Facebook adds autoplay video ads to News Feed

FT.com

Here's a much-anticipated feature from Facebook that marketers may love, if not its users.

The online social network has just announced it is beginning to test a video format for advertisers, where videos will begin playing as users scroll down to them in their news feeds. Clicking on them will turn on the sound.

Earlier tests of a way to make users' own videos behave the same way have resulted in views, likes, shares and comments increasing more than 10 per cent, according to Facebook.

The tests for ads will begin this week with a small number of people seeing video ads for the new film Divergent playing as they come into view in News Feed on mobile and desktop.

It looks like an elegant solution for incorporating video ads, earning more revenues and getting users' increased attention. But Facebook, as ever, runs the risk of people regarding this as an unwelcome intrusion into their personal social lives.

Digital video ad spending in the US will top out at $4.15bn in 2013, according to eMarketer estimates, up 43.5 per cent from $2.89bn last year.

It points out the TV market, from which Facebook hopes to siphon ad dollars, is far larger, with advertisers spending $66.35bn on TV this year in the US.

Here's its table on TV and digital video ad spend to 2017: