USA - Increasingly online adverts are directing potential customers to their pages on Facebook and Twitter platforms

[NY Times] MARKETERS promoting their products online have followed a fairly standard arc historically, first buying digital ads and building their own Web sites in the early years of the Internet, and more recently amassing followers on social networks like Facebook and Twitter.

Now, companies increasingly are running online ads that focus less on pitching their products than promoting their Facebook pages and Twitter accounts.

The ads, which have menu tabs and increasingly resemble mini-Web sites themselves, allow users to click within the ad to see a brand’s Twitter messages or Facebook wall posts in real time, or to watch a brand’s video content from YouTube — all without leaving the Web page where the ad appears.

Brands Now Direct Their Followers to Social Media