Mobile has put our minds in overdrive. We consume content at hyper speed and scroll through our feeds in no time flat. Living with a deluge of content hasn’t meant choosing what content to view as much as it’s meant consuming what content is available at a faster pace than ever before.

Facebook’s found that we spend 1.7 seconds, on average, with content viewed through mobile in our News Feeds. It’s not much better on desktop—2.5 seconds. People want to be entertained. They want to be engaged, but they do not want to give any piece of content, be it from friends or brands, more than a moment of their time. 

Needless to say, 1.7 seconds is not much time. What could possible be accomplished in 1.7 seconds? Well, in 0.25 seconds people can recall content they’ve seen in their News Feeds. That’s it. 0.25 seconds.

This research certainly benefits Facebook as it tries to contend with the fact that people tend to skip ads. Facebook's trying to say that doesn't really matter because 1.7 seconds is all you need. The value of those 1.7 seconds is certainly up for debate, especially with a research claim like this one, but that's how marketers should operate. Assume the worst. Assume seconds is all you'll get.

The gauntlet’s been thrown for advertisers. Marketers should assume 1.7 seconds is all they’ll get from people, and anything beyond that is extra. That’s quite the line in the sand, so what’s an advertiser to do?