Ads have always been a phenomenon associated with Facebook and its sister sites and users of Instagram might very well refer to this move as inevitable. Whenever a free product comes out from the company, it’s always just of time before ads are slipped into it.
Well, the very same thing will be happening to Instagram Reels, the firm’s TikTok competitor. Facebook has now confirmed that will be introducing 30-second ads in between Reels on the app. The clips will have a small “Sponsored” watermark to clearly indicate that it is an advertisement.
Despite the fact that this feature has been under testing for some months now, it is not yet clear how those ads are performing. The firm has also not yet provided any templates on how to build an ad for Reels yet in case there are users that need to market their businesses.
As it stands, Instagram already lets users shop for stuff from ads that appear on their feed and Stories. With new places for ads, it can now expand this ability. But it is also clear that the firm is looking to create more stream of revenue.
But it is a policy that has seen Facebook on the wrong side of the public and other firms. This can be related to WhatsApp whose privacy policy change saw it receive backlash earlier this year.
This move definitely does create the question about whether we’ll be seeing TikTok follow suit as well. In May, a report from Bloomberg suggested that the latter is preparing to introduce in-app shopping. TikTok already sells goods on its platform through partnerships with Teespring and Shopify.
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