Special Features
Facebook Looks To Lure Brand Advertisers
At a time when audiences are fragmenting, many advertisers look to big live TV shows such as The X Factor or America’s Got Talent as the best way of reaching a large chunk of a population in one go. But now Facebook is pitching to advertisers to use its own medium for the same end.The world’s largest social network is aiming for 1 billion users globally in the next few years, its founder, Mark Zuckerberg, told delegates at the Cannes Lions advertising festival yesterday. Russia, China, South Korea and Japan are next in its sights as it pushes its global reach.
But as Facebook aims to move further into Asia, it is still working on building a serious advertising business in the markets where it is more established.
Zuckerberg said it was "out of the experimentation phase" in advertising and was now growing revenues quickly, without having to "push a lot of the growth ourselves". But the group is desperate to attract the kinds of brand advertisers, such as consumer goods companies, which have typically been less keen on internet advertising than so-called direct-response marketers, which have gobbled up Google’s search ads.
To that end, it hired as its new European chief Joanna Shields, who as chief executive of Bebo when it was sold to AOL, has good form in pitching social networks to advertisers and agencies.
"Part of the transition we are making is we are much more focused on helping brands build their image and the conversation around Facebook," Shields told the Financial Times. Some ad agencies in Europe and the US have complained that Facebook’s sales teams can be difficult to get hold of, as it was overwhelmed by demand.
They also moan when it suddenly makes big changes to its platform, giving little or no notice, even to some of the largest brands on the site.
The first stage of Shields’ charm offensive will see Facebook’s sales team in Dublin take on more online work for "long tail", or small, advertisers, while expanding the teams in London and across Europe that go direct to agencies and bigger brands.
