Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past two years, you’ve most likely registered an account with or have heard of Facebook. If you haven’t heard of or used Facebook, you should know it’s basically a social networking site that was originally developed for college or university students. Now Facebook has grown far beyond just student users and now hold one of the top positions in their niche and continues to be one of the most visited and used sites in existence today.

Ok, now that the history lesson is out of the way, we can jump into the article topic, new Facebook Ads. On Tuesday, during the Facebook Social Advertising event (where more than 250 marketing and advertising executives gathered in New York), the MySpace killer unveiled their new ad system called Facebook Ads. The social advertising system will allow businesses and entrepreneurs to connect with a wide range of users and target advertising or media to the exact audiences the business needs to attract (it’s basically a BIG word of mouth system for businesses and also for users to find new things). The new Faccebook Ads are designed to show users new businesses, brands and products through their personal networks and the trusted referrals of their friends.

Here’s what Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook CEO, had to say about the new ad system…

Facebook Ads represent a completely new way of advertising online. For the last hundred years media has been pushed out to people, but now marketers are going to be a part of the conversation. And they’re going to do this by using the social graph in the same way our users do. The core of every user’s experience on Facebook is their page and that’s where businesses are going to start as well. The first thing businesses can do is design a page to craft the exact experience they want people to see. Social actions are powerful because they act as trusted referrals and reinforce the fact that people influence people. It’s no longer just about messages that are broadcasted out by companies, but increasingly about information that is shared between friends. So we set out to use these social actions to build a new kind of ad system.

The Facebook Social Advertising event also featured partnership announcements wth senior executives from huge new ad partners including companies like Blockbuster, CBS, Chase, Coca-Cola, Microsoft, Sony and Verizon. In total, over 60 major retail and Online brand partners were announced at the event. Those were just the major ones, in total over 100,000 new Facebook Ad pages went live on Tuesday.

Facebook Ads primarily consist of three parts…

• Businesses can build pages on Facebook to connect with their target audiences
• The ad system facilitates the spread of brand messages virally through Facebook Social Ads
• The interface gathers insights into user’s activity on Facebook that marketers want to know

100,000 Facebook Pages Launched:

Facebook Pages allow users to interact with businesses and organizations in the same ways they can interact with other Facebook users or profile pages. More than 100,000 new Facebook Pages launched on Tuesday covering some of the world’s largest brands, area businesses, international organizations and music groups.

Similar to Facebook users, businesses can start with a blank page and add any pertinent information or ad content they want including, but not limited to, photos, videos, music and even Facebook applications. Application developers have created a wide range of apps designed to enhance Facebook Profile Pages or Facebook Ad Pages. Applications include tools to book reservations, provide reviews of restaurants, ticket purchases and even things like custom t-shirt creation apps. Companies that have launched applications include Fandango, iLike, Musictoday, OpenTable, SeamlessWeb, Zagat Survey and Zazzle.

Social Graph Distribution:

Advertising messages are distributed through the Facebook “social graph,” or the network of real connections through which people communicate and share information. When people engage with a business Facebook Page, that action will spread information about that business through the social graph.

Users can choose to become a fan of any business or can share information about any businesses with friends and act as a trusted referral. Facebook users can interact directly with the business through that business’ Facebook Page by adding user reviews, writing on a business “Wall,” uploading photos and in any other ways that a business may want to enable. These actions could appear in a users “Mini-Feed” and “News Feed,” which are two of Facebook’s popular products that allow users to share information more efficiently with their friends.

Social Action Advertisements:

Facebook’s ad system serves “Social Ads” that combine social actions from your friends, such as a purchase of a product or review of a restaurant, with an advertiser’s message. The social actions enable advertisers to deliver more tailored or relevant ads to Facebook users that can even include information from their friends so they can make more informed purchasing decisions. Privacy is important, no personally identifiable information is shared with an advertiser in creating a Social Ad. Facebook has always allowed their users to make choices about what data is shared, and with Facebook Ads they are extending that to marketing messages that appear on the site. Facebook users will only see Social Ads to the extent their friends are sharing information with them.

Social Ads can appear either within a user’s News Feed as sponsored content or in the ad space along the left side of Facebook.

Brand Recognition, Presence & Promotion:

Facebook allows marketers to gain valuable insights and metrics about their business presence and brand promotion on Facebook. “Facebook Insights” gives marketers access to data on users activity, fan demographics, ad performance and even trends that are designed to better equip marketers with knowledge to improve custom content on Facebook and adjust ad targeting as needed. Facebook Insights is a free service for all Facebook Pages and Social Ads.

Conclusion & Final Thoughts:

If you haven’t already, be sure to check out more information at the main Facebook Ads page. This is a great move on the part of Facebook as they continue to improve their site, grow their user base and develop new and useful tools to help the community of users connect. Any one who needs to attract certain audiences (especially college or university aged people) should consider using the new Facebook Ads as a regular part of their marketing strategy. It’s no secret, they have a huge amount of user’s and traffic and it would be silly to let an opportunity for your business to attract a good number of them go by.

I will be testing some things out and will try to report back here with as much new information as I get about the Facebook Ad System. Have fun building your pages and remember to make use of all the neat Facebook Applications that are out now.