• by Colin Kirkland , February 15, 2024

In an effort to help small businesses utilize boosted posts on Facebook and Instagram without facing Apple's service-charge fee, Meta will soon begin allowing advertisers to dodge the fee by paying to boost their content from web and mobile browsers, on either Facebook or Instagram.

As a result of changes Apple made to the App Store Review Guidelines, the tech giant is requiring a service charge fee of 30% on all total payments.

By the end of February, advertisers using the Facebook or Instagram iOS app to boost a post -- otherwise known as turning it into an ad -- will be billed through and collected by Apple, not Meta.

“Boosting, which allows an individual or organization to pay to increase the reach of a post or profile, is a digital service - so of course In-App Purchase is required,” Apple said in a statement. “This has always been the case and there are many examples of apps that do it successfully.”

“We are required to either comply with Apple’s guidelines, or remove boosted posts from our apps,” Meta said in a blog post.

Removing the ability to boost posts would hurt small businesses by depriving them of a lack of reach, the company says, and therefore it is raising the price for boosts on iOS.

By choosing to take an extra step to boost ads through desktop and mobile browsers instead of the App Store, Meta says it is offering advertisers an alternative option to help them maximize the results of their ad spend.

Advertisers looking to boost posts through the Facebook and Instagram iOS apps are required to add prepaid funds and pay for them before their boosted posts are published.

This new payment process is set to roll out in the U.S. before launching in “additional markets and countries” later this year.