Facebook streamlines iOS downloads by revamping app install ads

Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) is overhauling its new mobile app install ads program, enabling iOS 6 device users to initiate downloads from Apple's (NASDAQ:AAPL) App Store without disrupting the Facebook experience.

Clicking on an ad will open a separate dialog box.

The Facebook ads, introduced this fall, target consumers based on the apps and games they already access on their smartphones. Developers select their intended audience demographic, budget and method of payment, and Facebook inserts ads for their apps directly into targeted users' mobile news feeds. In the past, clicking these ads redirected the iOS device to the App Store; with the new changes, clicking an ad now generates another dialog box, and once the install process is complete, users can simply continue where they left off, without exiting the Facebook platform.

Facebook also is introducing new tools enabling developers to customize ad creative directly from the app dashboard, power editor or the ads API. "From the promote tab in the app dashboard, click on 'customize ad,' upload an image and add a description that's most relevant to the people you want to reach with the ad," explains Facebook Commerce and Payments Product Manager Deborah Liu. "People with the latest Facebook app will also see a larger, more engaging image for mobile app install ads." Also new: Demographic breakdown of all app installs on mobile. Developers can now measure new installs by age, gender, and country. All information is aggregate and anonymous, Liu notes.

Facebook began beta testing the mobile app install ads program in late summer. "In early results, beta partners like Kabam, Fab, TinyCo and Big Fish were able to reach a more relevant audience and efficiently drive installs," Facebook software engineer Vijaye Raji wrote in an October blog post. "For example, TinyCo saw 50 percent higher [click-through rates] and significantly higher conversion rates compared to their current mobile channels, as well as a significant increase in player engagement." Raji added that a select subset of Facebook Preferred Marketing Developers experienced similarly positive results during the beta period.

Facebook now touts more than 1 billion users worldwide, with roughly 600 million accessing its services via mobile. As of the third quarter of 2012, mobile initiatives like the app install program generate 14 percent of the company's total advertising revenues.

For more:
- read this Facebook Developer Blog entry

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