Facebook Canvas: What is it & Why do You Need it?
DIY Sprocket Solutions
This article was updated on 7/2/2024 with the article entitled “Should Meta Instant Experience, ‘Formerly Facebook Canvas, Be Your Ad Choice?”
In February, Facebook announced a new feature being hailed as the evolution of mobile advertising. This feature is called Canvas. In their own words, “Facebook Canvas is an immersive and expressive experience on Facebook for businesses to tell their stories and showcase their products”. Well, that’s certainly not vague at all. So, what can it do exactly and what are the possibilities for marketing?
Well, there are already several brands using Facebook Canvas for advertising. It allows brands to create ads using: animations, images, carousels, buttons, product catalogs, tilt-to view images, videos, text, and more without any coding. Another great benefit is that it is built into Facebook so it doesn’t open up a new website when a user engages it. Because users are staying on Facebook, it is way faster than other ads that load an external link.
This is also a great mobile marketing tool. From Facebook:
Canvas was built to bring your content to life in a fast-loading and seamless experience on Android and iOS. Leveraging the same technology used to display photos and videos quickly in the Facebook app, Canvas loads quickly, as much as 10 times faster than the standard mobile web.
Facebook Canvas also allows users to engage in newer ways than ever before. Users can now not only watch video, but also swipe through products, tilt-to-view images, and so much more. Let’s illustrate how it works from a user perspective. Basically, these are ads. When a user clicks on a Canvas ad, it instantly goes full-screen and the user is in the middle of the experience.
But, will it keep users’ attention? Yes! Facebook already says that early testing of Canvas shows that 53% of users that open a canvas view at least half of it for an average viewing time of 31 seconds. Move over video ads! You have to consider also that this is a brand new ad format. People are interested. Don’t be late to jump on board with this one. Novelty is a big factor right now and Facebook Canvas is a great way to have a totally unique ad help you achieve your advertising campaign’s goals.
What do you think? Is this tool valuable enough to rework the way you think of Facebook advertising? I think it’s worth a shot. If nothing else, you can experience the different tools available using this format vs a more standard approach. Has anyone tried Facebook Canvas already? What were your thoughts? Were you blown away or left wishing that there were more options? Did your ad campaign come out the way you wanted? Did you see the results you expected? Comment below!
Breanne Bannon
Breanne is a Content Writer, Social Media Marketeer, and Sales Associate for Sprocket Websites.
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