Skip to main content

Facebook's focus is on mobile, says COO Sheryl Sandberg

As mobile users overtake desktop users, Facebook is increasingly zeroed in on mobile strategy, Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg said this week. 

Earlier this year, Facebook announced that for the first time, the number of mobile users exceeded the number of desktop users. No huge surprise there: More and more of us use our smart phones and tablets as one of our primary portals to the Internet (see also yesterday's IDC report, which forecasted a drastic widening of the tablet market in the years ahead, and a concurrent shrinking of the PC market).
Related stories

The big question was what Facebook was going to do to leverage all that mobile growth. Well, this week, at the All Things D conference out in Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif., Facebook COO Sheryl offered an answer of sorts: Shift resources from desktop development to the mobile side of things. "Mobile is the top goal right now," Ms. Sandberg said, according to MarketWatch. "Every product team is focused on mobile."

Meanwhile, she continued, Facebook would work on more tightly focusing advertisements on individual users. "The growth you’ll see from us on mobile is less about inserting more ads and more about inserting better ads," she said.

Already, this strategy seems to be working. As Raj Aggarwal, CEO of app analytics firm Localytics, told USA Today earlier this month, advertisers are flocking to Facebook's mobile app in droves. "For brands seeking to cost-effectively reach a highly engaged mobile audience, app marketing through Facebook is a must," Mr. Aggarwal said.

In related news, at the same All Things D conference, Sandberg played down reports of discontent among users of Facebook Home, a new suite of Android apps. She pointed out that Home users actually spend 25 percent more time on Facebook than the average user and send 10 percent more messages.

"Facebook home is version one of a very large transformation," she said.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

'Ek Thi Daayan doesn't propagate witchcraft’

Emraan Hashmi is an antithesis of his over-the-top screen image. In real life, he has a wicked sense of humour, for only those who get it. When he debuted in 2003, critics were quick to write him off due to his non-hero looks and his choice of films. It has been a long journey and not a smooth one for him since his ‘Murder’ days. From a mass hero catering to mostly frontbenchers to bankable star super-hit potboilers, he has coursed the long mile. His performance as Jogi Parmar in 'Shanghai' made the critics sit up and take notice of him. With Vishal Bhardwaj's 'Ek Thi Daayan', Emraan's filmi graph has taken a new turn as he stars along with Huma Quereshi, Kalki and Konkona Sen Sharma. In a candid chat, the star tells us about his role and why he wants to get rid of his ‘kisser’ image. Excerpts from the interview: How did ‘Ek Thi Daayan’ happen? I was drawn to the story and the subject, written by Mukul which was adapted by Vishal. It was fascinating be

Health News

Motorola's tattoos could replace passwords

Motorola’s forthcoming phones could use electronic tattoos or pills to identify users, it has been announced.   The technology, which aims to remove the need to enter passwords and replace them simply with a phone being close to a user’s body, was one of the suggestions Dennis Woodside, Motorola’s chief executive, California's D11 conference yesterday. The tattoos have been developed by Massachusetts-based engineering firm MC10, and contain flexible electronic circuits that are attached to the wearer's skin using a rubber stamp. Nokia has previously experimented with integrating tattoos into mobile phones, and Motorola's senior vice president of advance research, Regina Dugan, a former head of the US Pentagon's Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency, demonstrated the silicon-based technology that uses bendable electronic circuits. Initially designed for medical purposes, Motorola hopes the ‘Biostamps’ could now be used for consumer authentication purposes. Motor