The Ugly Truth About Facebook Advertising

According to one scientist, it’s better to say no to Facebook ads. Let’s say you pay $10 for a Facebook ad and you get 40 likes. That’s cool, right? That’s supposed to mean that your page engagement is going to go up. That’s supposed to mean that you’ll have 40 new customers, right? Not exactly.

Even if you go through “legitimate” means of advertising by using Facebook ads, you aren’t going to get better followers. Why not? Because according to Veritasium, an educational YouTube channel, “click-farms click the ads for free….they like pages other than the ones they’ve been paid for to seem more genuine.” Even though you aren’t paying for fake likes, you’re still getting fake likes.

It’s a tough pill to swallow, though, because there’s a lot of pressure from society to advertise on social media. If you skip it, you’re told you’re missing out on valuable engagement. And while you are missing out on some activity, its legitimacy is debatable. What’s the point of traffic if it’s not real? Exactly – there isn’t one.

So while you’re planning your marketing budget for 2015, you might take another look at the ad money you’re dedicating to Facebook. We’re not telling you what to do, but if you’re going to spend money, we want it to make an impact on your brand. A real one. One main issue is that online advertisements through social media sites like Facebook are largely automated. There aren’t any real people behind the scenes. According to one study, “more than half of online display-ad buys last year…were made using automated systems.” Why waste your time?

Advertising isn’t a one-click-fixes-all sort of thing, so instead of just checking the “advertise here” box, why not talk to someone who manages these sorts of campaigns? You’ll get more for your money and you’ll be able to advertise the right way.