Facebook Adds 10-Second Threshold For Video Ads
Facebook is giving advertisers an option to only pay for video ads that have been watched for at least ten seconds, the Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday. The new option is being rolled out Tuesday.
Previously, advertisers had to pay as soon as their ads came into view. Facebook will still keep this CPM-based option in addition to adding a 10-second threshold, which should help the company to sell some of its inventory at higher prices.
Advertisers frequently pay more if they can be assured that consumers actually pay attention to their messages. That’s why YouTube, Facebook’s biggest competitor in the video ad space, years ago introduced an option for consumers to skip ads they weren’t interested in seeing.
Earlier this week, Facebook started to tweak its algorithms for displaying videos in its news feed, adding implicit signals like play time and whether users unmuted a video to choose additional content to display.
Correction, 10:56 a.m.: An earlier version of this story stated that Facebook previously charged advertisers after an ad was viewed for 3 seconds.
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