Facebook is set to introduce TV-style adverts to users’ news feeds, selling spots to companies for up to $2.5 million (£1.64m) a day, according to a news report. Watch the Bloomberg report here: Bloomberg quotes ‘individuals familiar with the matter’ that Facebook is planning to roll out the new ad format by the end of […]
Facebook is set to introduce TV-style adverts to users’ news feeds, selling spots to companies for up to $2.5 million (£1.64m) a day, according to a news report.
Watch the Bloomberg report here:
Bloomberg quotes ‘individuals familiar with the matter’ that Facebook is planning to roll out the new ad format by the end of the year.
Advertisers can already upload videos to their Facebook page and have these broadcast into users’ news feeds, but the new service would insert ads from companies that users haven’t directly expressed an influence in.
Bloomberg’s sources say that users might see 15-second adverts “no more than three times in a given day” and that Facebook have already pushed back the launch of the new service several times due to worries that it would compromise the user experience.
At 15 seconds, the ads also would be the same length as Facebook’s Instagram videos – a feature that was added to the company’s photo-sharing service last month. That means the commercials would come in a familiar format for users.
The commercials will initially be sold on a full-day basis and can only be targeted to users based on age and gender, according to the people.
That would be a departure from how ad units are currently sold on Facebook, which lets marketers target ads based on location and areas of interest – data points that television networks generally don’t offer.
By relying on fewer categories, Facebook is mimicking the way television ads are purchased, an attempt to make the process more comfortable for executives accustomed to TV, the people said.
Although Bloomberg’s reports are only concerned with the US market, it would be expected than similar schemes would eventually be introduced to the UK.
The move would follow efforts by Facebook’s online rivals to capture ad dollars that have traditionally gone to TV networks. Google began funding original content channels on its YouTube video-sharing site in recent years, giving it a more curated venue for commercials.
A year ago, AOL started HuffPost Live, a CNN-like video stream running five days a week.
With Facebook, the idea would be to capitalise on the millions of users who actively check the site on a daily basis, including during the prime-time hours coveted by television advertisers. As of last quarter, 61 per cent of Facebook members were using the site daily – a number that has risen despite management predictions that it would decline.
“Every night, 88 million to 100 million people are actively using Facebook during prime-time TV hours in the United States alone,” chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg said last week on a conference call about second-quarter results.
A spokesperson for Facebook has declined to comment on its advertising plan.
Read the Bloomberg report here
