Facebook will be launching out a major new ad network, which will allow them to display advertisements throughout the web, according to a recent Wall Street Journal article. This launch is a long time in coming, and will put them in a position to directly compete with Google when it comes to being the ad network of choice for millions of businesses and marketers.
While there are few details available, the network is supposed to offer access to ad spots across the web and on multiple platforms. The demand side platform will allow bidding on impressions on thousands of third party sites, just like Google’s Display Network. Facebook is obviously going to be interested in pulling at least a portion of the $13.2 billion that Google made from their non-search ads..
Another major point of interest that people are talking about regarding Facebook’s ad network is that it will likely not use cookies. Instead, it will track user information through their Facebook account itself.
This will allow Facebook to use all the existing data they have on users, as well as additional browsing data that they collect, in order to provide the most targeted advertisements possible.
According to the article in the Wall Street Journal, this new network should be launched sometime next week. There will, undoubtedly, be a lot more information available about it from Facebook when it does launch. Whenever it happens, this is something all marketers will need to keep a very close eye on as it could potentially be an extremely powerful tool