Meta expands its advertising options across its social platforms, including video ads on Threads
For all of the talk about establishing and maintaining connections, for the companies behind them social media platforms are about making money. Advertising plays a massive role in this, and Meta is looking for new ways to grab users’ attention.
The company has announced it is testing video ads on Threads as it explores expanding its portfolio of ad formats. There are also new ad options for creators and brands on Facebook and Instagram, as well as the slightly unusual sounding “trending ads” feature.
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Meta announced the new ad features as part of IAB NewFronts 2025, with the arrival of video ads for Threads showing the company’s vision for its most recent addition to its social media family. There are also new video ads in Instagram reels, with the company saying: “we are testing Reels trending ads, a new short-form video solution that seamlessly delivers against the most trending, creator-created Reels”.
The social media behemoth explains:
[This is] a new content targeting product that seamlessly delivers ads immediately after the most popular, engaging creator-created Reels across our platforms. Brands may choose to run their ads next to overall top trending Reels or top trending topical lineups such as beauty, sports and more content lineups in the future.
Reels trending ads utilizes our brand safety and suitability controls, like Inventory Filter, defaulting to the ‘limited’ setting, as well as verification from Meta Business Partners.
Much of Meta’s latest ventures are about teaming up creators and brands, and this looks set to continue:
We recently launched personalized, AI-enabled creator content recommendations for brands on Instagram and today will expand access on Facebook. These help marketers identify what relevant branded content may perform best as an ad. Find these in our “Recommended” content within Partnership Ads Hub.
While creators are seen as being different to the average “consumer” social media users, they are far from being immune from targeting. Meta says:
Finding high-quality creators at scale can be a barrier for brands looking to expand their creator marketing efforts. Soon, we will begin a limited test of a Creator Marketplace Discovery API for Instagram to make it easier for businesses to connect with creators through their agencies and third-party tools. With this API, these partners will be able to search for creators and gather insights to help marketers find the right creator for their next campaign.
Advertiser/creator tie-ins are a big part of the present and future of marketing, and Meta says that it is also testing Facebook Live Partnership ads with the choice to boost user generated content, so advertisers can boost live videos in partnership with creators as a partnership ad.
And no announcement would be complete without reference to artificial intelligence. Meta does not disappoint:
Lastly, we’ve begun to roll out Video Expansion on Facebook Reels, which helps advertisers unlock more performance from their video assets and drive better outcomes. Video Expansion seamlessly adjusts video creative assets by generating unseen pixels in each video frame to expand the aspect ratio, creating a more immersive and native experience.
Video expansion is a great example of how AI will not replace creativity, but enhance it. Our suite of Gen AI creative tools will help mark a new era of creativity, which advertisers and agencies – and all of you in this room – will have a key role in shaping that future.