Google doesn’t have to worry about a competing ad network … yet.
Arianna Huffinton interviewed Facebook COO (And former Google vice president of Global Online Sales & Operations) Sheryl Sandberg today at BB Kings in Time Square. The interview was mostly soundbites and regurgitated material but I did hear one piece of newsworthy information (with the help of Jessi Hempel) …
During the Q&A, ClickZ‘s Kate Kaye asked whether Facebook Connect would be turning into an ad network. An ad network would allow sites that use Facebook to monitize the social information they have on users to show targeted ads. Just like Google (GOOG) knows what you’ve been searching for and makes money of that information in Adsense, Facebook knows what your friends like. It also knows what you’ve been commenting on around the web. This information might be as valuable, if not more valuable than what Google currently has. (Athough Google continually says they are becoming more social).
In Sandberg’s former role at Google she was intimately familiar with how valuable ad-serving information is.
But Sandberg said the company isn’t working on an ad network. “We have a lot of ads to sell already,” she said.
I don’t buy it.