Ad HustlerConfessions Of A Serial Internet Entrepreneur

So…I was browsing Facebook one fine day and saw a post by an industry friend, Stephanie Lichtenstein, talking about the great results she was getting in generating real “Facebook Likes” for her clients with small budgets.  Quite frankly, I found some of what she was saying hard to believe, so I challenged her a little bit.  She didn’t back down and after I asked her to do a case study she easily obliged.  I have to respect that and this is an interesting case study on how she generates likes for her clients.  Her company is MicroMediaMarketing.

After you watch the video, please share your thoughts or any other tips you have.

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I opened up my email this morning and found a very interesting email from Facebook.  At first I thought it was a phishing email but it looked legit to me after taking a look at it.

So this is pretty interesting.  Facebook is willing to give me a $500 Facebook Ads credit on one of my accounts if I change the phone number on my Facebook Page to a call tracking number that they provide.

This test apparently has nothing to do with the Facebook Ads platform because they aren’t asking you to send any Facebook Ads traffic to your Facebook Page in order to qualify.  They just want to know how many phone calls are being derived off of Facebook Business Pages.  So what’s Facebook up to here?  Some Ideas I Have:

• They just want market research and it’s worth it to give away a $500 coupon which essentially costs Facebook nothing in order to get a glimpse inside whether Facebook is making a businesses phone ring or not.
• They want to test if what businesses are doing on their pages has any effect on making the phones ring.  For instance does a business who updates daily get more calls then one who updates monthly?  Does the amount of fans have an effect on the quantity of calls that a business receives?
• They are considering a pay-per-call program where if you want phone calls from Facebook you have to pay for them…
• They are considering charging a fee for Facebook Business Pages (or upgrades to pages) and want this data to justify it.

Facebook’s IPO is around the corner and they want a piece of the local online advertising pie.  Is this the ticket to the data they need?

Why do you think Facebook is offering this?

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It seems like people always like to jump on the bandwagon of hating someone.  Sometimes it’s gurus, sometimes it’s bloggers and sometimes it’s “social media experts.”  I seem to constantly see people bashing “social media experts” on Facebook.  I’ve seen blog posts how you should NEVER hire a “social media expert.”  I get it.  I understand why people in the internet marketing field hate “social media experts.”  After all, how hard is it to write a blog post, setup a wordpress blog, update a Facebook page or Tweet?  It’s not very hard for a seasoned internet marketing vet which makes it look like “social media experts” are just scraping the bottom of the barrel and taking advantage of people.

Step back for a second and look at social media from an outsiders perspective.  Imagine your the V/P of Marketing at a local bank, you keep hearing about how everyone is on Facebook & Twitter.  You want a piece of the action but don’t know where to start.  You don’t know how to effectively manage a Facebook page and quite frankly, you don’t have time for it.  You’re not going to assign the task to some random teller you have working at the bank and you don’t want to do it yourself so you’re stuck between a rock & a hard place.  You have 2 options.  You either risk having some menial employee screw up your bank’s reputation with something stupid they say on social media or you hire a “social media expert.”

Yea, most “social media experts” have never sold a damn thing in their lives.  Some can barely write an intelligent sentence.  Just because there are crappy players in the field doesn’t mean that all “social media experts” are bad.  Not everyone mows their own lawn, not everyone does their own book keeping, not everyone cleans their own office.  They use outside companies to do these tasks even though they aren’t particularly hard.  In business, time is money and sometimes it’s better to pay someone else to do your dirty work because it’s more efficient and requires less involvement.

I can’t say every company needs a “social media expert” or “social media agency,” but some do.  Some companies don’t even know where to start.  Some companies need guidance.  Some companies just don’t have the manpower.  Every situation is different so give the “social media experts” a break because there is a place for every type of service if it fills a need.

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I got a question via emai from a reader today and figured i’d answer it publicly

First off, you have an awesome blog and your Local Online Advertising related articles are really helpful. Your post are inspiring and by doing some testing I have run into a weird situation.  Perhaps you could provide me with a hint or two.

On Facebook, if I bid on a CPC basis, I get a CTR of 0.089 to 0.1. Now, for the same add, if I bid on a CPM basis get plenty of impressions but my CTR is suddenly at 0.010%  to 0.012%.

I have tested it with different add variations, and if I found a winning add combination, stopped it and created a new add based on a CPM model my CTR is suddenly down.

have you noticed similar patterns? Have you found a solution, or perhaps have any tip?

By the way, if you want to try or test anything on the German market, I can help with any translation.

It’s a very legitimate question for a new Facebook Ads advertiser to ask.  In the past, this wasn’t the case.  If you converted a CPC ad to a CPM ad the click through rate would be pretty similar.  In fact a lot of affiliates were doing this to get cheaper ads by bidding CPM.  Around a year ago, Facebook made a change to their advertising system which rewarded CPC advertisers with more clicks and CPM advertisers with more impressions.  I guess their logic was that CPC advertisers wanted only clicks and CPM advertisers wanted only impressions (which we all know isn’t true).  The way they seem to accomplish this is by running CPM advertisers in lower quality positions.  Here is the letter Facebook sent out around that time.

