Why GM slammed the brakes on its $10m Facebook ads
In the week that Facebook finally went public, General Motors has axed its paid-for advertising on Mark Zuckerberg's social network. GM said today that it was still going to have a Facebook page and everything, but it wasn't going to buy any more ads because they just aren't shifting enough cars. It reportedly spent $10m on the …
This topic is closed for new posts.
Re: GOOD FOR YOU GM
Hmm, where are many 'GM' vehicles made?
How much of the 'American' vehicles are merely assembled in the U.S.?
Like us, you'd be scuppered without the Japanese and Chines and Koreans
Re: GOOD FOR YOU GM
I'm so loving your work BIG DUMB GUY 555!
Make good interesting cars, then you won't need to spend $10M. When was the last time you saw a Porsche or Ferrari advert?
Last time I saw a Porsche or Ferrari ad?
I've seen a smattering of them in the States, usually magazines or the occasional billboard, but nothing on TV -- and not a one for Ferrari -- while ads for US and Japanese makes, of course, are all over the place, non-stop.
As opposed to Porsche, BMW advertising is like a rash all over US TV, print, billboards, you name it. I don't know what that says about BMW, other than that they're one of the "hip" cars for affluent Americans to drive -- but then, so is Porsche, and I have yet to spot a Porsche ad on TV over here.
Mind you, I'm sure things are entirely different in Europe and the UK.
Re: Last time I saw a Porsche or Ferrari ad?
When they did their ugly SUV thing they did a few TV spots. Or maybe I maybe I made that up.
"When was the last time you saw a Porsche or Ferrari advert?"
Don't know about Porsche but Ferrari have managed to get Sky to devote an entire channel to their adverts ... SkySports F1 - Ferrari's entire marketing activity is effectively their F1 team
Wrong way around
Ferrari don't race to promote their cars, they make cars to pay for their racing habit.
shocking
so Google are bad at social but good at advertising
and Facebook is bad at adverts but good at social
and this is a surprise to who?
Re: shocking
Perhaps it's not so clever on GM's part to have forked out $10Million: Most of my friends don't use Facebook, but their kids - aged between 10 and 20 do.
I just wonder how sensible it is to spend such a lot advertising to those who won't be buyers for some years yet...
Re: shocking
>and Facebook is bad at adverts but good at social
>and this is a surprise to who?
The folks plonking down $100B for FB, would be my guess ;-)
<title> Why </title>
I always mark all face book add as "sexually explicit" unless they are remotely sexually explicit then i mark em "uninteresting" !
i think you find 77.9% of GM business is with other nations other than the USA http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2009/06/04/business/04overseas.graf01.ready.html
Are you sure?
"Think about most banner ads: they have rich media and flash or video. These are all the things that would compel someone to want to click on an ad"
This is a joke, right? Those are the things I installed AdBlock and NoScript for.
Re: Are you sure?
Any company that runs Flash ads that jump out of the screen, obstructing the article i'm trying to read, get instantly added to my boycott list
"Rich" media? Hah, ha, that's rich!
"Think about most banner ads: they have rich media and flash or video. These are all the things that would compel someone to want to click on an ad"
This is a joke, right?
Totally agree; AdBlock, NoScript and FlashBlock, FTW.
Also, as long as I'm here, just a bit of translation:
"Think about most banner ads: they have rich media and Flash or video. These are all the things that would compel someone to knee a Web site in the groin and, while it's doubled-up in pain on the ground, kick it repeatedly in the teeth."
You're welcome.
Ghostery
and did you try ghostery ? It makes these following ads non-following, removes all unwanted traces, to combat this:
"Say you've visited an airline company to book a trip to San Francisco and then you don't book it because you're just thinking about it. But then as you go to other websites like the BBC or USA Today the ads for that airline company follow you around from site to site, it's like a puppy dog following you home," Kim explained.
I'm amazed how much tracking stuff is on all web pages (only 1 her: "DoubleClick")
Re: Are you sure?
That's what I thought, then I realized we're not the people who ever click on ads in the _first_ place. So what makes an ad even more annoying to us, is of absolutely no interest to an advertiser.
if a 'punch the monkey' ad gets clicked on twice as often by the kind of people who click on ads, but causes 53.6% more rage in an adblock user, which of those two statistics do you expect the advertiser to be more interested in?
I always wonder why they don't recast those as...
...Punch the Advertising Executive.
Surely they would get 10x the clicks!
Re: Are you sure?: re: rage
Rage, in an adblock+ user? Who are you trying to kid, we don't see such ads.
As a test, if you're an adblock+ user, randomly select one of your bookmarked sites...and open it without adblock+. I'd bet you don't recognize it.
Re: Are you sure?: re: rage
Aye did that on friends computer left me wonder if I had the right site.
Re: As a test, if you're an adblock+ user...
Just did that, because I've been using AdBlock+ for years, and I haven't looked at the Internet without it for quite some time. Your post made me think I'd have a look, so I checked out El Reg, Demonoid, Listverse, Mental Floss, W3Schools, YouTube and Facebook with it switched off and...
...Holy Mother of God...
...AdBlock+ is back on now, and will be staying that way for the foreseeable future.
D'oh icon because mfw I saw those sites with ads.
Re: Are you sure?
Initial blocking of Flash content should be standard build on all Web browsers
Re: "Rich" media? Hah, ha, that's rich!
