at YouTube increased to 17%, higher than 9% in the first week of October. Meanwhile, during the same period, its advertising expenditure directed at Pinterest rose to 9%, up from 3% in the first week of October. The majority of the expenditure for TikTok—58%—went towards Google's mobile app advertising network, AdMob, which is higher than the 19% when Meta was still available for advertising at the beginning of October.
Horizon Media, Vice President of Social Strategy, stated that Meta this move "highlights the increasing intensity of competition in the digital realm as well as between the two companies." She said, "For marketers, this actually only reinforces the necessity to maintain flexibility and establish a balanced media strategy—don't put all your eggs in one basket."
It is not unheard of for Meta to exclude TikTok. Other platforms such as Amazon have also previously prevented competitors from placing ads; moreover, Twitter restricted users' ability to link to their own accounts on social applications like Instagram and Mastodon at the end of 2022, calling it "free promotion".
A spokesperson from Meta stated, "Refusing to provide promotional services to competitors is a common business practice in all industries." These changes from Meta will affect advertising policies in the United States, Canada, Egypt, Indonesia, Japan, Thailand, and Vietnam.
For Meta, the company achieved revenue of $117 billion in the first half of 2026, so losing one advertiser will not have a significant impact. However, Sensor Tower indicates that TikTok and ByteDance have always been significant advertisers on Meta's platform.
Meta will also lose advertising spending from third-party marketers who link to TikTok or other ByteDance-owned assets in their advertisements, which will further increase their potential losses. Brands that aim to direct potential customers to TikTok Shop and are directly targeted at consumers will also lose this channel.
It's okay even without Meta.
For TikTok, losing the opportunity to connect with over 3 billion monthly active users of Meta is a setback.
Like any social media giant, TikTok also has incentives to expand its user base. Advertising aimed at new users and promoting the download of new apps is part of their strategy – Meta also uses similar strategies to promote its own apps, such as Instagram.
TikTok An employee responsible for user acquisition, James Gao, posted on LinkedIn on Sunday, offering to contact anyone who has advertising inventory that could help the company achieve its goals.
Black indicates that although Meta holds the “largest share” of social advertising budgets, there are still many viable alternative options when it comes to using ads to drive actions such as app downloads. She said that in addition to Google, YouTube, and Pinterest, marketers are increasingly turning to other platforms such as Snapchat and Reddit.
