Picture This: Facebook Adds ‘Natural’ Looking Ads to Instagram

instagram pictures

facebook instagramSay it ain’t so Instagrammers: Facebook has announced it will start running advertisements on Instagram, the photo and video sharing service it purchased for nearly $1 billion in 2012.

A Facebook spokesman said the ads would begin to appear “in the next couple of months,” and only within the U.S. Facebook will strive to make the ads “feel as natural to Instagram as the photos and videos” on the site, according to the Wall Street Journal.

“Seeing photos and videos from brands you don’t follow will be new, so we’ll start slow,” the statement continued. “We’ll focus on delivering a small number of beautiful, high-quality photos and videos from a handful of brands.”

Of course the addition of advertisements on Instagram was widely expected considering how much coin was forked out to acquire the service, which is still not generating revenue.

Facebook needs to act very delicately making sure to keep the Instagram experience cool for users while finding a way to appease investors.

In its announcement Thursday, Facebook said it will continue to allow Instagram users the ability to remove ads they don’t like, and provide any feedback about “what didn’t feel right. We’re relying on your input to help us continually improve the Instagram experience,” the spokesman said.

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While this may open up Instagram to businesses more, will you be able to live with the ads now?
 
Image by Alison Yin for The Wall Street Journal

Daniel Zeevi

By Daniel Zeevi

Daniel is a social network architect, web developer, infographic designer, writer, speaker and founder of DashBurst. Full-time futurist and part-time content curator, always on the hunt for disruptive new technology, creative art and web humor.

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