Facebook is looking to take a bite out of TV ad budgets by offering advertisers ad space for video content in its coveted news feed. Though the social network hasn’t made details of the new ad offering public, Ad Age spoke to several executives that confirmed Facebook has been shopping the ad space for upwards of $1 million.
Facebook video ads are expected to debut in June or July, when consumers will start to see up to three video 15-second spots a day in their feeds, according to Ad Age. Though Facebook has not confirmed it, the ads are widely expected to autoplay.
Marketing asked its followers about this new ad product. Here’s what the press and the social web had to say about the video spots in the News Feed, autoplay and the steep price tag:
Tweets
Maybe it’s worth it to brands, but I already find advertising on Facebook invasive and annoying. Preroll = the worst. It’s a shame. Intrusive video ads are lazy and a negative user experience. At least offer something your audience values.
–Chris Boutet, senior manager of brand insights for Infomarket, tweeting to Marketing
Not sure how effective it will be to “force” ppl to watch ads when they can easily tune them out. If anything, it will annoy consumers.
–Patricia Gomez, Marketing student at Ryerson, tweeting to Marketing
Facebook may ring its own death knell with video ads that autoplay and extend across the page.
–Sosia Bert, executive producer of digital content at Young & Rubicam New York
I’m all for branded video content on Facebook. I’m all against autoplay video ads though. Haven’t we tried this before?
–Neilson Paty, creative director of Jetty Pro productions in Miami, Florida
Uhh, right. Facebook thinks you might like up to three video ads in your News Feed each day. Autoplay ads will make the News Feed unusable. Wonder if they are implementing it for mobile? Better have a good data plan.
–Danielle O’Hanley, digital content coordinator at Astral Media Inc., tweeting to Marketing
Press
By offering video ad units, Facebook will attempt to capture the major TV ad budgets but it remains to be seen if agencies will bite at the current price tag. If they do, it’s almost certain that a user backlash will follow.
-Matt Brian, writing on The Verge
While that sounds like great news for the social media giant, we’re not sure the same could be said for its users who might otherwise find the ads extremely annoying, not to mention inconvenient especially when trying to surf Facebook discreetly at work or in school.
-Tyler Lee, writing on Uber Gizmo
Winning over that much business will certainly pose a challenge. These types of video ads represent new and untested waters, so advertisers may be shy about shelling out such big bucks initially.
-Lance Whitney, writing on CNET
Facebook’s user base is particularly sensitive to change and probably won’t be crazy about the prospect of the News Feeds being bogged down by large, potentially obtrusive advertisements.
-Ricardo Bilton, writing on Venture Beat
Let us know what you think of the new ad space and its price tag in the comments.
