Facebook Is Said to Create Mobile Location-Tracking App
Facebook Inc. (FB) is developing a smartphone application that will track the location of users, two people with knowledge of the matter said, bolstering efforts to benefit from growing use of social media on mobile computers.
Context & Ripple Effects
Facebook had been laying the data and advertising groundwork: it moved from allowing location sharing in 2010 to preparing a location-based mobile ad product in 2012, alongside plans to target advertising from app usage. The reported standalone app would extend that strategy beyond voluntary check-ins toward a more persistent mobile signal.
The report travelled across a broad set of outlets, underscoring how closely Facebook's mobile-revenue strategy was being watched. Because the app is reported by unnamed sources, its development and final design remain unconfirmed.
First-order effects
- A dedicated Facebook location app, if released, would give Facebook a separate channel for collecting mobile location signals and connecting them to its social graph.
- Facebook's mobile-ad sales effort would have a more granular input for location-based targeting than the earlier product plans described in the corpus.
Second-order effects
- Advertisers buying Facebook mobile inventory could be offered campaigns tied more closely to where users are, increasing the value of Facebook's location-based ad product.
- Facebook's app-usage targeting effort would be complemented by an offline signal, pushing its mobile ad products toward combined behavioral and location-based audience definitions.
Third-order effects
- If Facebook pairs persistent location collection with advertising, mobile social platforms will increasingly compete on the breadth of signals they can turn into ad targeting rather than on social activity alone.
- The shift would make the boundary between a social app and a mobile advertising-data layer less distinct, with user location becoming a strategic input alongside app behavior.
The trend: Facebook's reported app is one step in the shift from explicit social check-ins toward mobile advertising built from continuously collected behavioral and location signals.