Should You Buy Facebook Ads, Focus on Your Facebook Business Page (Fan Page)? Or Get Smart and Do Both?
The Wall Street Journal ran an interesting article today on big brands and how much they’re spending on Facebook ads. They examined Ford’s “Doug” campaign and how their strategy shifted once the creative content (humorous videos) went viral.
The short story is that big business don’t need to spend much of their ad budgets on actual Facebook Ads. They do, however, use Facebook Ads to seed campaigns and get them started down the viral path.
The content on Ford’s Facebook business page is essentially free, and that destination becomes the main interactive channel once the campaign has gathered some steam. The ads merely get the ball rolling. The implications for Facebook are interesting, noted the article, because projections for their ad revenue and thus their valuation are in question. Companies that many assumed would spend handsomely on Facebook Ads are learning that they don’t need to. They can simply seed the campaign for a short time in the paid section over to the right of Facebook feeds, then turn off the ads when they’ve hit that critical mass. The users/Facebook community takes over and spreads their messages for free.
So what does this mean for small businesses and companies that don’t spend anywhere near the amounts that Ford dedicates to advertising and content production?
For starters, it’s interesting that Ford is so successful initiating campaigns via Facebook Ads. They work (period). We’ve seen it here at 3rd Street. It’s true. The targeting features are so much more interesting than AdWords.
Ford also integrates their off-line advertising with these online campaigns. They complement their Facebook Ads with TV, radio and print ads about “Doug.” It’s definitely a smart, instructive approach. You should be doing this, too.
There’s no reason why you can’t achieve the same results as Ford on a smaller scale, of course. If you follow their approach (seed campaign via FB ads => support with offline advertising (or not – you don’t have to do this, but it helps in certain consumer categories and even in trade publications) => develop compelling content to post on your Facebook business page => pull the plug on the advertising once you’ve hit a good target of “likes” and “shares” on Facebook (remember, Shares are more valuable than likes) => rinse/repeat.
Here are some other interesting tid-bits from that article:
“When Doug hit 10,000 fans, Ford stopped buying [Facebook Ads]. The company kept buying ads on other sites, Mr. Kelly said, but there was no reason to continue paying Facebook after Doug went viral.”
“Ford declined to give exact figures but said 49 online videos of Doug cost about the same to produce as three 30-second TV commercials.”
“..many of the largest advertisers say their [Facebook Ad] spending is small compared with other sites and make up a small fraction of their total ad budgets.”
“Ad executives say spending money on online content often is more important than buying ads.”
“Two people at Ford’s ad agency responded day and night to Facebook posts in the persona of Doug. In April, for example, a Facebook user named Laurie asked, “Is Doug single??” Two minutes later, Doug responded, “Is the sky blue, Laurie?”"
“The spokespuppet campaign is an example of “Likeonomics,” a term coined by Rohit Bhargava, a senior vice president with WPP agency Ogilvy, for the practice of brands using social media to create an affinity with customers who share the sentiment with friends.”
“Among Facebook’s recent successes: Sony Corp. is shifting 30% of its traditional ad budget into social sites, including Facebook, for its PlayStation console. Diageo, maker of Smirnoff and Guinness, committed in September to spending more than $10 million on Facebook ads.”
“In addition to using Facebook’s free tools, Ford said, the company was gradually increasing its ad spending on the site and recently closed its largest ad deal with Facebook. But because of the social nature of the site, Mr. Kelly said, “it doesn’t require Ford to spend large dollars on splashy ads to engage customers.”"
“Facebook, meanwhile, is “building our business for the long term,” said Mr. Fischer, turning down ads that compromise the user experience.”
Here’s the link to the original article: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204294504576613232804554362.html?mod=WSJ_hp_LEFTWhatsNewsCollection
What about you? Are you using integrated Facebook ad campaigns to support Facebook Fan/business page content?
Please let us know about your successes below.
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