As discussed in a recent article, Facebook is making it harder for brands to not use sponsored stories (or “featured stories” as Facebook is calling them these days). They recently started appearing in users’ news feeds, and as the free marketing that comes in the form of Page updates loses visibility by the hands of Facebook’s algorithm, sponsored/features stories are a way to make sure those posts are getting in front of eyeballs.
Now, according to a report from the Financial Times, sponsored/featured stories are coming to the mobile news feed as well, “within weeks.”
According to the report, “several people familiar with Facebook’s planning” say Facebook has already discussed proposals with ad agencies.
This is interesting, considering Facebook just told us the other day, “We want to clarify that we are not working with any agency to create paid ads on our mobile platform.”
That, however, was in response to a story about reported pilot testing of mobile ads. That story stemmed from Razorfish talking about them, which the company’s Paul Gelb later clarified, “Razorfish is NOT working with Facebook on any mobile media ad buying. Rather, in the interview I was referring to rich media featured stories, not paid ads.”
Well, featured stories are one kind of paid advertisement Facebook offers. You say potato, I say pa-tah-to.
Note: I don’t really say “pa-tah-to”.
Facebook made it a point that its mobile experiences generate very little revenue, indicating that this is a risk factor, given that the company’s mobile user base continues to grow. Long story short, Facebook needs to better monetize mobile, and it looks like that will begin happening soon. I doubt that Facebook’s other ad offerings on mobile are incredibly far off.
