affiliate marketers get the One Two from facebook
(there is a little intentional changing of small facts below to protect details of various businesses mentioned to protect those companies including my own)
Over the past two weeks facebook has made some changes to the way it is handling affiliate marketers. This is another wave in a series of changes over the past year where facebook has altered what ads are acceptable to be run on facebook.
I have been getting a steady stream of e-mails and phone calls from some of the biggest players in the industry asking me what is going on.
None of what I am saying is coming from inside of facebook, but instead what I have seen happening to my own campaigns, and from the campaigns of other big shot affiliate marketers.
The phone call or e-mail usually goes like this.
Super Affiliate: “Hey, How’s it going?”
Me: “Good! How are you?”
Super Affiliate: “So,….ah…have you noticed anything different about facebook ads lately?”
Me: “Yeh, I had some of my campaigns turned off”
Super Affiliate: (Now relieved that they were not the only one, now speaking in a stronger voice),
“Yeh! We were spending $xxxxx dollars a day on (dating/games/or education offers) and our ads just got turned off and retroactively disapproved.”
This has not been an uncommon conversation over the past few weeks.
facebook has been improving the quality of its ads over the past year. Many affiliate marketers I know, will run anything they can make money off of that doesn’t put them in jail. (an exaggeration, but not by much). facebook on the other hand is trying to protect its users from illegal and unethical behavior of it’s advertisers.
In my opinion, and only in my opinion, I think that affiliate marketers have as a group simply pushed the edge too far, and facebook is being a bit “cautious” or maybe “suspicious”, or “protective” against any affiliate offers that are being run.
Some people I know, who I believe have been spending way over the cost of a new Porsche EACH DAY on facebook ads, have had ads removed that appear to be both legal and ethical in my opinion.
This is a strong move by facebook, as this is real cash in a very significant volume that facebook is saying no to.
Here is a personal example of an ad I tried to run in another country to test what is going on.
I actually tried to run a few different versions of the ad to be as compliant with the policies as possible.
The original ad was not in English, but below is the Google Translation into English.
The Title of the Ad was:
Online Dating
The image in the Ad was:
The body of the ad said:
Online dating site (Dating Name Brand). Please complete form
online to participate.
If you click on the ad, it takes you to a dating site called “SITENAME”, which is a very generic site, similar to Match.com or Eharmony, but in another country. The site is free, and I am guessing makes it’s money off of advertising, or plans on making its money that way.
The ad was submitted to be shown to Males, who were single, between the ages of 21 and 60 in that country. It is interesting to note that in the new dating guidelines for facebook it states that you should also select in the demographics of the user, whether they are interested in men or women. At the same time, for some countries there is no option to choose whether the user is interested in men or women.
The ad was rejected with the following explanation:
Ad Disapproval Reason(s):
* The content of this ad does not adequately reflect the product/service offered. Ads may not be false, misleading, fraudulent or deceptive. Per section 4, ads must not make unsubstantiated claims, including but not limited to prices, discounts or product availability; use of current events in the ad text or image that create false association to be used for irrelevant commercial agenda; use of false qualifications to create a sense of relevancy; as well as the implication of dynamic ad content. Any statement made within an ad must be accurate and relevant to all users.
Additionally, ads must disclose what action or set of actions is required to qualify or receive the product/service. Offers requiring the submission of Personally Identifiable Information must disclose on the landing page how such information will be used and distributed. This disclosure must be clearly and prominently displayed.
When I read the reason above, it does not seem to match up with ad I ran. I can’t quite figure it out.
Now on the other hand, the ads I have running for brick and mortar businesses are running just fine with no hangups.
My feel I am getting from this is simply that facebook is being extremely careful of affiliate offers, extremely careful.
My final analysis is that an affiliate offer is no worse or better than any other offer. A brick and mortar advertiser, or a large fortune 500 company, can also be deceptive, or criminal in their advertising. At the moment the affiliate marketers have simply pushed a little too far, and are getting pushed back. This creates a tremendous opportunity for brick and mortar businesses to be advertising on facebook because they are not competing with the overly profitable illegal affiliate offers. Since facebook is a bid based system, the price is simply going to be a bit less now than it would have otherwise.
Many affiliate marketers have been scrambling to find other sources of traffic, and I am sure that is big talk at Ad Tech this week.
