Mari Smith says, “Facebook ads are the most targeted traffic your money can buy. Period.There is no other platform out there with 1.6 billion active users that offers the depth of granular targeting than Facebook. And now Instagram, too.However, every day, I hear of marketers who end up frustrated and confused when it comes to actually generating positive, measurable results from their Facebook advertising efforts.In this post, I’ll demystify why exactly there is so much frustration and confusion out there, and help you understand what even a few critical tweaks will make to your results.1.... [...]

Tim Peterson says, “Media companies have had Facebook’s Instant Articles all to themselves since the social network introduced the fast-loading mobile content format last May. But now, brands are finally able to get their hands on one of digital publishing’s shiniest new objects without piggybacking a publisher’s access.Facebook has opened up Instant Articles to mobile publishing platform Steller so that people, including brands, using Steller’s app to create visual-heavy stories can now distribute that content on Facebook through Instant Articles, a Facebook spokesperson confirmed.The... [...]

Eric Siu says, “Running a successful Facebook campaign requires targeting your ads to the right customer base. And because it’s not always easy knowing which demographic is most likely to convert, it’s important to collect data from your campaigns. That’s why Facebook Audience Insights is a great tool for understanding your target audience.Facebook has always been committed to working closely with its advertising partners. The company recently rolled out a number of changes to help its advertisers make their campaigns more successful. One of the biggest changes was Facebook... [...]

Patricio Robles says, “With Facebook Live, the world’s largest social network has entered the live-streaming space in a big way.As with most new Facebook product launches, there are many considerations for brands and marketers.Here’s what they should know about Live.Mark Zuckerberg is “obsessed” about it Facebook co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg has reportedly made Live a priority for the company’s video-focused product and engineering teams.Zuckerberg is Facebook’s de facto product chief, and while his blessing doesn’t guarantee success,... [...]

Tamar Weinberg says, “With Facebook’s eventual launch for Instant Articles to all publishers on April 12, WordPress has prepared for the deluge of interest in this new publishing platform by launching its own plugin to transform WordPress content into Instant Articles. The plugin launch was announced by the WordPress VIP team as well as Facebook’s media relations team, but don’t let the “WordPress VIP” phrase scare you: the tool is supported on all instances of self-hosted WordPress platforms as well as the VIP product.Currently, as seen in the link above, the plugin is available... [...]

Karissa Bell says, “Facebook’s big plans for Messenger may also include publishers.The company plans to open up its messaging platform to developers later this year during its F8 developer conference, according to a new report in Marketing Land. The feature will allow publishers to share content through Messenger via chat bots, with short descriptions linking back to articles on their website, the report says.Facebook is already rumored to be working on a software development kit that would allow developers to build chatbots that run inside of Messenger. Among the developers testing... [...]

Michael Guta says, “The use of emoticons or emoji quickly lets you express yourself without having to type what you are feeling about a particular conversation, image or other content; and until now that was the end of it. But the type of emoticons people use can now be used to generate another data point that lets businesses know what users are feeling about the products and services they offer.The launch of Facebook’s Reactions extends the expressive range of the Like button with five additional animated emoji: Love, Haha, Wow, Sad or Angry. This development was in part a reaction (no... [...]

Kia Kokalitcheva says, “They may not be as sexy as the celebrities Facebook is reportedly trying to woo, but small and medium businesses are still an important group of customers for the social network.On Wednesday, the Menlo Park, Calif., company unveiled a new tool that lets businesses make a short introductory video about their company. Dubbed “Your Business Story,” the video tool lets businesses create essentially a photo slide show to which they can add some music from a library and a short text description of “what they are in the business of” doing.With video’s meteoric... [...]

Ben Davis says, “Facebook recently released its second annual State of Connectivity report on global internet access.The tech giant has long pushed for increased global internet connectivity and this report is designed to increase the sharing of data around this issue.You can see all the data by downloading the report, but here are a few of the stats that spoke to me.1. Availability3.2bn online3.2bn people had internet access at the end of 2015, with 4.1bn people not yet connected.The chart below shows how internet penetration has increased fairly steadily since 2006”.Key stats... [...]

Andrew Weber says, “Back in September, I conducted an examination of e-commerce advertising and purchase activity run through Nanigans software, which was developed by the company that employs me. I noted some clear behavioral patterns, such as consumers generating the greatest share of purchases on Wednesday or Thursday of a given week.In this column, the focus turns to lead generation advertisers who, as a whole, seek to drive more complex conversions, like contacting a mortgage lender or requesting a car insurance quote. Facebook advertising data shows how advertisers in this ecosystem... [...]