Meta's business chief Marne Levine exits, shaking up ad team

Marne Levine, Meta’s chief business officer, announced she was stepping down on Monday, a move that shakes up the ad leadership at the company, which owns Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp. Levine was with Meta, which rebranded from Facebook in 2021, for 13 years, and became chief business officer in 2021 as part of a leadership reorganization. Now, her move away from Meta puts more responsibilities under Nicola Mendelsohn, a familiar face among major ad agencies and brands. Mendelsohn is now the “head of global business group,” instead of VP of global business group, according to an announcement from Meta. Justin Osofsky, who was chief operating officer of Instagram, is now head of online sales, operations and partnerships at Meta. The best and worst Super Bowl ads Ad Age reviews the Big Game commercials Click here “I’ve decided that it’s time for a new chapter,” Levine posted in a note to Instagram on Monday, a fitting place to convey the news since she was Instagram’s first chief operating officer. Levine talked about how she oversaw advertising and partnerships as chief business officer for nearly two years. Levine’s departure comes on the heels of Shery Sandberg’s goodbye last year, after 14 years as the No. 2 executive at the company. In 2021, Carolyn Everson, who preceded Mendelsohn atop the global business group, left then-Facebook after a decade at the company. At the time, Everson had been in the running to be the chief business officer, a role that Levine wound up filling. Levine was taking the role, and other duties, that David Fischer had filled as chief revenue officer. Levine and Sandberg were close associates, and Levine noted that Sandberg recruited her to join Facebook. Levine leaves as Meta is in the middle of an advertising and technological transition. Meta’s ad revenues have been affected by economic uncertainty, but also by drastic changes to the online ecosystem amid privacy restraints that started to limit marketing data the company relies on to target and measure ads. In the fourth quarter, Meta’s ad revenue dropped 4% year over year to $27.2 billion. During the past two quarters, ad revenue has declined, an unprecedented retrenchment for the company. But there were signs of strength especially as Facebook and WhatsApp both reported crossing 2 billion monthly users. Meta is remaking its ad platform to rely on more artificial intelligence to handle targeting and developing new ad formats in video products like Reels and WhatsApp messaging. Levine was central to the way Meta went to market with those changes. Since late 2021, Meta’s stock price fell precipitously amid concerns CEO Mark Zuckerberg moved too quickly, and spent too much money, on metaverse-related projects. This year, Meta has set a tone that it is focused on its core businesses and efficient management. Meta’s shares are up almost 45% so far this year, at about $180. As the head of global business group, Mendelsohn will now oversee global partnerships and engineering, Meta said in its announcement about the moves. Mendelsohn mostly works with the major ad agencies and brands, and now will have more supervision over the products they use to run campaigns across Meta. Osofsky is handling revenue generation from the small- and medium-sized businesses, which make up the bulk of Meta’s 10 million-plus advertisers. Compared to big agencies and brands, the smaller advertisers rely more on Meta’s self-serve ad platform to set up campaigns. Levine will officially step down on Feb. 21 but stay on for the transition into the summer, Meta said.

Meta's business chief Marne Levine exits, shaking up ad team

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