Jason Akatif, founder of Ads 4 Dough stated that he keeps a spreadsheet with hundreds of traffic sources. It sounds like affiliate marketers will need to do the same, at least for a while. I am starting up a spreadsheet to do the same.
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It’s probably not your ads, but the ads of some other unscrupulous affiliate marketers that have spoiled it for the whole bunch. As we all know, not all affiliates operate on the up-and-up and some may have posted less than wholesome ads that led Facebook to set limits on like ads even though they might not be offensive. Unfortunately, it is one of the down sides we have to deal with in order to be i the business we are in.
ReplyPersonally i believe that some of the ads they do have should not be there. They are sometimes just not needed due to the fact that they are usually about the games that are on facebook that everyone already knows about. i feel they should run adds of their supporters who help make using facebook free! such as companies who contribute to them.
Replyfacebook can be made into a more business oriented social site. This works well.
ReplyIve seen facebook caery some of the dumbest ads ever. i wouldnt take it personal, i suppose if certain people complain about an ad enough facebook will rmeove it?
ReplyI also have seen a lot of ridiculous ads on Facebook. I don’t blame anyone for complaining.
ReplyRemoving ads from any website means lower money income…..so longterm I think they will not remove any of them permanantly.
ReplyI agree that what they are doing is wrong; certain ads that are being removed are removed with no concrete basis as to how they are influencing facebook users in a negative way; the ads that are being left alone; however, are ads that should in fact be removed. I am met every morning with an ad at the top of my screen of a woman lying on a bed in panties and a bra urging me to play a specific game, this is aggravating, as I have two daughters under that age of 18 on this site.
ReplyI have watched Facebook over the past year and it is constantly changing. I would not expect anything to remain as it does from day to day. Anyone who is using this forum to advertise should be aware of this before they jump in.
ReplyI Believe Facebook, IS, being overly cautious. People have a choice whether or not to click adds. Facebook is losing money just to prove a point. It seems like they are removing perfectly good adds just because they might not appeal to some users, not because they offend all the users. it’s just plain stupid!
ReplyThey should mellow out about the ads on facebook,but at the same time they just need to keep a close eye on certain ads. Not a big deal. They should chill out.
As you said, just keep a list of other high traffic options for ads.
ReplyI find the Facebook ads to be such an annoyance. They are never anything I would click on.
ReplyTraffic Sources WAS the talk at adtech among affiliates. There were some good sources there I guess we’ll see how they work out. Just encourage testing them out and hope for some new sources to emerge.
Replyfacebook ads are kinda irritating. not so much when they’re jus there, but when they’re animated it gets really agitating
ReplyI think the facebook ads are irritating as well. I understand their purpose, but I just pretend they don’t exist.
ReplyThere are a lot of sites out there just trying to scam people out of money. I don’t blame Facebook for being so cautious.. I was tricked out of money about 3 years ago thanks to sites like that.
ReplyI think that facebook is right in taking ads down that may be misleading or fraudulent. However they should have given the companies some warning and better explanation as to why this is happening.
ReplyFacebook should just make ads optional
ReplyI’m glad they’re making a conscious effort to have appropriate ads. I guess they need to put a little more work into making sure they are leaving acceptable ads and only taking off the ones that are inappropriate.
ReplyI think this is a great step for those who use social networking sites. I’m glad that facebook is doing something about misleading ads, even if that means some companies are not able to post their ads.
ReplyThe ads on facebook don’t bother me that much
Replybut when they flash bright colors it’s just ugh.
Filtering is complicated. I had a Facebook ad for a Facebook application and they denied it for using the word “facebook” in it! I had to wait a week after I asked why they didn’t want me to advertise my Facebook App! They really need to build some better mechanisms to handle this.
ReplyI think this was a good move for facebook. I’m sick of seeing some of these misleading ads!
ReplyI personally would like to see some higher restrictions on misleading ads that don’t link to what is promised. I often see affiliate companies being the biggest culprit of this, not to say that brick and mortars can’t be guilty of this as well but it just seems like a lot of affiliate sites first priority is to suck people in, and not the actual product.
ReplySome ads lead to places with viruses or apps that do such. I’ve already had to clean off my computer because of that. Filtering is complicated. They really need to build some better mechanisms to handle this.
ReplyIt all seems like a work in progress. Yes, it is frustrating. With time though, I think that the process will become more accurate.
