The immersive future of advertising on social media apps: Facebook Canvas

In testing since last year, the advertising platform Facebook Canvas has recently been officially launched on the market. Better known as instant ads, because of the conceptual affinity with Facebook Instant Articles, the platform dedicated to publishers, Facebook Canvas was created with the intent to provide advertisers a simple but powerful tool to create Full-screen rich media advertisements (with audio and video component included) in the Facebook app, which can load instantly - exactly as is the case with Instant Articles. 

How the ad experience changes with Facebook Canvas

The social media advertising revolution intercepts The increasingly mobile trend of the digital experience experienced by the average Internet user. In fact, recent surveys show that online purchasing decisions are made in the majority of cases right on a mobile device, smartphone or tablet that it is. The loss of centrality of the desktop dimension pushes to optimize platforms designed for web advertising from the perspective of exclusively mobile use, overcoming the technical limitations associated with the portable web universe.

WHAT OBSTACLES FOR YOUR WEB MARKETING?

Prior to the release of Facebook Canvas, Facebook home ads would open and load, when clicked on, in a browser within the app, and it was not possible to achieve a true full screen format because the in-app browser frame was an impediment to full-screen message expansion. Not to mention, making the mobile versions of websites gradually more complex, loading times for these ads had increased to 10 seconds: a wait that discouraged most users from completing the opening of the advertisement. Facebook Canvas solves both problems:

• the advertisement is shown in the Facebook app itself;
• being partially preloaded, the ad appears instantaneously following the user's click on the related link in the neews feed.

The benefits of Facebook Canvas for web marketing

Why does Facebook Canvas promise to be a trump card for your online business?

First of all, Facebook Canvas conquers with a'extreme ease of use. The user-friendly design of the platform provides a Drag and drop system, which does not require any code.

In just a few intuitive steps, you can create 360-degree advertising content for your brand, including videos, animations, carousel units, and product catalogs. Second, test results on the platform have shown that Facebook Canvas is able to generate a Far greater involvement of users in interacting with the advertising message, compared to traditional advertising. Ads on Canvas can last up to 70 seconds: more than 50% of Facebook subscribers who clicked on these new ads viewed at least half of them, to An average viewing time that, remarkably, is around 31 seconds.

An unprecedented and all-encompassing shopping experience finally seems to await compulsive online shoppers even on smartphones and tablets.

Last but not least, the price remains unchanged: Facebook Canvas ads will cost exactly as much as those in the regular Facebook news feed. Nor, for their part, will Facebook users have to fear being smothered by an unsustainable amount of ads.

Take your first steps on Facebook Canvas

How to create original and persuasive story telling about your brand for your target audience on social media through Facebook Canvas?

The undertaking is undoubtedly less complicated than you might think. While waiting for the platform to be available on other apps, such as Instagram, you can start using it in the Facebook app environment by signing up here, or by accessing it directly from your page, via the "Publishing Tools" tab.

On the menu to the left, you will find an option specifically for Canvas. In this section you can view a previously made Canvas ad (without the ability to make changes) or create a new one.

My first Canvas at

Click on the "Create" button at the top. Give the new Canvas a name: at this point you have available on the left all the components that you can, at your discretion, add to the advertising message.

On the right, you will see a preview of your creation. Although by default Facebook Canvas asks you to provide theme, photo, header and button, you are free to add, delete and move any element you want.

Using the "Add Component" button at the bottom, you will be able to select one or more of the following items to add, multiplying the units in the same category as needed:

• button
• carousel
• photo
• block of text
• video
• product catalog.

THE SELECTION OF THE THEME AND HEADER

The theme is the background color of the blanks, consisting mostly of the text blocks. If you want to customize it from the standard black or white, you can enter the color via hex code or by clicking on the gradient in the color guide.

You also have the option of setting a fixed header that always appears at the top of your Canvas ad (Facebook suggests a 120x44px image, maximum supported size 882x66px). In case of a transparent header, you are allowed to select background color and its opacity.

VIDEO SUGGESTIONS

• Minimum resolution of 720p
• Avoid full-screen videos
• Maximum total duration (including multiple videos) of 2 minutes
• MP4 or MOV format

THE PHOTO.

Facebook gives you 3 options when it comes to photos: default, tap to expand and tilt to pan. Image requirements are set as follows:

• By default, images will use the width of the entire screen: a maximum width image measures 1080 pixels, while the maximum height is 1920 pixels. The tap to expand and tilt to pan options allow you to take advantage of wider and taller images, respectively.
• The formats that can be used are PNG or JPG.
• In total, you can put 20 photos in your Canvas.

THE CAROSELLO

With the carousel format, Include multiple images (a minimum of 2 to a maximum of 10 per carousel) of the same size In a single ad unit. By selecting the default option, you will be able to attach a link to the image, a feature not supported by tilt to pan mode.

THE TEXT BLOCK

For Liven up your multimedia visual ad with informative portions, you have at your disposal the text blocks. Even for these components, there are a variety of customizable options, such as font type, size and color, as well as alignment, bold, italics and underline. A single text block can contain up to 500 characters.

THE PRODUCT CATALOG

If you have a product feed, this element allows you to incorporate it into the ad, in a manner akin to what happens for Dynamic Product Ads. Items will be displayed dynamically, without you being able to preset the order, up to 40 at a time.

THE BUTTON

Through this option, you will be able to Redirect users to an external link. For the button you will use a set of 30 characters, with 48px padding above and below. At your discretion, you will place the button internally or below the Canvas ad, in a sort of fixed footer.

Your Facebook Canvas ad is ready for your social media marketing strategy

Once you reach the end of the creative process, saving in the upper left corner to record your artwork is a must. Before you click "finish," however, remember to preview! By selecting "Preview on Device" Facebook will send a notification to your phone so that you can view the result directly from your mobile device.

The preview is critical especially because once the Canvas ad is finished, you will not be given a chance to edit it again!