It’s Now Possible to Paint a Better Advertising Picture with Facebook Canvas

Facebook has launched another product designed to help brands around the world build engagement with fans through immersive and creative ads that tell vivid stories. The launch of Canvas has so far been met with high praises and seems set to revolutionize social media advertising on mobile devices.

With mobile penetration outranking desktop, the Canvas product was launched as more companies seek to target mobile users. It provides an instantaneous, full-screen viewing experience for ads on mobile devices and brings products to life via stunning images, videos, and call-to-action buttons. Canvas ads are also designed to run smoother and load faster than standard mobile web content.

How does Canvas work?

Facebook users will see Canvas ads as regular sponsored posts but once tapped on, they will instantly spring to life on the full screen of the mobile device. Viewers can also interact with the ads by zooming in to view image details, tilting for panoramic views, and swiping through a series of images.

Making a Canvas Ad

Developed exclusively for use on mobile platforms, Canvas is available to both iOS and Android users around the world. Facebook advertisers who have access to Power Editor can access the Canvas Builder to create ads that can then be shared as sponsored ads on the pages they manage. To create a Canvas ad, the page manager has complete creative control in designing the story that is intended. A carousel of images can be added, as well as videos, text, and call to action buttons to compose your Canvas.

How this will impact businesses on Facebook

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Brands on Facebook measure their return on investment (ROI) in several ways, with engagement rates being one of the key performance indicators. Complaints about sponsored ads in the past surround the fact that images and videos often take a long time to load on mobile devices. Additionally, tapping on links may take a long time to load the brand’s website, which may be a turn-off to fans.

The new Canvas ad platform not only provides businesses with an easily customized digital ‘canvas’ on which they can design interactive multimedia stories within the Facebook app, it also allows them to pull fans in via fast-loading content that is highly engaging. Canvas uses the same technology that Facebook introduced recently to help pictures and videos load faster than ever before. With audiovisual content proving to be more engaging than text, Canvas paints a bright advertising picture for brands going forward.

Here are some important stats that put the significance of Facebook Canvas into perspective.

  1. Over 1.2 billion of the 1.4 billion active monthly users on Facebook use the mobile app.
  2. Ads created by Canvas are reported to load and run 10 times faster in the Facebook app than similar content on standard mobile web platforms.
  3. Over 19 million businesses have optimized their Facebook pages for mobile browsing.
  4. In 2015, there was a 122% increase in ad spending by businesses.
  5. Also in 2015, Facebook mobile advertising accounted for 62% of total advertising revenue from the social platform.
  6. Top ad spend share goals are engagement (23%) and website clicks (20%).
  7. Slow load times are among the top reasons people discontinue browsing websites.
  8. The average website is now three times bigger than they were in 2011, which is one reason why they may load slowly on mobile devices.
  9. Canvas ads make it possible for fans to quickly view much of the content they would be visiting websites to see.
  10. Canvas ads can be easily shared and have call-to-action buttons.

A number of businesses around the world have already started to benefit from Facebook Canvas. Will you be using the new service in your Facebook marketing strategy?