On Friday, Facebook announced a major update to the way its mobile users see ads.
The social media company officially launched its Canvas platform, which basically means that now, when smartphone users click on an ad in their news feeds, it will open a full-screen, rich media page inside the site.
The idea behind the platform stems from the fact that mobile sites have tripled in size since 2011, causing slower load times and fewer users willing to sit through an ad, reports TechCrunch. Ads on Canvas, on the other hand, will be preloaded by Facebook (FB) and show up in about one second in a user’s news feed.
According to the Canvas site, a number of big brands are already using the advertising platform, including Target (TGT), Macy’s (M), and BMW, among others.
This had been a good week for Facebook advertisers, as the site announced an additional five “reactions” just this Wednesday. The new reactions, which offer the options for users to love, laugh, be sad, angry, or surprised at items on their news feeds, are expected to yield much richer insights to Facebook’s advertising partners.
As Wired’s Julia Greenberg notes, “It’s easy to imagine a future in which advertisers may very well be able to recalibrate their ad campaigns automatically based on how you’ve reacted to their ads in the past.”
