We are often asked by creators “How can I monetize my videos on Facebook?” In this blog post we aim to tell you how to monetize videos on Facebook.
In 2015, Facebook announced they were running a beta trial with a select number of American companies to test ad breaks on native Facebook videos. These companies are referred to as “publishers” by Facebook, since these companies publish content to the Facebook platform. It was rumoured at the time that the revenue share was 45% for Facebook and 55% for the publisher, which are similar rates to YouTube.
Since the initial beta, Facebook have tested out different ad formats on their platform. They’ve found that people watch videos on Facebook very differently compared to YouTube or other video players. For example, people often watch videos on Facebook muted whereas most other platforms people watch videos with the sound on.
Facebook have rolled out ad breaks for Facebook Live prior to allowing publishers to monetize from ad breaks for on-demand video. This is because they see huge growth potential in live video. They have been testing mid-roll ad formats, however there’s been quite a bit of backlash against the format with viewers abandoning the content and publishers have raised concerns about having to re-edit content specifically for Facebook. Therefore Facebook continues to run the beta to find the ad formats that work best for their platform.
In April 2016, Facebook launched Rights Manager, which allows publishers to block unwanted user generated content or prevent freebooting (as it’s referred to on Facebook). Since the first day it launched, we’ve been working on the Rights Manager tool and providing valuable feedback to Facebook. For those that want to control their rights on Facebook, Rights Manager was a welcome solution to gain some control over their content being used on the platform. Not only is is frustrating for rights owners to not know how their content is being used, but it’s close to impossible to know anything since Facebook’s search is limited to only people you’re friends with on the site. Rights Manager fixed part of the problem, since publishers can now block or monitor user uploads of their content, even if the content is private or in a private group, but the monetization features are still only available to the initial beta testers.
The great news is that anyone can apply for Rights Manager, but there are a few issues that one might encounter. First, in order to gain access to the tool Facebook needs to approve your application based on their criteria. They will only approve applications for publishers like us that meet their criteria. Secondly, you need to have expertise in rights management to use Rights Manager, which even if you have access to the tool, you won’t be able to use without assistance.
Those that have access to Rights Manager will eventually be able to monetize their videos through the tool. This is why we often strongly recommend that people sign up for it, so you will have the ability to monetize. Facebook are working on completing the beta testing before rolling it out to the masses. Be assured that they want an excellent viewing experience for users as well as maximum revenue for publishers.
If you have access for Facebook’s Rights Manager, please get in touch. We’d be happy to discuss further how to help you enable monetization.