What is Social Media Monetization?
Social media monetization refers to the various ways social media platforms facilitate revenue generation for their users.
Revenue can come from three different sources:
- Platforms - Revenue redistribution programs are funded from platforms’ own ad revenue (sometimes called “Revenue sharing programs” or “Bonus”).
- Audiences - Features like subscriptions or digital tips enable users to generate revenue directly from their audience.
- Advertisers - Services like creator marketplaces and branded content tools enable creators to engage in paid partnerships with brands.
Click each platform below for an overview of their offering:
Platforms
This website places particular emphasis on revenue redistribution programs, which rely on platforms’ decisions for eligibility as well as for who and what gets rewarded. Monetization terms and policies also apply to monetization services facilitating access to revenue streams from audiences and advertisers.
Why Do Platforms Redistribute Revenue?
Because it makes business sense for them.
Social media companies used to act as ad intermediaries between publishers and advertisers on their platforms. Reselling creator’s ad placements was a way to expand their ad inventory. Creators’ earnings were tied to the ad placements they helped unlock, with platforms deducting a (hefty) fee for facilitating the sales.
They’re now moving to paying content royalties - based on content engagement (rather than ad placements). Platforms are increasingly serving ads everywhere, regardless of publishers’ consent, and continue to redistribute revenue because they need content in order to keep audiences engaged — and ultimately sell more ads.
The question now is what will happen when platform start generating their own content, using GenAI? What’s to say that they won’t unilaterally reduce, or outright terminate, all royalty payments?
How Much Money Do Platforms Redistribute?
In 2024, we estimated that social media companies redistributed over US$ 20 billion dollars to more than 6 million accounts globally via their respective revenue redistribution programs.
As of September 2025, Facebook alone has up to 8 million accounts enrolled in its newly consolidated content monetization program.
We’re looking at ever more actors benefiting, and ever larger sums.
Individual payouts vary from account to account and can range from anywhere from a few dollars to hundreds of thousands of dollars a month.
Who Is Eligible For Monetization?
In theory, any user may be considered for monetization programs, so long as :
- They meet a program’s minimum eligibility requirements.
- They are — and remain — compliant with platforms’ monetization terms and policies.
Platforms typically prompt users to monetize as soon as their account meets their minimum requirements.
How Does Monetization Work?
In order to monetize and receive payouts, users must:
- Unlock access to a program by meeting minimum eligibility requirements
- Submit an application
- Sign on to the platform’s monetization terms and policies
- Pass an onboarding review
- Post eligible content
- Register an eligible payout account
- Earn enough to meet the minimum transfer threshold
How Do Platforms Moderate Monetization?
Just as with content moderation, platforms have monetization rules, as well as systems and processes to enforce them.
- Rules - monetization services are regulated by monetization and payment terms, monetization policies (often broken down between partnership and content requirements), and program eligibility requirements.
- Enforcement - platforms enforce their monetization rules through a combination of human and automated review processes — including program onboarding reviews, bank account reviews, and ongoing content and account eligibility reviews.
Social media companies have a long history of failing to curtail abuse of their services at scale. Unsurprisingly, this applies to their monetization services as well.
What Are The Concerns?
Platforms’ failure to enforce their polices over who and what gets paid, can have substantial impact on:
- Media and Creator viability - creators of authentic content may face increased precarity, as they face automated demonetization decisions, as well as increased competition and content theft, with no compensation for lost revenue.
- Brand safety - advertisers, publishers and creators may experience damages to their brand when associated with actors, behavior or content that violate platforms’ policies and their own brand safety and suitability preferences.
- Society - society bears the bulk of the impact when harmful and illegal content and activities are incentivized – and financed – by platforms, as well as when authentic content creation is undermined.
This is why we need more transparency — and accountability.
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