Dive Brief:
- Facebook confirmed with TechCrunch that it's testing ads in Groups in four markets — Australia, Canada, Ireland and New Zealand.
- The ads will look that same as Facebook News Feed ads, and will be targeted by Facebook’s usual identity-based options as well as Group topics.
- According to Facebook, its News Feed ads will be fully saturated by the middle of next year and the Groups ads are an effort to find a new revenue stream so the social media giant can maintain growth.
Dive Insight:
Groups is an untapped revenue source for Facebook with around a billion users, and even exists as a standalone app. It will be interesting to see how Groups users respond to being served with ads in a space designed for community interaction around causes and other discussion topics.
Facebook has long advocated for balancing a good user experience along with providing its advertisers with value, and feedback from the tests will likely go a long way in determining if Groups ads roll out across all of Facebook.
As the social media space matures, Facebook is smart to test new revenue-generating opportunities — something that is also evident in this week's launch of Workplace, an enterprise chat service.
Other new revenue streams for Facebook include an increase in the ad load on Instagram, new live video mid-roll ad units and sponsored messages from businesses on its Messenger app.
About the Groups ad test, Facebook told TechCrunch, “We have started to test delivering ads to people in Facebook Groups, and will be evaluating the response before determining how we will move forward.”
