… let’s think about Facebook advertising.

In this use case scenario … you are responsible for evaluating if Facebook advertising is a good option for ACME Corporation.

Facebook and Google are the undisputed duopolies of digital advertising. As a result, most marketers think they have to advertise on one or both of those channels to compete.

But unlike Google Ads, I’m not sure if Facebook ads are worth an investment, simply because everybody else is doing it.

Consider this … Facebook earns tens of billions of dollars in advertising revenue every year. But, does Facebook generate tens of billions of dollars in return on advertising spend (ROAS) each year?

I’m not so sure. No one really knows. And Facebook is not going to tell us.

Let’s face it, … Facebook advertising, and Facebook marketing, is not what it used to be 5 years ago.

Back then, if you posted content to your newsfeed, there was a good chance that at least 10% of your followers/fans would see your post, organically.

But today, you’re lucky if 1% of your followers/fans see your newsfeed post.

Why?!

Because Facebook wants you to pay them money to boost your organic content. And in my judgment, there is something fundamentally untrustworthy about this.

Do I have your attention, ?

Good … let’s keep thinking about it.

Businesses work hard to earn their organic followers/fans and build brand loyalty on Facebook. And in most cases, they’ve invested a lot of time and money into building their Facebook business page and organic audience.

Also, based on previous Facebook advertising experience … there are legitimate concerns about Facebook analytics … they seem like vanity metrics.

As you know, … Facebook reach affects every other trackable Facebook metric:

• engagement
• likes
• comments
• clicks
• conversions
• etc …

All Facebook metrics boil down to reach.

But think about it … can we truly qualify how many people our Facebook ads reach?

No. We can’t.

Marketers, like you and me, have to cross our fingers (🤞) and trust Facebook metrics. But I’m not so sure if we should trust them these days.

Here’s another reason … advertisers can not call Facebook for advertising support. To me, this is very bizarre … and it’s definitely not customer-centric.

It’s like Facebook is not willing to stand behind their advertising products and answer hard questions from their advertisers.

Call me a skeptic, … but when a company has over 40,000 employees and is worth hundreds of billions of dollars … it seems like a support department with a call center should be standard operations. After all, much smaller companies offer this basic level of customer support and empathy.

Not to belabor the point … but you’ve probably seen dozen of consultants run ads on Facebook representing themselves as Facebook ads “experts”. But I’ve heard many stories of people being overcharged and scammed by some of these “experts”.

… as the CMO, these are legitimate concerns and questions you’ll need to evaluate. Your job is to make smart marketing decisions and produce results. That’s all that matters.

Let’s keep thinking about Facebook advertising and cover a few more topics.

Fake and Inactive Facebook Accounts

According to this article published on CNN Business, Facebook shut down 5.4 billion fake accounts in 2019. And they shut down 3.3 billion fake accounts in 2018. The article goes on to report as much as 5% of new monthly accounts on Facebook are fake.

According to Statista, Facebook has 2.4 billion worldwide monthly active users (180 million are in the United States).

These numbers are obviously HUGE. But they present even more cause for concern from an advertising perspective.

Albeit, half of the United States are still monthly active Facebook users … there was a staggering amount of fake accounts removed from Facebook over the past couple of years. And these fake accounts were responsible for an astonishing amount of fake news and content.

So, … I say all this to say … do consumers still trust Facebook as an advertising platform?

This is a VERY important and legitimate question to ask.

Because consumer trust is everything in advertising.

Based on my observation, the Facebook ads that I see in my newsfeed don’t get nearly the engagement (likes, comments, & shares) than Facebook ads from yesteryear.

What’s more, when people comment on Facebook ads these days, their comments seem very skeptical.

I remember when banner ads first became mainstream on the web. Everybody noticed banner ads and the click-through rates were through the roof.

But a few years later, something strange happened … banner ad click-through rates to a sharp nosedive.

And usability experts learned why … because of a phenomenon known as banner blindness.

Banner blindness is a long-known user behavior fact that describes people’s tendency to ignore page elements that they perceive (correctly or incorrectly) to be advertisements.

Marketing leaders like you need to think about things like fake accounts, fake content, banner blindness, and consumer trust on Facebook. Because Facebook ad rates are steadily increasing.

We have to ask ourselves if Facebook advertising is worth it in 2020. Or, are we investing our marketing dollars in a black hole?

Facebook Content & Campaign Creation

… content and campaign creation is another important consideration.

We’ve both seen some fly-by-night Facebook ads that were … let’s be real … horrible.

It’s almost as if someone said, “let’s advertise on Facebook” … and two hours later, they were running ads.

The thing about Facebook advertising, and any advertising campaign for that matter, is that it can not be ad hoc if you expect it to be successful.

Advertising campaigns require a thoughtful strategy. And they require the creation of strategic and professional campaign materials such as ad copy, custom graphics, landing pages, and sales funnels.

If you listen to Facebook advertising “experts”, they all preach the same thing … “targeting”. It’s all about how you target your Facebook ads.

That’s only partially true. They say that because that’s what they are good at … and it’s quick and easy for them to make money off of you by showing you a few targeting tricks.

But in my judgment, the creative materials that support any advertising campaign are the fundamental ingredients to a successful campaign. It’s been that way since the advertising was invented in the early 1990s.

… I say all this to make you think … don’t do ad hoc Facebook advertising. You’re only going to waste your valuable marketing dollars.

If you are serious about Facebook advertising, take your time, and invest in strategic and professional ad copy, custom graphics, landing pages, and sales funnels.

For the love of your money … don’t be that guy or gal that jumps in without a strategic plan.

How to Get Started:

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