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GM Says Facebook Ads Don't Work, Pulls $10 Million Account

forbes.com

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Re: GM Says Facebook Ads Don't Work, Pulls $10 Million Account

#11

Post by ticks »

jonknee wrote: post #3

> GM spends about $40 million a year on Facebook marketing, according to the Wall Street Journal, about $10 million of which is for paid advertisements. It will continue to post relevant content about the company and its brands on GM’s Facebook pages. The best marketing on Facebook doesn't make Facebook any money.

$30 million sounds like a lot for promoting a brand for free on one platform.

Re: GM Says Facebook Ads Don't Work, Pulls $10 Million Account

#13

Post by noodle »

ntkachov wrote: post #4

GM kindof has their work cut out for them on facebook. Most of facebook isn't looking for a new car (maybe a used one) and the facebook moms aren't exactly stoked for GM cars.

I think a better question is how GM measures the effectiveness of their campaigns on Facebook. Its not like you can track the conversion rate from ad click to car buy.

Re: GM Says Facebook Ads Don't Work, Pulls $10 Million Account

#17

Post by ssclafani »

ntkachov wrote: post #4

GM kindof has their work cut out for them on facebook. Most of facebook isn't looking for a new car (maybe a used one) and the facebook moms aren't exactly stoked for GM cars.

Your impression of Facebook's user base is about five years out of date. Facebook is closing in on having ~1,000,000,000 members. I would suspect millions of those members are looking for a new car right this second. Facebook needs to find better a way, like Google did, of matching those members with advertisers.

Re: GM Says Facebook Ads Don't Work, Pulls $10 Million Account

#18

Post by hkmurakami »

rio517 wrote: post #2

I don't think that's the case for everyone. I work at a online advertising firm in DC specializing in political and non-profit work - mostly email list building, soliciting volunteers, awareness, etc campaign activities. We work with AOL, Yahoo, Google and Facebook, among many others. I'm not a fan of FB's policies in general, but... We've found FB to be very effective - on a cost per acquisition basis, much more so…

Perhaps your firm has found Facebook effective because of its altruistic nature. People want to share great things that they are involved in: nonprofit work, political activism, etc. Advocacy for such issues and causes are something FB users probably want to share with their friends.

Meanwhile, I imagine that people don't really share things like "I really like the new model of the Cadillac XYZ!". Maybe they think that their friends will view it as shallow gloating; maybe you don't want to reveal the fact that you bought a new car.

Facebook revolves around "Sharing of information". Brands that have values that users want to share with their friends will do well. Those that can make users think twice about sharing (even if they really do like the brand) may fare worse.

Re: GM Says Facebook Ads Don't Work, Pulls $10 Million Account

#19

Post by brd »

noodle wrote: post #13
ntkachov wrote: post #4

GM kindof has their work cut out for them on facebook. Most of facebook isn't looking for a new car (maybe a used one) and the facebook moms aren't exactly stoked for GM cars.

I think a better question is how GM measures the effectiveness of their campaigns on Facebook. Its not like you can track the conversion rate from ad click to car buy.

I'd imagine that they're doing a form of A/B testing geographically. All other things equal, its easy enough to only do an ad campaign within a certain radius of a dealership and measure the change in that dealership to others in the state.
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