Facebook Exchange CTRs vs Facebook Custom Audiences CTRs, January-December 2014 [CHART]

There’s been plenty of buzz that Facebook Exchange (FBX) is dying, and recent research by Kinetic Social found that clickthrough rates (CTRs) for Facebook’s Website Custom Audiences (WCA) were dominating those on FBX. In December 2014, the average CTR for US retargeted display ads run on WCA was 1.25%, vs. just 0.12% for FBX.

WCA placements saw average CTR rise nearly 1 percentage point between January and December of last year. In comparison, CTR for FBX increased just 0.09 point.

Kinetic noted that comparing FBX and WCA retargeting display ad CTRs is “apples to oranges” to some degree, as FBX ads are desktop-only, while WCA placements are run on both desktop and mobile. As consumers spend more and more time with the social network via smartphones and tablets—eMarketer expects mobile to account for 61.5% of time spent with Facebook per day by US adults this year, vs. 38.5% for PCs—reaching users on such devices is critical. And the large majority of Facebook ad revenues in the US and worldwide now come from mobile placements. eMarketer estimates that in both the US and globally, paid advertising on mobile will account for more than 70% of Facebook ad revenues in 2015, vs. less than 30% for desktop. Read the rest at eMarketer.