The Success of Third Party Advertisements on Facebook
The Success of Third Party Advertisements on Facebook
Maria Asselanis
Virginia Commonwealth University
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The Success of Third Party Advertisements on Facebook
Asselanis 2
Abstract
Consumers and some businesses who use Facebook came to the notion, a long time ago,
that advertisements on the website are annoying and ultimately do nothing to help the company.
However, multiple studies have been performed, which proved that small businesses thrive and
survive off of the customers hooked by advertisements on the “newsfeed”. Facebook is one of
the most widely used social media websites around the world. The website collects the data from
the users who sign up for it and forms a large database of their personal preference,
demographics of the individuals. Businesses can utilize the information collected by Facebook to
narrow or widen the variety of the people viewing the advertisements. Another factor that
businesses take advantage of by using Facebook to advertise is the idea that 23% of the users
check their account five or more times every day. These people checking the “newsfeed” so
frequently will come across the same couple of embedded advertisements every time they get on
the website which would make it more likely that the user would consider buying the product.
Thus this process will increase the product outreach. Although 23% of the users check it that
often, the majority of the users do not so it will be up to the company to create the
advertisements or profile pages as consumer-friendly as possible, to gain the other 77% of the
Facebook users as consumers of that particular product. Through the studies performed by
researchers, it can be seen that from the use of profile pages and embedded advertisements
businesses using Facebook as a platform increases their sale outreach.
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The Success of Third Party Advertisements on Facebook
Social media has engulfed the lives of society within the last decade. It has been
introducing and connecting people who share similar interests on these platforms. Once people
realized that this type of interaction was not going away, some started to take advantage of the
situation. Businesses started seeing social media websites as a way to expand their company's
image and product outreach. At first big businesses were slow to adapt social media as a
marketing tool even though the websites had been gaining popularity for many years. Websites
like Myspace, Twitter and Facebook were not seen to be worth the money to advertise on it
because this was a big economic risk for them as no one had ever done it before. Although big
businesses saw this as a risk they did not want to take, small business used this opportunity to
get their word out their products. Most small businesses used the social media website, Facebook.
According to Pattison (2009), “And with 300 million people on Facebook, and still growing,
that’s increasingly where your audience is for a lot of products and services” (1). Facebook has
become such a huge forum of users and thus is known as the most widely used social media site
in the world. Small businesses have been able to get the products advertised to a large variety of
people. Once it became clear that Facebook was a great forum to market products, big companies
began placing advertisements as well. However, as companies begun advertising products
Facebook became cluttered and many users had different opinions to the advertisements than the
companies. The users and other businesses thought the propaganda was annoying and ultimately
useless in creating growth in product outreach. Nelson-Field (2012) references Brown and
Rothschild "Advertising clutter is a widely recognized factor that reduces advertising
effectiveness by causing avoidance behaviors and memory interference/impairment" (1). The
clutter and the way the messages appeared to the public on this site discouraged users from
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seeing the full effectiveness of them. Even though there is clutter from the advertisements on
Facebook, companies still try to get their products out. Ultimately, businesses that use Facebook
as a platform to advertise products and the firm's image does not successfully increase the
outreach to consumers due to the lack of participation within the target audience as well as the
interactive nature of the messages themselves.
In order to create an advertisement that will be most effective on Facebook, the company
must figure out which users will respond well to it by targeting a specific group or groups of
people. Figuring out the specific audience for any type of propaganda is one of the most
important factor in its success or failure. While trying to come up with the right audience the
company must see the social media website, Facebook, as certain type of community, an
electronic tribe. Adams and Smith (2008) defined an electronic tribe as "an exclusive, narrowly
focused network-supported aggregate of human beings in cyberspace who are bound together by
a common purpose and employ a common protocol and procedure for the consensual exchange
of information and opinions" (17). Companies must realize that the internet has made it possible
for people to connect with others from around the world which gives a different perspective to
advertisements. Unlike television messages, Facebook advertisements must be succinct and
interactive with the user or risk losing potential customers. Through a handful of studies
performed over the last five years it has been seen that the target audience of Facebook
advertisements have been reached.
