Facebook to market ads on Instagram photo site

10/5/2013

SAN FRANCISCO — Facebook, will sell advertising on its Instagram photo service, the first effort to make money from the company’s largest acquisition on record.

Promotions will start to appear nationwide on the mobile application, which lets users share images from smartphones, the operator of the world’s most popular social network said Thursday in a blog. Instagram will deliver a “small number” of pictures and videos from a handful of companies that users aren’t necessarily following.

Facebook is seeking new ways to drive revenue from mobile devices as users increasingly access digital services from wireless devices. While mobile made up 41 percent of ad revenue in the second quarter, up from 30 percent in the previous period, Facebook remains a distant No. 2 in a market led by Google Inc., according to researcher EMarketer Inc.