socialmediocrity

Facebook appears to have launched an initiative to increase the engagement of its users in branded Fan pages.

Following the introduction of some Fan pages into the targeting available through the ad platform, this has the potential to improve, or at least increase, the available audiences to advertisers that want to target users based on keywords. However, a couple of examples show that the initiative is not limited to major brands.

Firstly, Axe, previosuly known as Lynx in the UK. The potential upside from the perspective of an advertiser is clear,a nd with over 40,000 “fans” it certainly offers a good opportunity to target users based on their personal hygiene interests.

Interestingly of the 40,000 fans the product has, one of them is already my friend.

As I mentioned though, it does not appear to be limited to large brands. Imagine my surprise, then, when the Fan page for Classic Studios, a business run by a friend of a friend popped up.

What’s interesting here is that, despite Classic Studios having just 9 fans in total, it seems that because one of those is a friend of mine, the chances of me seeing an ad for the Fan page is roughly equal.

Overall, the push will be interesting to see develop. Certainly at the moment there are some notable discrepancies in fan page interest, something that will doubtless be discussed in more detail another time. But for the time being this increases the value of building a Fan page on Facebook, on the grounds that what appears to be a free promotional initiative from Facebook will drive users.

Perhaps Facebook are bulding some stats to understand the metrics before they make it available as a paid-for ad placement, but for the time being at least, expect to see an apparent increase in Facebook Fan page activity. Or perhaps they are comparing the stats with the home page “engagement ” ads, to determine the relative response rates.

In what appears to be another recent change to the ad guidelines, it is now acceptable to advertise alcoholic beverages on Facebook.

Clause 12 refers

Ads for Alcoholic Beverages

• Adverts must all be targeted to people 21 years old or older in the US, 19 years old or older in Canada, 18 years old or older in the UK, and 21 years old or older everywhere else. All Facebook Pages viewer restrictions must be set at 21+ regardless of the country they are in or targeted to. In the case where a user’s age cannot be determined, the advert cannot be displayed to the user in question.
• It is recommended that the ad creative contain text that promotes drinking responsibility. Acceptable examples include “Drink Responsibly” and “Drink Smart.”
• No ad should include content that might appeal to (or mislead) minors by implying that the consumption of alcoholic beverages is fashionable or the accepted course of behavior for those who are underage.
• No ad creative promoting alcoholic beverages should include any person under the age of 21 or be suggestive of the presence of minors.
• Adverts may not portray or promote intoxication. Adverts should not induce people to consume alcohol in excess, make references to the intoxicating effects of alcohol, depict activities that encourage excessive consumption or that encourage drinking at a rapid rate, or suggest the strength of the alcoholic beverage being advertised.
• Adverts may not promote any giveaways as a reward for purchasing the alcoholic product.

Although they make some attempt to retain some degree of decency, they don’t really go any further than the law in the retrospective territories.

So the breaking news is, it’s OK to sell alcohol to adults, according to Zuckerberg.

Another means of attracting advertising dollars in a time of economic crisis. How much longer do we think the stance against tobacco products, adult material, and firearms will hold out?

If you take the time to read Facebook’s ad guidelines you could be forgiven for thinking that they were being overly-protective of their users. In amongst the normal “nothing illegal” clauses, there are a number of more interesting, and perhaps intriguing clauses, that perhaps say more about the founders ideals than any long-term stand against good old fashioned good fun.

