Brands removing ads from Facebook Groups

Looks like Facebook is losing some points due to poor ad monitoring on its advertising platform, according to NMA.

High-profile brands such as eBay, First Direct, Vodafone, O2 and now Tesco have all taken measures to remove advertising from the social networking giant after finding their ads placed next to inappropriate content and groups supporting holocaust denial and extreme political parties such as the BNP.

Seems like the industry has been putting quite a lot of pressure on Facebook to stop the misplacement of ads and either give more control to brands or Facebook should dedicate more time to monitor particular controversial groups and proceed with the removal of ads.

A couple years back, Facebook had somewhat solved the problem after Vodafone had proceeded with the removal of their ads, however, it seems problem has resurfaced once again.

These are serious mistakes that could, if perceived by many, present quite a big challenge for corporations. However, in an UGC network as such, it is almost impossible to control absolutely everything.

Possible solutions to these issues could be:

1. You advertise on Facebook and are prepared to accept that your ads could appear beside inappropriate content. If your brand is strong enough and well-established such mishaps shouldn’t present any repercussions.
2. You can choose to only advertise on the Facebook homepage and/or user profiles to be on the safe side.
3. Advertise on Facebook and closely monitor your ads.
4. Don’t advertise on Facebook at all.

This entry was posted on Friday, May 15th, 2009 at 5:38 pm and is filed under Social Marketing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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