While facebook and twitter are on my adblock filter (and at the home router 'ban list' as well) I suppose most of the people actually consider the ads part of the website they visit.
Re: Are you sure?: re: rage
Sigh. Read the context. This sub-thread was started by an adblock user who was bashing how annoying Flash/video ads are. My point is that, since we block them, advertisers don't care about that at all.
Larry Kim is wrong.
"Think about most banner ads: they have rich media and flash or video. These are all the things that would compel someone to want to click on an ad. use an ad blocker."
Fixed for you.
Re: Larry Kim is wrong.
If you're using an adblocker arguably you're not the target audience for web advertising, flash animated or otherwise.
Re: Larry Kim is wrong.
However, if you annoy visitors enough one of two things happens:
1) They go away and never come back.
2) They install an ad blocker and never see another web advert.
Both of these are failures for the advertiser, and the latter is more serious.
Option 2 is more likely on a site that the user finds compelling because they want it despite the annoyance, and becomes almost certain if it has a social element that allows users to talk to each other.
Somebody will discover ad blockers, and then everyone will get one.
Simplest explanation
...most GM cars are crap and unmarketable?
Re: Simplest explanation
"The Vauxhall Corsa: for people who don't know any better!"
Re: Simplest explanation
The Vauxhall Corsa: A badly dressed Fiat Grande Punto.
Re: Simplest explanation
The American car companies have upped their game in the last seven or so years. My wife would NEVER have considered an American marque but she likes the Cadillac CTS, loved the Potiac Solstice, has seriously considered a Ford when we talk about replacing a VW Golf, ... Besides, when all the components are made in China (and those components include Toyota's bad brakes and BMW's bad fuel lines) and Honda, Toyota, and Subaru have assembly plants in Indiana, ...
Re: Simplest explanation
"The Entire Vauxhall Range: for people who don't know any better!"
There, fixed it for you!
@Armando123 Re: Simplest explanation
Po[n]tiac Solstice..
Well, fancying a car that is no longer made by the self same GM doesn't say much about...something....
Re: Simplest explanation
I had no idea Vauxhall fanboys existed. I guess they don't know any better.
Re: @Armando123 Simplest explanation
Pontiac and Saturn, which had the same car under their badge, were axed when GM had to slash left and right in the wake of the financial crisis. They sold well enough and they got good reviews; the timing was bad.
Re: Simplest explanation
And even if they should produce something that isn't crap, so many of us 'Merkins are still so pissed at Government Motors over the government buyout we wouldn't buy one anyway.
When I were a lad . . .
. . . we used the Hosts file to block with.
With AdBlock I tend to strip back as much of the adserver URL as possible to save time later.
With Facebook and the current 'news feed' or the new 'here's something the bloke in the pub's brother's mate's dog looked at' there is the option to turn it off.
I am tempted to turn off AdBlock to see what ads are aimed at my minimalistic and totally bogus 'personal details'.
I like it that GM it to keep its free Facebook page - the big firms are learning from the punters.
Re: When I were a lad . . .
Turning off the adblocker can be a bit of an eye-opener as to how bad things have gotten. For years I never new there were adverts in between Youtube videos...
Re: When I were a lad . . .
There are? Have I missed any good ones? I've already seen the Bundaberg suitcases.
Re: When I were a lad . . .
I personally have a double edged strategy.
Facebook.com is blocked by my hosts file. There's nothing on there of value for me.
Flash Ads I kill with noscript.
I don't mind non-flash non-JS ads, they are OK.
Not quite on topic
but can anyone tell me why anyone thinks FB is worth a squillion dollars?
Re: Not quite on topic
Because all bubble companies are worth whatever money they can persuade the gullible to part with unitil the music stops
Re: Not quite on topic
"... can anyone tell me why anyone thinks FB is worth a squillion dollars?"
Yes: some people are frigging idiots.
EXACTLY. It's NOT, just Smoke & Mirrors.
Dirty American politicians continue to allow the Wall St. 1% of 1%ers like JPM that go caught betting and losing 2 Billion dollars to keep BETTING unsuspecting hardworking people's retirement and savings (mutual funds and 401k), and take the suckers on the street, the casual investors for a ride.
This is 1998 TGLO IPO redux. TheGlobe.com IPO Pop was reportedly a record increase, but crashed a couple of years later, and it was a far SUPERIOR site!
FB = Fools' Buy
Re: Not quite on topic
"... can anyone tell me why anyone thinks FB is worth a squillion dollars?"
Yes: some people are frigging idiots.
Uhhm, yeah... what he said. Apparently, there are still plenty of dumbasses with lots of money who weren't fleeced during the original Dot Bomb Era.
Re: Not quite on topic
May be something to do with the fact that they have 800 million active users.
(coat 'cause I'm not one of them.)
Re: Not quite on topic
aparrently it isnt. you see they dont have the cool code that sees i just cancelled a booking to fly to sf and then bombard me with ads for flights to sf..... you know, that place i DONT want to go to!
FFS
can you believe the bollocks these silicon cul-de-sac types spout
@SavageNation
"JPM that go caught betting and losing 2 Billion dollars to keep BETTING unsuspecting hardworking people's retirement and savings (mutual funds and 401k),"
Investing is betting, PERIOD. You risk your money in hopes that you will have more at the end.
Nice rant and all, but I'm pretty sure you don't really understand economics that well.
That said, YES Facebook is a fools buy, it's an inflated pop stock with no sustainable business model.
This topic is closed for new posts.
