Comments on: Dear Facebook- Please Attempt to be Tasteful

By: colon

colon — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 22:37:28 +0000

I’ve seen a lot of junk ads on face book lately too. A lot of those scam diet offers mostly. Not sure if FaceBook is trying to tell me I’m too fat or something.

By: krissy knox

krissy knox — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 09:20:14 +0000

How disgusting.

Krissy :)
my main blog: Sometimes I Think
Follow me on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/iamkrissy

By: Laura Bergells

Laura Bergells — Fri, 26 Dec 2008 19:05:27 +0000

Since an actual human being reviews FB ads before they go live, adding “tasteful” to the list of requirements is simple. It’s also courteous and more socially acceptable — important criterion for a social media site that wants to maintain an aura of respectability.

By: Ria Sharon

Ria Sharon — Thu, 25 Dec 2008 06:17:39 +0000

And I was upset because I was getting every celebrity diet ad! What is Facebook trying to tell me, Chris?! :)

By: Misty Lackie

Misty Lackie — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 20:27:43 +0000

I have seen some pretty bad ads on FB too and this example is right up there in the “bad” category. Larger companies with solid products/services will think twice about advertising on FB because they won’t want to be associated with this type of stuff.

By: Cynthia

Cynthia — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 16:29:40 +0000

Sadly, it's up to the person paying for the ad to be on FB to decide who they target. For example, my Prospere Magazine ads target pretty much ALL WOMEN in their 20s and 30s who have a university education. This means that Jane Facebook User, age 29 and a graduate of Big City U will likely have seen my ad at one point. Maybe someone needs to create some sort of app which can be used to turn off certain ads...

By: MzPritteful

MzPritteful — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 15:30:20 +0000

Sadly, that is how all marketing works. It is a targeted ad that is placed somewhere where it may or may not get seen, have some sort of effect on someone, or even offend someone. In my eyes, online banners of this sort are pretty old school anyway. No one really looks at them, clicks on them, etc. They are just a waste of money basically.

You can’t get upset about banners on your page or even when Facebook looks at your information. If you look at it from Facebooks side of things, they believe they are helping the situation I’m sure by attaching ads to your interests because you are more likely not to get ads that do not apply to you or aren’t to your liking. Their system is not fool proof yet being that it is a new thing they are doing.

I guess you just have to either not advertise there until they work out their kinks or, if their banners are really bothering you either delete your profile or ignore them. Talking about them and not looking at things from all angles is like beating a dead horse. Nothing in advertising is perfect and innocent and if you are in marketing/advertising you should have figured that out by now.

By: Rich Glass

Rich Glass — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 13:39:25 +0000

This is a big problem when it comes to convincing a client to use FB as a marketing tool. I am also wondering how many users actually pay attention to the ads in FB, as you can see in this thread there are a few that don’t. Time to look for a Case Study.

By: Bill Cammack

Bill Cammack — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 10:04:09 +0000

That’s pretty foul. I agree with CC. Facebook incorrectly riffed off of something on your page. Facebook’s nosey like that with their “targeted advertising”.

I did a post about overweight women and posted the link to my blog on my Facebook page. All of a sudden, they started sending me ads for dating sites that cater specifically to the overweight female fetish.

I guess it’s the same way that google ads try to figure out what your page is about and serve text and images that are in-line with the content on your page, but that’s out of hand. They need to start putting ratings on those ads so you can choose which ones you’re willing to accept. You don’t need your kids looking at your Facebook page and seeing EITHER of those. :/

By: MzPritteful

MzPritteful — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 05:48:13 +0000

I have a bit of a different view on all of this. I love Facebook and I have been a member since it’s start. They used to not have any ads at all, but they have to make money right? Their advertising platform is actually quite ingenious on their end. My company does market on the site quite often for our clients. They do a few things that make them much better then your average site with banners. #1 is that they allow you to choose the demographic that you would like to market to and #2 is that they charge you per click and not per view and this can constantly be re-evaluated. Ads on Facebook are placed using a bidding system. So, if I want to advertise to people in their 40s in Chicago it will show me how many people are in that category. From there I am asked how much I am willing to pay per click and how much I want to spend total. Now if someone else is trying to put out ads to the same group and has placed a hirer bid than I have their ads will be first priority. Unfortunately this is good and bad. While mostly good…you happen to be seeing the bad end. My guess is because there aren’t as many people using Facebook that are your age demographic yet (although that is quickly changing) and so what happens is that people aren’t bothering to advertise things here that would be more to your liking. So these tasteless ads that are probably bidding $.01 per click are getting priority on your page. My advice is to stick it out. Facebook is one of the best social media platforms out there in my eyes and they will only continue to grow. They are already ten steps ahead of any other social marketing site out there and twenty steps ahead with how they handle this type of media. But, like I said…for your demographic it might not be there yet.