Facebook wants to leverage the power of its personal data to challenge Google for online Ad dominance
Importance: [rating=4] (For online advertisers)
Recommended source: Facebook for Business
Facebook is announcing a big extension to its audience network, which was launched in 2014 to let advertisers use Facebook's data for targeting customers with ads outside of Facebook.
Facebook will start selling video ads to cash in on this valuable section of the ad market. Ads purchased through Facebook's audience network can appear on the sites of any publishers signed up to use audience network, and can be targeted based on the data Facebook have from their users profile and activity within the platform. Facebook will let marketers know the number of views so brands can get an idea of the number of impressions which will have helped build brand awareness.
Taking a 'mobile first' approach has meant the audience network has until now been primarily a mobile offering. However with this latest announcement, Facebook are going to start expanding its ad network on desktop, as the video ads can appear in-stream and in-article for the first time on desktop.
Facebook will be hoping this will let it compete with Google in the lucrative online advertising space. Google is the far bigger player in this area, but Facebook is hoping it can use the fact it knows more information about its users (because we tell Facebook everything) to offer superior targeting options.