As marketers, we pay attention to what is working in our marketing strategies and to try to make the changes to capitalize on those things. So, while Facebook’s tweaks to their platform may, at times, seem annoying to those of us who run marketing campaigns on this platform, the truth is that they are only doing what we do. They continually evaluate their website and make the changes that they believe will make it more valuable to their customers.
The newest change was officially announced yesterday on its Business News Page. The ads on the right sidebar will be re-configured to more closely resemble ads in the Newsfeed. While the full rollout of this change is set for later this year, watch for some advertisers to start using this new ad design later this month.
The changes include:
- The ads in the sidebar will be larger.
- The proportions of the ads will match the ads in the New feed.
- Because of the size change, there will be fewer ads presented on the right sidebar.
The reasoning behind the change, according to Facebook is to make the “right hand column ads more visually consistent with the ads that appear in the News Feed” offering advertisers a simpler way to create ads and giving them “an enhanced creative canvas.”
Facebook reports that these changes are intended to provide a better experience for their members and to simplify ad creation for marketers. In early testing of these ads engagement was up to three times higher. Because the new ads use the same proportions as the News Feed ads, designers will be able to use the same images for ads appearing in the News Feed and in the right sidebar.
Early comments on the announcement have been, for the most part, positive. This change seems to be a win-win for marketers – better user engagement and less work creating ads. However, the question is, since there will be fewer ads, will the price for the ads increase?