We all knew Facebook was working on auto-playing video ads but the company never acknowledged their existence until now. The social network announced today that it would begin testing video ads that will automatically play as a user scrolls through his or her news feed. Audio is muted by default until a user taps or clicks on the ad. This works exactly like auto-playing Facebook videos from your friends.
Facebook hopes that video ads will allow advertisers to increase engagement with their ads, citing an “an increase [of] more than 10 percent” for likes, comments, and shares. Once a video ad finishes, Facebook will display two additional videos to get users to discover more content through advertising. Instagram will likely see the same implementation of auto-playing video ads in the future. The social photo app recently introduced its first sponsored ads in its mobile apps.
For those worried about going over their data caps, Facebook has a clever solution. The app will cache video advertisements while users are connected to Wi-Fi, even if the user doesn’t scroll to an ad. This allows the app to display the ad without connecting to the internet.
While auto-playing video ads are finally official, you’ll likely not see them for a while. Facebook is rolling them out to “a small number of people” to gauge user reaction and to make sure everything is ready for a global roll out.
Check out the video below to see the video ads in action.
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Source: Facebook Newsroom