Due to the complexity of the advertisements, the participation within the targeted group
of users does not seem to be present. Kapp and Peters (2013) had created three distinct
advertisements that could be publically seen for a specific amount of time. Each of the three
were surveys to gather information about women ages between 35-40 about mammograms. At
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the conclusion of the surveys Kapp and Peters (2013) states "...our low yield in completed
surveys indicates this potential is far from actualized. Our click-through rate ranged from 0.024
to 0.033 %, depending on the ad" (3). The click-through rates are defined as the number of clicks
the sponsored story or ad received divided by the number of times it was shown through the site.
The three advertisements had slight difference, of graphics with plain text, plain text or a change
in background color, but they all had the incentive of a "chance to win a $50 gift card". From
Kapp and Peters results the advertisement with the breast cancer graphic and plain text gained
the greatest click-through rate with "0.033%". It can be seen from this study that people tend to
gravitate towards advertisements that have a graphic that describes what the provider is talking
about rather than just blanket phrases.
Additionally a study performed by Yaakop in 2013 brings to light a similar issue of how
people perceive the advertisements created by third-party businesses and how it affects the
participation within the target groups. The overall study he performed was to determine the
public's attitude towards the messages being displayed on Facebook's interface. As stated in the
study "A total of 350 respondents participated in the study. The results suggest that there are
three online factors that significantly influence consumers’ attitudes towards advertising on
Facebook. The factors are perceived interactivity, advertising avoidance and privacy" (1). The
one big factor that was not seen to affect viewer attitudes is the credibility of what is being said.
It is very surprising since society thrives on credible sources to gather opinions of products or
news. It can be seen that for many users that after clicking on a link of a company's
advertisement, popups automatically come up asking for user information which discourages
most from continuing to the original link they clicked on in the first place. This is because the
user cannot continue to the site without inputting the information. Similarly, the study of Kapp
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and Peters (2013) prefaces the idea, "Challenges include developing an ad to foster interest
without biasing the sample, and motivating women who click the ad to complete the survey.
There is still much to learn about this potential method of recruitment" (3). Not only does
participation of users in advertisements, such as surveys, vary because of the way the message is
placed in the public view but also the level of interactive nature of the advertisement after the
user clicks on the embedded link.
Companies that use Facebook as a platform
Simarly a study performed by Riebe and Sharp brings to light the issue of as Kapp and Peters.
Riebe and Sharp (2013) sets off to prove that the sales through Facebook are not as accurate as
people would think. As stated in the study, "
Overall the studies performed to analyze the effectiveness of the advertisements
on Facebook for third-party product outreach have shown many failures, but it is a great tool for
future companies to reference as they go forward and try to use Facebook as a platform.
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Works Cited
Adams, T. & Smith, S. (2008). Electronic tribes: The virtual worlds of geeks, gamers, shamans,
and scammers. Austin: University of Texas Press.
Clinch, M. (2013, October 29). Facebook marketing? Don't bother, says new report. Retrieved
March 5, 2015.
Kapp, J., Peters, C., & Oliver, D. (2013, January 6). Research Recruitment Using Facebook
Advertising: Big Potential, Big Challenges. Retrieved March 5, 2015.
Nelson-Field, K. (2013, June 1). More Mutter About Clutter Extending Empirical
Generalizations to Facebook. Retrieved March 5, 2015.
Pattison, K. (2009, November 11). How to Market Your Business With Facebook. Retrieved
March 5, 2015.
Riebe, E., & Sharp, B. (2012, June 1). What's Not to "Like?" Can a Facebook Fan Base Give a
Brand The Advertising Reach it Needs. Retrieved March 5, 2015.
Yaakop, A. (2013, February 28). Like It or Not: Issue of Credibility in Facebook Advertising.
Retrieved March 5, 2015.
Yang, T. (2012, March 1). The decision of Behavior of Facebook Users. Retrieved March 5,
2015.