Messenger bots can now send you ads on Facebook

Facebook has made an important change to its Messenger Bots policy that will allow businesses to send you ads. The change comes from a need to define the way Messenger Bots can contact a customer and with which types of content.

As per the new rule, a business can send promotional and marketing material to a user but only if the contact is initiated by the customer and that too within 24 hours of contact. So, don’t worry about spam, you will always be in control.

The subscribers to any brand’s Messenger feed will get messages unprompted and more regularly. If subscribers reply to a message, the conversation will switch into a standard messaging mode. Existing companies using the service have three months to comply with the new rules for standard messaging, which are now in effect and for firms who want to start, Facebook promises to review new bots within five days. The new subscription options are starting in beta for companies involved in news, productivity and personal trackers (bots used for fitness, health wellness, and finance).

With its latest move, Facebook aims at monetizing its one billion monthly Messenger users. Advertising was always the next step for Messenger Bots. There are reportedly 18,000 bots on the service and 23,000 companies using Facebook’s deep-learning tech that enables natural language recognition.