Facebook presented a revamped News Feed at a press event today, offering several upgrades: 1) Richer, more visually engaging stories; 2) Content-specific feeds; 3) Platform-consistent experiences. Advertisers may benefit as more screen real estate will become available for News Feed, allowing in-stream ads to become larger and more engaging, similar to high-CPM “takeover” ads on other websites.
Making feeds more consistent and content-specific should improve the News Feed experience, which could make users more tolerant of ads, enable new formats (e.g., video), boost ad loads, and allow content targeting. News Feed enhancements will roll out starting today on the web, and over the next few weeks on mobile.
Facebook is adopting the visual navigation that it currently uses on mobile to the web, creating a more consistent feel across PC, tablet, and smartphone screens. Advertisers and developers may grow more comfortable now that users see the entire screen on all devices, which has the potential to improve eCPMs over time.