Log onto Facebook and you're greeted by name.

"Welcome [you]!" the screen reads.

Scroll a little further and you'll see something else that's personalized: an advertisement.

"We need Virginia Tech undergrads for a survey on internet usage," read an ad that ran recently on vt.facebook.com. Click on it and it connects to www.SuperbRewards.com.

It's one of several targeted ads that attempt to pull users' attention from profiles to products.

Facebook spokesman Chris Hughes said the site is a big hit with advertisers because it makes sure their messages get to the right students.

"When you sign up for the Facebook, you fill out a profile where you're describing yourself in many ways," Hughes said.

"It's a site really interested in connecting like students and our advertisers in a way that's actually important and not just random."

Big fan of SpongeBob SquarePants?

When Paramount Pictures was looking to build hype around the 2004 movie starring the sea-dwelling sponge, executives turned to Facebook.

Within two weeks of setting up a sponsored group for the movie, Paramount had attracted the attention of 20,000 students.

Sponsored groups are one of three types of Facebook ads.

Introduced last winter, they are intended to promote a product, idea or brand.

Groups for video games, movies and TV shows allow users to sign up, post messages and get information from the company sponsoring them. The group is also listed on users' personal profiles.

Using bright colors or flashing icons, banner ads tempt users to click on them and sign up for a program, buy a product or connect to a new Web site.

Josh Iverson sells ads for Facebook, along with a variety of other online products, as the national advertising and sales account director for Y2M, a youth media and marketing firm in Boston.

"We might mention Facebook to almost every company we work with," Iverson said. "Very often people will say, 'Here's my product, I'm in the college market, what do you suggest?' "

"The only difficulty," he added, "is it is somewhat expensive. If your budget is not in the high four figures or five figures, you can't really do a campaign."

Despite the high cost, Hughes said, both banner ads and sponsor groups are in high demand.

Hughes wouldn't put an exact figure on the number of Facebook advertisers or its ad revenue, but he said the business is talking to hundreds of different companies at any given time.

A third option for advertisers -- this one with a significantly lower price tag -- is text announcements.

These are typically used by students or companies looking to target specific campuses.

In its own announcement, Facebook said last month that text announcements make more sense than posting fliers.

"Why?" the ad asks. "1. It only takes 2 min.; 2. As low as $9/day; 3. We'll love you forever :)"

But it may take a while for announcements to catch on with local businesses.

Both the Hokie House and Manoca's Salon regularly advertise in Virginia Tech's student-run newspaper the Collegiate Times. But neither Blacksburg business has considered buying ads on Facebook.

Manoca Simpkins, owner of Manoca's Salon, said she's done some online advertising before but it didn't yield much response.

She said she'd rather stick to ads in print media, targeted to both students and community residents.

Hokie House manager Oliver Marques said he's never talked about advertising in Facebook, but wouldn't rule it out entirely.

The restaurant, which targets a predominantly student clientele, runs about three ads a week in the Collegiate Times, Marques said.

Facebook has come a long way since it was launched in February 2004.

"In a few months ... we transitioned from having a fun, cool little Web site to beginning to understand that we needed to have a financially stable organization and be set up for long-term success," Hughes said.

The company, now based in Palo Alto, Calif., has received significant boosts along the way.

In the fall of 2004, private investor Peter Thiel gave Facebook $500,000. And in the spring of 2005, venture capital firm Accell Partners added $12.2 million to company coffers.

This most recent investment allowed the company to grow from eight to 40 employees and buy the technological hardware to move to more schools faster.

More schools has meant more users and more users has meant more advertisers.

Advertisers "come to us because we have become the site or the conduit to reach the college audience," explained Hughes.

"It's one of the most trafficked Web sites on the Web, period, and it's the place where college students come together nationally right now."

That was the hook for STA Travel.

On Oct. 1, the company joined a rotation of ads that pop up when users log onto the welcome screen.

STA Travel Internet director Hunter Heaney called Facebook and STA a "natural fit."

"We're the largest student travel organization and it just seems to be the place getting the most traffic from students," Heaney said.

"With the Internet in general, you can spend a lot of money to put your name out in a lot of different places, but we try and target our specific audience."

Heaney said he is not yet sure how the ads will affect travel sales, but he already expects STA to increase its presence on the site and eventually offer special discounts there.

That way, when users log on, they'll get a personalized welcome -- and, maybe, a Spring Break special.