Facebook to shift focus to mobile advertising

Facebook could be set to shift its focus onto mobile advertising as more users access the social network through their smartphones.

According to official figures from the organisation, 425 million people use Facebook on their phones and tablets.

Despite the startling figure, however, the firm said it is not yet generating revenue from its mobile properties through display advertising.

Both Apple and Google, on the other hand, have lowered the cost of mobile advertising on their services as a means of enticing businesses to adopt the platform.

"Our ability to [generate revenue from mobile advertising] successfully is unproven," Facebook noted.

However, it is unlikely that the site will rest on its laurels for long, particularly as the social media mobile advertising market could be worth hundreds of billions of pounds.

Commenting on the situation Facebook finds itself in, David Berkowitz, vice president of emerging media for digital-marketing agency 360i told Bloomberg and the San Francisco Chronicle: "There has never been a media property, to my knowledge, with 400 million users and no revenue model."