

Anatomy of a Facebook Ad Failure - einarvollset
http://einarvollset.com/2008/10/31/anatomy-of-a-facebook-ad-failure/

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markbao
I once ran a personal (not personal _s_ ) ad on Facebook using free credits,
back in my naïve days. (I realize that age isn't a representation of work, but
I didn't have much space to enter what exactly I worked on - and decided age
is a quick clincher.)

<http://files.markbao.com/fb_ad.png>

It didn't really go too well. I'm the owner of a now-defunct Facebook ad
network, so it's interesting to see the official one in action. I targeted it
towards entrepreneurs and venture capitalists (though I had a separate one
that targeted venture capital networks only, which I received 3,000
impressions and 4 clicks through.) After 242,000 impressions, I had 378
clicks, CTR of 0.16, and average CPC of 0.32/click and average CPM of
0.49/thousand impressions. In total, I took out $119 out of my free credit.

The results in terms of contacts: I received about 10 Facebook friend requests
each day it was going, and about 3 LinkedIn invitations; I gained a few
quality connections that were not just random people.

You can't put a price on a connection, but $119 is a bit to spend for that.

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foulmouthboy
From his own numbers his conversion rate is coming in at 1.6%. Quick Google
search suggests that 1.7% is average for referral programs, so his ad wasn't
exactly a failure. The failure happens when we take into account Amazon's
referral fee. It simply doesn't make sense to spend extra money on something
that's intended to be used in no-cost situations, like alongside blog posts.

Numbers: [http://www.grokdotcom.com/2008/09/22/top-10-online-
retailers...](http://www.grokdotcom.com/2008/09/22/top-10-online-retailers-by-
conversion-rate-august-2008/)

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colinplamondon
Sounds like he was incredibly close to operating a profitable affiliate
advertising campaign- breaking even means he's onto something and could
probably be eeking out a solid profit were he to tweak the ad copy.

~~~
pmjordan
I'm confused. He says he paid $70 for the ads, which resulted in $1.36 in
sales. How is that close to breaking even?

