Last week, when Facebook signaled plans to sharply reduce the number of discrete ad formats it offers, no one criticized the move. And why should they? After Facebook’s early frenzied experiments in advertising, it’s a natural step to assess what performs best, lose the rest and restructure the whole ad offering around advertiser objectives rather than features.
But could it have an impact on Facebook’s sprawling Preferred Marketing Developer ecosystem? We asked CEOs at five companies holding the Ads API badge for their take.
- Ric Calvillo, CEO, Nanigans
- Sheldon Owen, CEO, Unified Social
- Amit Avner, CEO, Taykey
- Don Mathis, CEO, Kinetic Social
- Laura O’Shaughnessy, CEO, SocialCode
Click or scroll down for their answers.
Ric Calvillo, CEO, Nanigans
“The simplification and consistency in these latest updates will result in an easier onboarding process from a sales perspective as much as it will help streamline workflow management and the scaling of campaigns. The ad units may change, but our campaign methodology will remain consistent; our algorithms will remain rooted in predictive lifetime value and ROI.
It’s critical for Facebook to continue to iterate and enhance their ad products; it’s been one of the core reasons behind their success to date in developing such a relevant ad ecosystem for end users. In a similar light, the PMDs that can continue to keep pace from an engineering perspective will be the ones who benefit most.”
Sheldon Owen, CEO, Unified Social
“As a PMD, everything we do is tailored for our customers’ business and marketing objectives. For everything from lead generation and awareness to conversions and app installs, Facebook provides an incredibly effective platform to achieve these objectives.
When Facebook implements their streamlined ad units later this year, they’ll also be eliminating redundancy and complexity that will leave PMDs with a powerful set of tools. In particular, the ability to add social context to all advertising – not just Sponsored Stories – allows our software platform to leverage Facebook ad units in new ways.
As Facebook matures as a marketing channel, the changes that they make create new opportunities for everyone in the PMD program to build on.”
Amit Avner, CEO, Taykey
“The impact for streamlined ad formats will be more thought put into the limited formats, which I believe will result in partners innovating on the existing formats. In our case, that is how to make sure the ad is relevant to what’s topical now. And more thought will be put into the creative and native experience, which will provide superior consumer experience.”
Don Mathis, CEO, Kinetic Social
“Facebook’s recent moves bode well for PMDs that focus on advanced delivery technologies…but not so much if a PMD’s value-add is limited to decrypting the (increasingly straight-forward) Facebook ad platform.
The key here is that the core back-end is not changing. Instead, this is an ad unit reorganization which simplifies Facebook’s offerings, aligns them more closely with advertiser goals and better leverages social content. For example, at Kinetic we see CTR and conversion rates that are as much as 10x higher on an app install versus an offer unit. We expect the changes will translate into enhanced performance for our clients.
Fewer, more valuable ad units create a rare nexus of improved user experience and advertiser inventory. For the same spend, the overall quantity of ads a user sees should decrease, while a corresponding quality improvement will yield increasing interaction. There is more space for content, more engaging ads, a higher ROI, and the whole experience becomes more social.
We expect ad inventory will increase in cost, but so will performance. This is analogous to newsfeed inventory – fewer, more valuable ad units provide a better experience for everyone.”
Laura O’Shaughnessy, CEO, SocialCode
“We’re pleased to see the continued evolution of Facebook’s advertising offerings to best align with brands’ overall marketing goals.
Campaign data shows that our own clients have already gravitated towards ad units that achieve larger business goals, including conversions or actions that result in quantifiable ROI. These goals are attainable through Facebook campaigns; brands are looking for a streamlined and efficient approach to reach them. Facebook is a step ahead in recognizing this need and in placing a heavier focus on only those advertising solutions that deliver preferred results.”
