I’m convinced: Advertising on Facebook is useless.
Part of the attraction, supposedly, for advertising on Facebook is that they know so much about all their users – through various, sometimes ethically-questionable means – that your advertising will be precisely targeted to precisely those people it will be most likely to interest. If that were really the case I can see why an advertiser would go for it: There’s no wasted money/effort directed at people uninterested in, or actually hostile to, your product or service. If that’s how it worked it would be great. But it doesn’t work.
I know this because of what I see in Facebook’s “targeted” ads to me.
There are, to be frank, some things in this world that truly offend me. I won’t into details because they’re quite beside the point and because there are few things as annoying as a person who tells you what offends them. What offends me is none of your business. But please remember that what offends you is none of my business, so please don’t tell me about it. Deal? OK.
None the less, there are some specific things I find really offensive. You’re the same way, I’m sure, we just have different things that offend us but that’s what makes the world an interesting place. The trouble is that I get Facebook advertisements for these things that thoroughly offend me. So I click on the little “X” in the ad’s upper right-hand corner to make it go away and select “Offensive” when the list of reasons pops up. All well and good? Well, in a word, no. Because, after a couple of years of this I’m still getting Facebook ads for the same material. In fact today (and this is what triggered this little rant) I got an ad from a specific advertiser for whom I have indicated “Hide all ads from xxxxx because it’s offensive” in the past.
This is obviously annoying for an end user like myself, but it’s no big surprise. We all know how Facebook feels about its end users. But what’s astonishing is that they’re willing to rip off paying advertisers this way. If you’re an advertiser paying Facebook for “targeted advertising” you are simply not getting what you’re paying for. Facebook is delivering your ads even to people who are openly hostile to you and/or your business! Is “openly hostile” an overstatement? Perhaps. At first. But I can assure you that after a few “Hide this advertiser” clicks that are simply ignored, you will find it to be less of an exaggeration every day.
So again I ask: Why would anyone advertise on Facebook?
Why Would Anyone Advertise on Facebook?
I’m convinced: Advertising on Facebook is useless.
Part of the attraction, supposedly, for advertising on Facebook is that they know so much about all their users – through various, sometimes ethically-questionable means – that your advertising will be precisely targeted to precisely those people it will be most likely to interest. If that were really the case I can see why an advertiser would go for it: There’s no wasted money/effort directed at people uninterested in, or actually hostile to, your product or service. If that’s how it worked it would be great. But it doesn’t work.
I know this because of what I see in Facebook’s “targeted” ads to me.
There are, to be frank, some things in this world that truly offend me. I won’t into details because they’re quite beside the point and because there are few things as annoying as a person who tells you what offends them. What offends me is none of your business. But please remember that what offends you is none of my business, so please don’t tell me about it. Deal? OK.
None the less, there are some specific things I find really offensive. You’re the same way, I’m sure, we just have different things that offend us but that’s what makes the world an interesting place. The trouble is that I get Facebook advertisements for these things that thoroughly offend me. So I click on the little “X” in the ad’s upper right-hand corner to make it go away and select “Offensive” when the list of reasons pops up. All well and good? Well, in a word, no. Because, after a couple of years of this I’m still getting Facebook ads for the same material. In fact today (and this is what triggered this little rant) I got an ad from a specific advertiser for whom I have indicated “Hide all ads from xxxxx because it’s offensive” in the past.
This is obviously annoying for an end user like myself, but it’s no big surprise. We all know how Facebook feels about its end users. But what’s astonishing is that they’re willing to rip off paying advertisers this way. If you’re an advertiser paying Facebook for “targeted advertising” you are simply not getting what you’re paying for. Facebook is delivering your ads even to people who are openly hostile to you and/or your business! Is “openly hostile” an overstatement? Perhaps. At first. But I can assure you that after a few “Hide this advertiser” clicks that are simply ignored, you will find it to be less of an exaggeration every day.
So again I ask: Why would anyone advertise on Facebook?