Facebook Marketing Discussion

[Digmen1]

Hi Guys

I like advertising on Facebook, as they have text ads with pics.

I notice that the last 10 posts at least are all negative posts knocking Facebook for its share price or its privacy etc etc.

There are a lot of luddites on here.

What matters is that Facebook is still growing.
And that lost of young people use it.

So we need to help each other get our ads on Facebook to be effective and cost effective.

Any suggestions ?

[Leosghost]

There are a lot of luddites on here.

Nope..a lot of realists..

What matters is that Facebook is still growing.

So facebook say..in the real world..fake accounts don'(t count as growth..

And that lost of young people use it.

Nope ..they have moved on.. now it's their parents and their grandparents and companies PR depts and spambots and fake accounts that use it

So we need to help each other get our ads on Facebook to be effective and cost effective.

You are flogging a dead horse..(did you buy shares ..you are very enamoured of them, against all the evidence ) the ROI is crap unless you are in "events" and a very few other niche markets..which is why the big companies are closing their ad accounts there or dialing their spends waaaay back..

They need to cut the cost of their ads by at least 80% and stop being tricky about who sees the ads..then maybe..ads to baby boomers..and your gran..
But the "young market" that was there, has upped and left..

[travelin cat]

We have had very poor success with Facebook ads. Visitors to FB get "ad blindness" and after a while they do not see the ads at all. There of course will be some people that have success with FB ads, we did not.

There are rumors that ads will start appearing in people's news feed, this will possibly create a better ROI, but it probably will also cause a lot of people to abandon FB.

[topr8]

>>What matters is that Facebook is still growing.
>>And that lost of young people use it.

i don't want to be negative about facebook, but i agree with Leosghost ...

of the real users: lots of them are underage - every small kid i know uses it; lots of bored young mums and unemployed people use it to post continually about their lives; etc. etc.

i think for some niches it is great - for mine it just hasn't worked out at all ... although i will admit that i've made 2 sales from people that somehow found my business page on facebook!

[Marshall]

Have to agree with Leosghost 100% and add that people are not on facebook to look at ads, they are there to share photos, life stories, and other information which, without facebook, people probably would never share - all the minutia in life that most people really do not care about.

I should also add that I did a survey with about 100 friends of mine from diverse backgrounds and interests who say they don't even notice the ads regardless what they are for. What does that tell you.

Marshall

[anallawalla]

The key words here are "niche" and "engagement". I consult to a global top 20 company and can say that the only consistently rewarding spend has been from specific campaigns using a third-party platform. For example, a current promotion gives people a chance to win a phone and it has over 60,000 likes. (I can't elaborate) This type of campaign has very little engagement because people will click "like" purely to win something.

The return from pure FB ads has been less useful and can be better treated as a branding exercise.

Entertainment venues with a local audience do very well with plenty of engagement and zero spend. The DJ can whip up the crowd and they can run a variety of tactics week after week. They would regard FB as a fantastic platform. :)

I'd say that the majority of advertisers would agree with Leosghost, but some of them could be guilty of being poor marketers (boring ads, wrong targets) and a few others would have found the platform fine for their needs.

[buckworks]

I've sung this song before, but for me as an advertiser, the single biggest thing I'd wish for would be the ability to cap how many times an individual user sees my ad in a given time period.

That would spread my ad spend around a lot better and reduce the problem of ad blindness.

[Leosghost]

I can't see that happening, I suspect that the only group that the "deciders" at facebook have greater disdain for than the advertisers on their platform, is their users..

[Digmen1]

Some great replies.
And some constructive ideas.
I have made a couple of sales from my Facebook books ads.
But they are just too dear to get a good ROI.

Some of you say people don't go on Facebook to watch the ads.
That is a silly statement.

I don't watch tv to see the Ads.
I don't read a newspaper to see the Ads
I don't listen to the radio to hear the ads.

But they still pay to put their ads on those mediums.

Lets hope that the fall in the share price at Facebook will make them realise that they need to help their advertisers more.

[engine]

Some of you say people don't go on Facebook to watch the ads.
That is a silly statement.

I don't think it's a silly statement at all. TC said "Visitors to FB get "ad blindness" and after a while they do not see the ads at all."
That is the point, and unless the ads are more intrusive they won't get more clicks.

A quick poll, and no cheating, please. Tell me what ads were on your FB page last time you checked?

I can't tell you and I had logged on an hour, or so, ago.

The ads are not clearly defined in amongst all the other clutter on the page, imho. In addition, unlike AdWords and AdSense, they are not targeted in the same way. If they are targeted at me, when I have noticed them, they are for products and services I have zero interest in. If advertisers are targeting me with those ads, they need to learn more about their audience.

I mentioned clutter earlier. There are so many apps on FB that want me to click on them to grow a farm, or to run a birthday app. I don't click on those as the privacy info made me ignore them. It's difficult to tell what's an ad and what's an app, imho. I don't click.

I don't go to FB to look for products and services. I do go to a search engine when looking for products and services.

Survey: Facebook Ads Don't Influence Most Users [webmasterworld.com]

they need to help their advertisers more.

That has been one of the gripes from agencies [webmasterworld.com] and major companies. If they can't get attention, how can the smaller advertiser get mindshare.
Big Brand GM withdraws 10mil in ad dollars [webmasterworld.com]
Pizza joint buys a Facebook ad and discover how well it works [webmasterworld.com]

Don't get me wrong, FB is marvelous resource for marketers with over 900 Million users. I beleive that when FB have worked out how best to get to the audience, as marketers, we'll all be better off.