In what has been a fairly rocky last week for Facebook, with the co-founders of Instagram stepping down from the company and the data breach that affected nearly 90 million total users, a bit of good news has emerged. This news will hopefully be the catalyst Facebook needs to change the tides of what has been very rough waters as of late. 

The Stories format is becoming more and more popular, most notably with Facebook’s crown jewel acquisition Instagram. But Facebook Stories have also continued to grow in popularity. In an Ipsos survey commissioned by Facebook IQ, 68% of people said they use Stories on at least three apps, while 63% plan to use the feature more in the future. Instagram Stories dominate social media as a whole. Over 400m people use Instagram Stories every day. Taking note of the success and visibility Instagram Stories were producing, Facebook launched Instagram Stories Ads last year. As a whole, the feature has been a success. And as monthly active users for the app continue to grow, there is also a growing focus on the development of the feature and it’s concept.

This growing focus quickly evolved into the development of Facebook Stories Ads. This feature was available to select advertisers based on a checklist of criteria for qualification. But for some, it may not be a surprise to hear Facebook has announced that it will be rolling the ads out to all advertisers. With more than 300 million daily active users, Facebook Stories and Messenger Stories are prime features for monetization. Beginning this week, advertisers will now be able to “include Facebook Stories as an additional placement to News Feed or Instagram Stories ad campaigns, delivering messages in a full screen, immersive environment.” Facebook will also soon be allowing them to extend the reach in Messenger as well, which should assist in generating even better results. 

The wait is over! Facebook Stories ads are now available to support all the objectives that are currently available for Instagram Stories ads, which includes brand awareness, reach, app installs, video views, traffic, conversions  and lead generation. Advertisers will also have the ability to utilize Facebook’s full lineup of targeting capabilities and data.

Facebook stated that “for performance marketers, stories ads can also inspire people to take action,” Over 50 percent of the people surveyed in the above mentioned Ipsos survey said “they’re making more online purchases as a result of seeing stories.” No surprise there. But as a marketer, this is key information in determining the value of your ad spends. 

Brands that have already tested the ads have “found that adding Facebook Stories to their Instagram Stories ad campaigns resulted in more customer actions at a lower cost.” Another non surprise. But to what extent? The data will be interesting to find out exactly what type of increase in sales these companies are seeing from Stories ads. The increased revenue is obviously not the only appealing element of the feature. Certainly brand awareness and consideration will surely be impacted by these ads, and those factors are also very important to leverage in your overall marketing ecosystem.

Do you plan on utilizing Facebook Stories ads? Tell us why below!

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