Facebook's Latest Shot At Survival

 With users shifting from computers to smartphones for accessing Facebook, the company is now working really hard to monetize this platform. Zuckerberg will now let advertisers place ads specifically on smartphones, something that the company had never done before.

 
WSJ has reported that Facebook did not give a break up of its mobile advertising revenue in its $3.7 billion last year indicating that the amount was not significant enough. Advertisers were given a package for ads and mobile ads were a part of that. This was acting as an obstruction for advertisers who wanted to place their ads on mobiles.

 
All that is about to change as Facebook gets smarter. Ads will now be allowed to appear on user’s news feeds too. The company will allow brands to pay per post. The fee will be based on a bidding process that charges advertisers per every thousand ads viewed in the News Feed or per ad clicked on by a user. This way even regular brands can use facebook as an advertising tool.

 
This move was inevitable as Facebook was losing money through the mobile platform.But the company must be very careful because these ads could create a nuisance for users. We all remember how Twitter had to remove the ‘Quick Bar’ due to widespread outrage among users. Facebook must be careful as it is already losing users and user time. A postIPO research concluded only two out of five people access FB every day.

 
Zucky’s company must remember that a mobile screen is much smaller than the computer screens so the ads must be designed in a way that they blend in with the news feed and don’t annoy users too much.

 
One way or other users can expect the social networking sites to come up with several other ways to earn revenue now as they have truckloads of investors to satisfy. Let us just hope that these money making ways don’t make our beloved Facebook a thing of the past.