Facebook is No Longer Limiting Text on Your Ad Images – Chris Zaccaro

I’m giving a thumbs up to Facebook for finally doing away with its infamous, long-in-the-tooth 20% rule.

Until now, Facebook discouraged its advertisers from using images with more than 20% text, either by limiting an ad’s reach or by flat out rejecting the ad altogether. Their public justification was that images with less text performed better—they also implied that it would keep news feeds cleaner and less overwhelming.

However, as many marketers will testify, image text captures your audience’s attention and it allows you to share extra information or calls to action that may not work within the copy of an ad. And I think we can all agree that Facebook is WAY past the point of being overwhelming these days. A text heavy ad may just leave you “whelmed.”

This move by Facebook has been an oddly quiet one, with no real, public announcement being made by the social media behemoth. But news of the 20% rule’s demise has been circulating in the blogosphere—including Social Media Today, who credits social media expert Matt Navarra with the official confirmation.

So go forth designers! Make that call to action larger or add that extra line of text. No one is stopping you now!