The world’s largest social network launched video ads that run in users’ News Feed in December with a trailer for the movie “Divergent” and then launched them properly in March. The ads begin playing in the News Feed without sound and stop playing once the user has scrolled past them. For those interested, they can click on the video and receive the video in full-screen and accompanied by sound.
Who would pay for these?
Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) described its Premium Video Ads as designed “for advertisers who want to reach a large audience with high-quality sight, sound and motion.”
For the most part, they’ve been reasonably well received and not occurring as frequently as many feared when the company announced the project that could be a potentially huge revenue stream..no pun intended.
The international markets that were added today are, in no order of importance but simply alphabetically, Australia, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Japan, and the UK. For now, they will be available to a “limited group of advertisers” and won’t be shown in everyone’s News Feed. Rather, the company stated that users in the seven countries mentioned will begin seeing them more frequently “over the next few months.”
While in the States they have become of a regular addition to users’ News Feeds since December, only this month did Facebook begin allowing television shows and consumer goods to advertise.
Controls and new metrics for advertisers
With 1.28 billion users, Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) has made a concerted effort to roll-out the auto-play ads slowly. In addition to the measured roll-out, Facebook is trying its best to annoy users less by exercising strict control over video quality. Despite this, a number of advertisers have questioned the effectiveness of ads that can simply be scrolled past.
Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) responded to this as well today by introducing new metrics that allow advertisers to see the number of people who view the ads and the length of time that they watch the short spots.
“These new metrics are designed to help you learn what’s resonating with people and determine how to more effectively create and promote your videos on Facebook,” a Facebook spokeswoman said in a statement.
