Google and Facebook ad traffic is 90% useless • Hacker News Board

Re: Google and Facebook ad traffic is 90% useless

#101

Post by altitudinous » Mon, Jan 16, 2017, 1:00 AM UTC

Readers that come from your newsletter are already converted to you. Readers that come from an advertisement do not know who you are and are evaluating your website to see if they want to convert to you. It is reasonable to expect that only 10% of these people want to convert to you. The other 90% after scrolling down your website are not interested in converting to you. Your website did not contain the hook to make them convert. You should improve your website.

TL;DR The adverts performed 100% in bringing visitors to your website. That is their job. Your website is not converting them to real users 90% of the time. Your website failed.

Re: Google and Facebook ad traffic is 90% useless

#102

Post by wheaties » Mon, Jan 16, 2017, 1:06 AM UTC

jondubois wrote: post #76

abalashov wrote: post #23

I really thought I was crazy when I thought that a 99% bounce rate is unreal, even for my highly specialised product sites which cater to a very niche audience. But I ultimately came to a similar conclusion; no matter what ads I come up with, it's money down the drain, and I've never had a single conversion that came through the door that way. I've spent untold thousands on paid ads. I learned a great deal about whic…

I felt the same when I tried LinkedIn ads... It doesn't even compare to a poorly targeted Reddit post. I don't know if big companies get special treatment, but as a small startup, these ad networks just don't seem to work at all. Sometimes I feel that the reason why big companies advertise through Facebook/LinkedIn/Google is not to promote themselves, but rather, to bleed small competitors out of business by inflatin…

Big companies use more advanced features like adaptive audience segmentation or dynamic creatives to better target viewers. Hence they tend to bid on those who are statistically more relevant to them.

Re: Google and Facebook ad traffic is 90% useless

#103

Post by somid3 » Mon, Jan 16, 2017, 1:12 AM UTC

abalashov wrote: post #98

DougN7 wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Make sure you control which countries your ads can show in. 90% of my budget for high tech equipment was getting spent in Bangladesh. Pure fraud. Once you start clamping down a LOT, results can get better.

Indeed; I limited my impressions to the USA and a handful of developed nations, as well as a handful of middle income countries I know to be good markets for my product. Bangladesh didn't make the cut. :-)

Do you have a breakdown of % VPN IPs vs. not of your visitors?

Re: Google and Facebook ad traffic is 90% useless

#104

Post by somid3 » Mon, Jan 16, 2017, 1:14 AM UTC

oblib wrote: post #97

I haven't use google ads in years but I did study my logs and watched them in real time and came to the conclusion they were either hitting me with bots or foreigners getting paid to click their ads. It was blatant theft in my opinion.

Agreed.

Re: Google and Facebook ad traffic is 90% useless

#105

Post by somid3 » Mon, Jan 16, 2017, 1:17 AM UTC

soared wrote: post #36

OP is simply doing it wrong. Advertising works, and the title's claim only shows how inexperienced op is. I work at a digital ad agency. Ads work if you do it correctly, but it's incredibly easy to waste money. People like op are why google and Facebook make buying ads overly complicated - if it were easy you wouldn't have to spend so much money. If op is reading this, I'd be happy to hop on a phone call and help you…

Sure, can I can show you my data and make you believe otherwise, I really want to get to the bottom of this since others also believe it to be an issue.

Re: Google and Facebook ad traffic is 90% useless

#106

Post by somid3 » Mon, Jan 16, 2017, 1:18 AM UTC

soared wrote: post #36

OP is simply doing it wrong. Advertising works, and the title's claim only shows how inexperienced op is. I work at a digital ad agency. Ads work if you do it correctly, but it's incredibly easy to waste money. People like op are why google and Facebook make buying ads overly complicated - if it were easy you wouldn't have to spend so much money. If op is reading this, I'd be happy to hop on a phone call and help you…

can you email me at somid3 at gmail?

Re: Google and Facebook ad traffic is 90% useless

#107

Post by crablar » Mon, Jan 16, 2017, 1:34 AM UTC

This is due to the ad fraud bubble. We have covered it extensively on Software Engineering Daily: https://softwareengineeringdaily.com/?s=ad+fraud

Re: Google and Facebook ad traffic is 90% useless

#108

Post by pryelluw » Mon, Jan 16, 2017, 1:39 AM UTC

abalashov wrote: post #23

I really thought I was crazy when I thought that a 99% bounce rate is unreal, even for my highly specialised product sites which cater to a very niche audience. But I ultimately came to a similar conclusion; no matter what ads I come up with, it's money down the drain, and I've never had a single conversion that came through the door that way. I've spent untold thousands on paid ads. I learned a great deal about whic…

Inbound done well outperforms others. The thing is that it requires a bit more effort. You can really leverage organic and establish low cost funnels. Feel free to ping me if you have questions. No bs or strings.

Re: Google and Facebook ad traffic is 90% useless

#109

Post by lisivka » Mon, Jan 16, 2017, 1:40 AM UTC

dajohnson89 wrote: post #58

victorhooi wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What exactly is "dumb" amounts of money? If by dumb, you mean enough for authors to get by, then you are probably in the minority. People love talking about how much they hate ads, and how, no, they're not cheap, they would totally pay for content. Let's be honest - internet users are cheap. They want stuff for free. And if site A starts charging, they will jump ship to site B, until eventually it's a race to the bot…

Sure -- I agree that content producers need to make money, and ads (invasive/unethical or not) are a time proven way of achieving this end. Let's do a run down of my monthly online spend. Netflix: ~$9.99 Hulu premium: $11.99 HBO now (or is it HBO go?): ~$12.99 Sling TV: ~$50 Google play (includes YouTube red): ~$13 Amazon prime (also used for the Amazon TV shows): ~$9 Spotify: $10 A random Twitch show that I patroniz…

Add Kiva to your list. ;-)

Re: Google and Facebook ad traffic is 90% useless

#110

Post by dajohnson89 » Mon, Jan 16, 2017, 1:46 AM UTC

matwood wrote: post #86

dajohnson89 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure -- I agree that content producers need to make money, and ads (invasive/unethical or not) are a time proven way of achieving this end. Let's do a run down of my monthly online spend. Netflix: ~$9.99 Hulu premium: $11.99 HBO now (or is it HBO go?): ~$12.99 Sling TV: ~$50 Google play (includes YouTube red): ~$13 Amazon prime (also used for the Amazon TV shows): ~$9 Spotify: $10 A random Twitch show that I patroniz…

Interesting you use Spotify and Play. Spotify really seems redundant in your scenario.

I see why you might think that -- but Spotify's playlists and the discover weekly features overall are much better then Google play. Yet, as a project fi & G apps user, Google play has great download functionality.