Facebook ads work, I often buy sub £50 / $50 items from Facebook and Instagram.

Would I buy a $699 (£531) scooter from a facebook ad? Probably not.  Would you?

The problem with any form of "interrupt" marketing, versus say, social selling, is that you are not in control of the next action after you have delivered the message.

Let me explain.

If I see an ad for a $699 scooter, my next action, as is probably yours is to go onto the internet and look at other scooters.

Recently there was a CD box set for sale which was presented to me via a Facebook ad.  Yes, I'm old enough to know what a CD is and still buy them.  I was presented an ad that said they were on special offer at £39.95, but I checked out Amazon and they were selling on there for £19.99.  A saving of £20 ($26).  I put a note on the Facebook Ad to make sure people knew they could get a better deal on Amazon.

The other thing that is important here is that I didn't buy.  In the time it took to check out the lower price, I decided not to buy.

With social selling, the sale is based on "permission" so there is a connection, you could call it a relationship.

I was given some advice when I first started in sales which was "selling starts when you get the answer of "no"."  With interrupt marketing, if you get a "no" you are not there to sell.  Hope was never a strategy!

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This week, I was in Barcelona.  To start my presentation I always ask the audience to stand up.  Then I say, sit down if you can remember an advert you have seen in the last 24 hours.  Nobody sits down.

I do this, conference after conference.  Nobody ever sits down.

The average person is hit with 1,000 interrupt messages every day, "buy my crap" people scream, on adverts, on emails and on cold calls.  And what do we do?

We filter it all out.

One of the skills we have taught ourselves in the digital age is to filter this out.  Or we turn to technology such as ad-blockers, the cold calling filter in iOS 13 or rules in our email.  Spam emails can then bypass junk and land straight in the dustbin without you having to see them.

Or we have legislation GDPR or CPAA.

Whenever I post articles like this, I always get a comment from the same person where they say "all evidence shows that advertising spend is increasing".  It is.

It's increasing as everybody is ignoring it and you are going to have to spend more and more and more and more and more on advertising as we all ignore more and ignore more of it.  Period.

 People are looking for insight, education, tell me something I don't know.  They are looking for content (on social), they don't want somebody's "buy my shit" "we are number one" "we are market leading" "we are award winning" crappy marketing message interrupting their day.  However it's delivered.

Interrupt and broadcast marketing is dead .... it's time to start building your world without it.

PS

Facebook also have a great process so if you don't like an ad you can hide the advertiser, never to see them again.  Something I use a lot, as it helps to fine tune the ads you see.

In fact, I only see ads from companies where I already follow their page.  Is that Ironic?