Upcoming system change:

As you know, we continuously work to make our ads system more accurate in order to further improve the effectiveness of your advertising campaigns. Among other ongoing improvements, we are refining our ads delivery system to better reflect the goals of our advertisers. This change will take place over the next few weeks and, assuming current bids remain unchanged, will mean that:

CPC advertisers (advertisers who have chosen to bid “cost-per-click”) may receive more clicks.
CPM advertisers (advertisers who have chosen to bid “cost per thousand impressions”) will continue to receive impressions but may receive less clicks.

Do I need to do anything?

As a CPM advertiser, you are indicating to our system that it’s more important that your ad is seen by your audience rather than clicked i.e. you have chosen to pay for impressions, not clicks. If your main objective is to increase awareness of your business with an ad impression, there is no need for action. However, if your most important objective is to drive clicks on your ads, you should change your bids from CPM to CPC.

I hope that answered your question.

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I was reading a Wickedfire thread which referenced an AllFacebook post which alerted me to something that Facebook is up to.  Apparently Facebook is testing ads targeted at status updates.  Facebook has a lot of data on their users so power to them for using it to help their ad system.  See the AllFacebook post for a screenshot of a possible implementation of this new targeting system.

Honestly, if that is how they are going to implement an ad targeting system based on status updates I don’t understand what they are trying to do.  The whole system makes no sense to me in this context.  This got me thinking…..Rather then just criticizing someone elses implementation, how would I implement a status update ad targeting system that would be effective for advertisers?

If I Were The Boss At Facebook Ads……

I’ve come up with 2 possible solutions that could essentially revolutionize online advertising. (Hey Facebook: Show me some love if you take my ideas)

My thought process: The reason why search engine marketing is so darn effective is because there is intent behind a search, and advertisers can cater their ads to that intent. The ads on search engines fulfill a need.  They are the answer to a question.

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Status Update Targeted Ad Implementation I

Let’s say a Facebook user made the following status update:

“User Name I feel like crap today and i’ve felt like crap for a month. I wish I had health insurance so I could finally see a doctor.”

Then if Facebook would allow you to target on the following criteria:

Status Keyword: health insurance
Status Time: today (other options being “yesterday,this week,this month,ever”
Location: Within 15 miles of Asbury Park, NJ

You could craft an ad with text like:

Need A Doctor?
No insurance required. Our office only charges $49 for a non insured patient checkup.

This would make Facebook almost as effective as search engine marketing because you could target intent rather then just interests.

This implementation isn’t always going to be perfect.  For instance if someone wrote as a status update “Thank goodness for health insurance” the ad would make no sense in that context.  However, this does move Facebook Ads closer towards having the ability to target based on intent.

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Status Update Targeted Ad Implementation II

My second idea would be wayyyyyy more effective but risk annoying Facebook users.  It goes like this:

An advertiser decides they want to run a Status Targeted Ad.  They select their demos:

Status Keyword: health insurance
Status Time: today (other options being “yesterday,this week,this month,ever”
Location: Within 15 miles of Asbury Park, NJ

The advertiser is presented with a list of status updates that match their criteria but Facebook removes any identifying information about the user.  For instance:

1) I feel like crap today and i’ve felt like crap for a month. I wish I had health insurance so I could finally see a doctor.
2) Thank goodness for health insurance
3) Does anyone know what a red rash with a purple triangle in the center if it on your ass signifies?  I lost my health insurance when I lost my job so I can’t get it checked out.

In this example #1 & #3 would be extremely relevant to a doctor that could offer a $49 office visit without the need for insurance.

My proposal here is to allow the advertiser to JOIN THE CONVERSATION and have the “ad” be a reply to that users Facebook status.

Example:

Facebook User: I feel like crap today and i’ve felt like crap for a month. I wish I had health insurance so I could finally see a doctor.
Advertiser Reply: My name is Dr. Smith and we examine uninsured patients for only $49.  Give my office a call at 555-5465 for more info.  Feel Better!

And for this type of advertising Facebook could invent a whole new pricing model.  Not per click, or per thousand impressions: PER REPLY!

This would increase Facebook’s bottom line because they could implement this alongside their current CPC & CPM ads.  They could charge a flat rate across the board per reply ($1-10 for instance) or could even build in some type of bidding system.

They would also obviously have to cap each user to receiving one “sponsored reply” per day to limit the annoyance of this ad system.

If the ads were targeted and legitimate the responses could actually HELP the facebook user into making a decision or finding the answer to a problem.

Personally I think this idea is genius.

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That was my contribution to the world of online advertising.

What do you think of my ideas?  Do you have a better one?  If so please share in the comments!

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