ReplyAnother example of why having your own product or service can make a killer. Affiliate offers keep getting pounded by search and social marketing services. Create something legitimate that people like, and they will do the marketing for you.
Reply@Zac Johnson:
Yeh Zac, I have had my best successes selling my own stuff online. To date actually made easily over 100X more profit the last decade selling my own products, rather than other peoples products.
Got something new coming out in the next weeks. 🙂
ReplyIt’s true that a TON of affiliate stuff got cut recently. I think it’s an effort to “clean house” from the scammy offers, etc. Once FB cools down a bit, I think affiliates will be right back in business with a new set of guidelines… And those guidelines I think are fairly good (Because… we really cant get auto insurance for $13 bucks per month… 😉 )
ReplyThey for sure have to do something about all these ads that are misleading. Whatever happened to false advertising being punishable? The internet cannot be a rule free place. Companies shouldn’t be allowed to take advantage of naive internet users.
Replywell i think facebook should remove such ads. Of course facebook wants to hold some sanity for its website. We don’t want “you just won a lottery” ads popping up all over facebook.
ReplyWell done!
While people posting ads on Facebook are trying to sell a product a service, it has to be understood that Facebook is also trying to make money off of these ad placements. They must offer relevant, appealing advertisements to their end users, or these ad placements do neither Facebook or the people placing the ads any good. Facebook simply does not want to upset it’s userbase.
ReplyFacebook is a social site that attracts many ‘consumers’ from all walks of life. While the reason we log on isn’t for the advertising, it is there. Unfortunantely the most attractive offers are usually the ones that are erroneous. You have to be careful of what you click on in case of the viruses, etc. I think it’s good facebook is trying to keep it cleaned up. It’s just a shame that legitimate advertisers get cut. Maybe they should filter their ads through human reviewers.
ReplyIt sounds like Facebook is trying to be more careful with the advertisements that they are allowing to be shown on their site. It might be that they are just trying to protect the younger users from the more unscrupulous advertisers which is a very good thing. I don’t want kids running across banners that are for a dating site but the picture in it is a very naked woman.
ReplyI’m sure at some point Facebook will relax the guidelines. I’ve had many legit campaigns retroactively disapproved and of course it was very frustrating, but I can understand their need to protect their userbase. Hopefully they’ll straighten out their guidelines (it seems there’s some confusion internally) and it’ll be back to business again.
Cheers
ReplyFacebooks really gotten crazy.
ReplyI also noticed that ads only appear on pages that are simliar. Example if your ad is about cars and the page you are viewing is about dating, chances are your ad wont appear, so is it possible that if your ad has nothing to do with anything that it will be rejected?
ReplyThey should calm down on all of that. I mean, Facebook is offering their service for free to users, and they are being paid by those advertisers. If they keep it up they are going to lose their advertisers, which means they will use the people who are paying them.
ReplyIn order to be a free service…. facebook needs these addys….. I loath them but I do understand why they are there.
ReplyI really hope they get it together. Facebook is the only communication I van get with some of my family. 🙁
ReplyI hope that Facebook finally puts in a place a mechanism by which all super affiliates and others will be able to abide by so that legitimate ads don’t get turned off without prior notification or warning. It seems that Facebook might be facing some potential liability issues and is looking to clean up it’s image.
ReplyI am so glad facebook is taking a stand against affilate marketers. Way to go. Its about time.
ReplyI’ve personally tried Facebook advertising myself and did not have much luck in ads converting. I don’t know what it is.
ReplyFacebook is in an interested situation when it comes to advertisement. They have to be aware of the oodles of spam that are out there and all of the scams that almost everyone is trying to pull- because if they aren’t they will lose a lot of customers. Part of the reason that facebook has become so popular and MySpace has been left behind is that facebook at least offers some type of spam filter and privacy protection. Even when their system doesn’t work properly, they are making customers feel protected by giving them the option to change their filters. MySpace, on the other hand, has turned into “that place I never go to anymore because it’s all a lot of junk and porn.”
ReplyHow strange. Have all dating site ads been pulled? I can’t remember ever seeing any of them on my facebook. @sraley2: And yes, a lot of the reason why no one goes to Myspace anymore is because it is full of a bunch of BS in your face ads. Facebook has always been classy in its presentation, and I think they are just filtering out the junk.
Reply