One of the greatest challenges to buying advertising online is the lack of “ratings”; the data that tells agencies and their clients how effective an ad buy might be.
Search ads—those that pop up alongside your Google search for, say, coffee shops and tell you to get your fix at Café Joe’s in your neighborhood—are more popular, because they are measured by click-throughs. Though that might not be an entirely accurate measurement—some will see the ad but not click, and others will click on it by accident—it at least offers some hard number with which to gauge. And media buyers are really awesome with numbers.
But Facebook just announced today it will be polling users about display ads and sending the data to Nielsen for analysis. Display ads are typically banner ads, across the top or middle of the page, or ads down the side of the page, in the rail. Facebook will begin testing new formats for display ads and asking users whether they noticed the content.
Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg credited the company's revenue growth, which is expected to rise more than 70 percent this year, to Facebook’s increasing number of users and the introduction of new ad products. Considering Facebook is expected to generate more than $500 million in revenue in 2009, this could be a big deal.
It will be exciting to see whether this makes Facebook ads more useful and valid in traditional media buys. And just out of curiosity, my own poll: Did you see and link to this blog from Asher’s Facebook page?
--Julianne W.
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