Meta’s chief business officer steps down shaking up its ad team

Meta’s chief business officer Marne Levine will be stepping down from her role in the tech company after 13 years. Levine has held multiple leadership roles in her time in the company and stepped into the role of chief business officer in 2021, according to her LinkedIn page. In her role, she oversaw the company’s advertising and business partnerships.

Moving forward, Nicola Mendelsohn, the VP of the global business group and Justin Osofsky, the VP of Meta, will take on expanded roles and will represent the company when it comes to advertisers and partners. They will report to COO Javier Olivan.

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“From running global policy, to growing our Instagram business as the first COO, to leading our ads and business partnerships teams, Levine has been an incredible leader at Meta over the last 13 years. I’m grateful for our partnership, her commitment to Meta, and the energy she brought to the company every day,” Olivan said.

He added that Mendelsohn is highly reputable in the ad industry while Osofsky has a unique combination of product, operations and business experience that will serve him well in his new role. “They’re both proven leaders, and we’re fortunate to have them leading this important work and representing the company with our advertisers and partners.”

Levine is set to step down from her role on 21 February but will remain an employee at the company until the summer to ensure a smooth transition. She started at Meta in 2010 and has worked at a variety of executive roles over the years such as chief operating officer at Instagram and the vice president of global public policy at Facebook.

Before joining Meta, Levine worked in public policy, helming roles such as chief of staff and special assistant for economic policy at the White House National Economic Council.

MARKETING-INTERACTIVE has reached out for a comment.

The news comes just weeks after Mark Zuckerberg called 2023 the "Year of Efficiency” for Meta as the company focuses on “becoming a stronger and more nimble organisation”. The news sent stocks surging by 19% at that point in time. 

In its quarterly statement, the company said it expects the first quarter total revenue to be in the range of US$26-US$28.5 billion, and it anticipates that the full-year 2023 total expenses will be in the range of US$89-US$95 billion, lowered from its prior outlook of US$94-US$100 billion.

The report also said that ad impressions and price per ad across its family of apps increased by 23% year-over-year, and the average price per ad decreased by 22% year-over-year. For the full year 2022, ad impressions increased by 18% year-over-year and the average price per ad decreased by 16% year-over-year.  Meanwhile, monetisation for Reels on Facebook also reportedly doubled in the last six months.

Despite this, Meta shook the industry at the tail end of 2022 when it announced its axe of 13% of its global headcount, amounting up to 11,000 staff.

Zuckerberg told employees then that the company would also be taking a number of additional steps to become a leaner and more efficient company by cutting discretionary spending and extending its hiring freeze through the first quarter of next year.

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