Mobile continues to bolster Facebook revenue
Facebook’s revenues rose 38 per cent year-on-year in the last quarter to hit $1.46bn (£938bn) based largely on its ability to monetise its mobile audience.
Its average monthly audience hit 1.1 billion during the period.
Revenue from advertising hit $1.25bn (£803m) during the three months to March 31, representing a 43 per cent increase from the same period in 2012, with revenues from mobile ad units accounting for 30 per cent.
However, profit margin fell to 26 per cent during the period, down from 36 per cent 12 months earlier.
The decrease in margin was attributed to ongoing investment in its ad serving and measurement technology, such as the continued roll out of Facebook Ad Exchange (FBX) plus the acquisition of the Atlas Adveritsing Suite from Microsoft.
The social network also emphasised the significant strides it has made in developing and monetising its mobile audience since its IPO.
Among the milestones reached during the quarter were its average monthly mobile audience was 751 million plus its picture-sharing service Instagram hitting 100 million monthly users.
Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook CEO, says: “Overall, there are three main parts of our strategy. Build the best mobile product, build a platform with new services that leverage the social graph, and build a strong monetisation engine.”
“Every major brand, company or service wants to build apps as a storefront or interface for their customers and each of these companies wants to reach their customers to encourage them to install their [mobile] apps,” he said.
Research firm eMarketer forecasts Facebook’s earnings from display advertising will hit £279m in the UK this year representing 18.6 per cent of the total market, rising to £384m in 2015 when total spend will hit £2,042m, see chart below.