Facebook Adds Ability To Sell Virtual Goods To Desktop Gamers Via Ads

Facebook has always allowed desktop gamers to spend real money for virtual currency. Starting today, it’s giving game developers the ability to sell virtual goods within Facebook advertising.

The new product — for News Feed and right-hand column ads — has already shown success in reducing the friction for gamers to pull out their credit cards, according to post by Pin Lu on the Facebook Developers blog.

Kixeye tested the new ad product to promote its Battle Pirates game, offering discounts on virtual gold and “saw over a 10 percent click-through rate and a 50 percent conversion rate for past purchasers,” Lu wrote. “They saw a 14 percent conversion rate for those who hadn’t paid before. In addition, they targeted their highest value spenders with large discounts — for instance, $500 worth of gold virtual currency for $250 — and saw over 5,000 percent return on ad spend.”

Developers are able to purchase the ads, starting today, on all Facebook ad interfaces, including  Create Flow and Power Editor, or via one of Facebook’s Preferred Marketing Developers. For more information, see Facebook’s tutorial.