Facebook Trials Topic Exclusions As Advertiser Worries Mount

Marketers have had a problem with Facebook Ads for some time, and the tech giant has finally instigated the baby-steps required to fix it.

When someone as powerful and influential as Proctor & Gamble chief brand officer Marc Pritchard calls social media ‘5% of P&G’s marketing spending, but it’s 150% of our problems’, you know that brands have a real battle on their hands.

What is the solution?

Social media marketers can now puff their cheeks and breath a sigh of relief because Facebook has announced that it will test a feature that gives marketers more control over what content their adverts are shown next to. This should allay fears certain brands have over where their ads are placed on Facebook, and the reputational damage a lousy placement can do.

In an announcement, Facebook explained more.

Facebook

“We are planning to test a solution that will allow an advertiser to select a topic, like Crime and Tragedy. That selection would help define how we’ll show the ad on Facebook, including News Feed.

For example, a children’s toy company may want to avoid content related to a new crime show, so they could select the “Crime and Tragedy” topic.”

It is expected that the new product development and testing in the News Feed will take much of the year.

Facebook’s growing brand safety issues

Without proper safety features, brands run the risk of harmful content being shown next to their ads, which causes reputational damage to that brand. After putting blood, sweat, and tears into building something, the last thing marketers want is to unravel that with a bad Facebook advert that’s beyond their level of control.

Ineffective safeguarding has led to brands being reluctant to continue spending on Facebook Ads, or they’re considering what life would look like away from the platform.

A negative environment for ads is a common hazard that marketers have to deal with, which creates a brand safety risk. It can be challenging for advertisers to see or control the content their brands are being associated with, but Facebook is trying to soothe those concerns.

Unilever has already gone on a social media break, while it’s clear that P&G isn’t happy with the safety net provided by Facebook and the like. Where the big boys lead, the rest might follow in time – even if the effectiveness of Facebook Ads makes it difficult to give up.

For example, locally, more niche platforms like Snapchat, Pinterest and TikTok are experiencing an uptick in demand, alongside the incumbents.

SMI AU/NZ managing director Jane Ractliffe, 2021

“In the past six months, we’ve seen increasing demand for social media sites as Facebook continues to grow and new entrants such as TikTok, Pinterest and Snapchat also benefit from the wave of revenues flowing to this sector.

In the December quarter most of these groups are averaging growth of more than 25%, and the sheer weight of revenue moving to social media in the second half has meant its emerged as one of the very few media sectors to now be reporting growth over this tough calendar year.”

Facebook does offer some safety controls

Facebook does offer some safety features, but they’re clearly not working for many brands and advertisers. They are:

• Block lists. These prevent ads from running on specific websites or apps within Facebook Instant Articles, Facebook in-stream videos or Audience Network. To find out how to create these block lists, visit this page.
• Inventory filter. An inventory filter will let you to control the type of content that your ad appears within, but it won’t block any URLs. However, only Pages, websites and apps that comply with Facebook policy can be part of their placement.

Facebook

“Inventory filter gives you an extra layer of control over sensitive content, allowing you to choose full inventory, standard inventory or limited inventory on Audience Network, Facebook in-stream and Facebook Instant Articles.”

• Live stream opt-out. Ads can now appear in Facebook live stream from some approved gaming partners, and are currently being tested with those range of partners. You can opt out of this or add the Facebook Page of publishers who had hosted a gaming live stream within 90 months to your block list (see image above).

Facebook’s brand safety best practices make pains to point out that community standards are enforced for all the content that’s shared across the Facebook ecosystem. It goes on to say that restricting delivery options could lead to more expensive ads, but cheap eyeballs are often not all they’re cracked up to be anyway.

Just ask Mercedes-Benz, which found its ads plastered all over Islamic State YouTube videos in 2017. If it sounds too good to be true, it sadly usually is.