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Facebook testing ‘mid-roll’ ads

January 11, 2017

Facebook is preparing to test mid-roll video advertising – in which ads are played midway through a video that a user is watching.

The ads would likely first appear in Facebook videos by professional publishers, according to reports.

To date, the Facebook has resisted allowing pre-roll ads, that play before a video starts, which are common on YouTube.

Publishers would receive 55 per cent of revenue from mid-roll ad sales, according to tech site Recode.

“Advertisers are super keen on video advertising,” Eleni Marouli, at analyst company IHS Markit, told the BBC. “If Facebook wants those TV ad dollars, they have to invest more in video.”

Marouli added she did not think mid-roll ads would necessarily be more disruptive for users watching video on Facebook, but noted that it would be up to the social network to decide whether the inserted content would be kept brief – shorter than typical TV ads, for example.

 

Categories: Advertising, Articles, Social Media