Facebook is currently testing a program that will add mobile games ads and suggestions along with likes, comments and other notifications on a user's menu.
Facebook, world's largest social networking site, is making changes to its platform by integrating mobile game ads and suggestions into the notifications tab. Users will be seeing new advertisement notifications of suggested games based on the user's existing gaming habits.
The new ad system is currently in a testing phase before being launched as a full-fledged feature, AllThingsD reported Tuesday. It may come handy for users looking for new games to play on Facebook, but might be disturbing for people who like to keep their notification area ad-free.
The new ad system notifies users based on the games they play on Facebook and if users do not play any games, it is unlikely that they will receive any such notifications, says the website.
"We're always testing new channels to promote games," a Facebook spokesperson told AllThingsD. "This is part of a small mobile distribution test we're running for game developers."
Advertisements are a major source of revenue for Facebook. In 2012, 84 percent of the company's total revenue was generated from advertisements. So it is quite obvious the California-based company makes every effort to expand its advertising platform.
Earlier in May, Facebook revealed that mobile ads led to a 58 percent increase in profits in the first quarter this year. The active users on Facebook have reached 1.11 billion, with 751 million users accessing the site from their mobile devices. The Facebook app for Android, Apple and Windows Phone uses the device ringtones to alert users of any Facebook notification, based on user's device settings. So the company should be sure not to tick off its customers by bombarding with new ads and suggestions.
The new feature, in its testing phase, does not have an option to turn off alerts unlike other type of notifications on the site. But the company should consider giving users the option to turn off notifications for game ads if an actual feature is set to be rolled out.
Recently, Google Inc. also enhanced its Gmail interface by providing multi tabs with a dedicated tab for advertisement messages that appear in the form of emails. Revenue generated from advertisements is the main source for these web giants. Hence, for these companies to invent new features to promote ads in a better and attractive way does not come as a huge surprise.