Clause 9 gives us a list of stuff we shouldn’t do:

We do not accept advertising referencing, facilitating or prompting the following:

• Tobacco products
• Ammunition, firearms, paintball guns, bb guns, or weapons of any kind
• Gambling, including without limitation any online casino, sports books, bingo, or poker
• Ringtones
• Software downloads, freeware, or shareware
• Scams, illegal activity and/or illegal contests, pyramid schemes, or chain letters
• Uncertified pharmaceutical products
• Adult friend finders or dating sites with a sexual emphasis
• Adult toys, videos, or other adult products
• Web cams or surveillance equipment
• Web-based non-accredited colleges that offer degrees
• Inflammatory religious content
• Politically religious agendas and/or any known associations with hate, criminal and/or terrorist activities
• Political content that exploits political agendas or uses “hot button” political issues for commercial use regardless of whether the advertiser has a political agenda
• Hate speech, whether directed at an individual or a group, and whether based upon the race, sex, creed, national origin, religious affiliation, marital status, sexual orientation or language of such individual or group
• Content that advocates against any organization, person, or group of people, with the exception of candidates running for public office
• Content that depicts a health condition in a derogatory or inflammatory way or misrepresents a health condition in any way
• “Get rich quick” and other money making opportunities that offer compensation for little or no investment, including money making schemes positioned as alternatives to part-time or full-time employment

I find the third bullet the most interesting, as the more time I spend on Facebook, the mire it appears as though it is jointly sponsored by Sky and Betfair – Betfair Casino, Betfair TaiKai, Betfair Sports betting. You name it, Betfair are advertising it. I guess they didn;t read as far as bullet 3 when they accepted the ads.

As fors software downloads, although they are treated in a separate and expanded section within the guidelines, this too is somewhat overlooked. I know for a fact of at least one advertiser whose service requires you to download their client, and yet they seem to have had their ads accepted. And does this exclude the likes of Skype, who currently require you to download software? Presumably Firefox couldn’t promote themselves if they wanted to, and all those ads for microsoft and MSN. Do their sites really not have software downloads on them?

It would be great if the guidlines and rules were so simple as to write them down in a few bullet points, but it seems as though they are verging on the uncompetitive if some online casinos are more equal than others, which appears to be the case right now.

Through extensive use of the Facebook ad platform, and no small amount of chance, I stumbled upon (not literally) the fact that Facebook have slipped another targeting feature in to their ad platform.

The public platform is suggesting that we you now target users by their job description. Which of course could be something of a boon to B2B advertisers, and a distinct advantage to recruitment advertisers of course. The phrases have begun appearing in the keywords

I’m not sure it will be enough to reverse the CPM decline the ad proliferation has caused, and especially not in this climate, but definitely a positive move. And like dynamite, it can benefit users and advertisers and Facebook alike, as long as it is used responsibly. Facebook themselves will need to maintain their vigilance, and avoid any temptations to allow it to be exploited harmfully.

And of course it is not only B2B advertisers that stand to gain. It is probably the greatest indicator of an individuals income level too, which makes the targeted groups all the more interesting to more niche and high-end advertisers.

The platform will begin to get very interesting when Facebook begin to separate some of these targeting variables, and we can begin to genuinely micro-target users based on multiple interests, job titles, and fan page affiliation.

So I noticed this morning that a third ad placement has appeared, as if by magic, on the right hand side of Facebook pages.

This is odd for two reasons.

Firstly, I wasn’t aware they were selling out anyway, so I don’t entirely understand the push to generate more ad positions just yet. If anything this will put more over-supply into the Facebook ad inventory micro-climate, and push CPMs down even lower than they are at the moment (if you use the public platform that is). So it doesn’t necessarily offer any good news for Facebook themselves.

Secondly, it is of course bad news for advertisers – which can only mean dowward pressure on…..you guessed it…..CPMs. Why is it bad news for advertisers? Of course one argument would be that cheaper ad space should be good news but now that, for want of a better phrase, each advertisers’ “share of voice” on the page is reduced then we can expect response rates to drop. Heck, for most advertisers, and especially those that aren’t micro-targeting, they’re pretty low already.

So the barrel seems firmly aimed at the toes on this one – hopefully they’re still trying to decide whether to pull the trigger just yet. I would expect them to wait until demand is sufficiently high, but perhaps the need for revenue, or at least the need to be seen to be maximising revenue, is greater.