As expected Facebook introduced new ad offerings at its fMC conference on Wednesday. These included display premium ads on the log-out page and Sponsored Stories in the News Feed on mobile devices. It also debuted Offers, a fort in which businesses can share discounts and promotions directly from a Facebook Page. They can be distributed through the News Feed or a Sponsored Stories and redeemed via email or on a mobile device.
Reach Generator
Facebook also gave the audience a preview of Reach Generator, a tool for brands to maximize the fan base that will see its content. And while some of the details are still under way–for example example, it is uncertain how many fans a brand must have to qualify to use it–it is clear that Reach Generator will play an important role in Facebook's ever-changing ad ecosystem.
Its premise is this: Facebook will guarantee, for a price, that a company's posts will reach 75% of its fan base within a certain month. As observed, more details are necessary before brands can decide whether to participate. If they do, however, a close understanding of the demographics on Facebook will be an essential part of the decision.
Fortunately for marketers, there is plenty of such data—data that even delves into unexpected areas.
Starting with the basics:
For a company that has been conservative with its mobile offerings, it has a lot of mobile users. According to Facebook data released in February, the social network has 425 million monthly mobile users, and the platform sends more than 60 million visitors each month to apps and games.
Other points of interest:
Facebook works better for B2C than B2B companies. A HubSpot study found that there was a gap in the effectiveness of different channels between B2B and B2C respondents. Among B2C companies, 77% said they had had acquired a customer through Facebook, making it more effective than a company blog (60%), Twitter (55%), and LinkedIn (51%). By contrast, among B2B companies, LinkedIn was the most effective, with 65% of these respondents having acquired a customer through the professional network. Company blogs (60%), Facebook (43%), and Twitter (40%) followed. These stats were part of an an e-book released in February 2012 by HubSpot.
41.3% of students use social media for research or study purposes, according to a survey released in February 2012 by ebrary. And although a majority are not yet engaging with social media tools for these purposes, there are some usages which a majority of students report being likely to engage in. For example, roughly 7 in 10 are very likely (22%) or somewhat likely (47.2%) to use a social media tool to connect with other students with similar academic interest, and slightly less than 60% have some interest in sharing research information with peers or using research recommended by peers.
Short updates from Facebook and Twitter (32%) and emails (27%) ranked as the leading ways in which consumers most prefer to get information from their favorite brands, according to survey results released in December 2011 by AYTM Market Research.
