What Mobile Advertising Means to Facebook

Written by Emily Friday, 14 September 2012 11:36

The most popular social network in the world knows exactly where their company needs to be in order to survive the coming years – leading the mobile atmosphere.

Earlier this week at San Francisco’s Tech Crunch Disrupt Conference, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg emphasized the importance of the company’s mobile push, stating, “Over the next three to five years I think the biggest question that is in everyone’s minds, that will determine our performance over that period, is really how well we will do with mobile”.

So, what does this all mean for mobile advertising on the social network?

Currently, the primary way to buy ads on Facebook’s mobile apps is through Mobile Sponsored Stories. What is really going to propel the company forward in mobile advertising will be the technological transformation of its ad platform Facebook Exchange (FBX). As it stands now on PCs, Facebook Exchange allows advertisers to use automated systems to bid for ads and place them in real time, optimizing information about users gathered from their visits to other websites. Bringing FBX to mobile will put Facebook in a whole different advertising ball game, and could help them surpass eMarketer’s prediction of $387 million in ad revenue for the company in 2013.

With the mobile advertising industry changing by the minute, it will be all eyes on big networks, like Facebook, to see where it all goes.