Facebook Ad Boycott - Thoughts on the Implications for Small & Regional Businesses
Many prominent brands are boycotting Facebook advertising during July in protest of Facebook “not doing enough to stop hate speech” on their platform (article linked below). Interestingly enough, it appears as though several of these brands aren’t even advertising on Facebook or Instagram and haven’t for a while.
After checking Facebook's public Ad Library tool (linked below), it appears as though Coca Cola, Addidas, and Lululemon all show 0 ads in the ad library. Why publically admit to a boycott if you weren't even running ads? It seems like a straight PR move.
Starbucks is one of the brands that has been advertising and actually has active ads running right now. I bet they spend a good amount each month too.
The PR play and arguable hypocrisy at the mega-brand level is a topic for someone smarter than me to elaborate on (or me after I've had a couple of whiskeys). However, this situation is having implications that are trickling down.
I get the PR play for the mega brands, but where does this leave smaller companies that rely on social ads A LOT? I'm thinking about regional and local-level companies. I'm thinking about many of my clients.
What's the best recommendation to make to these businesses considering the climate on social media right now? Do they hold off advertising via Facebook/Instagram in caution of a potential backlash? Will this boycott even mean anything to them and should they even care?
The best answer we've come up with is to be as transparent as possible about what we are hearing and what the potential implications are. Then, let the company make their decision. Sounds great, but sometimes this doesn't go over well. Many times, the client isn't sure what to do and defaults to us to make the best call - we are a marketing company after all.
The next best thing we are advising is to just stay away from Facebook for a bit. Performance hasn't really been stellar for the last few months anyway. With that said, we aren't saying to stop advertising. Instead, take a look at alternative social platforms like Reddit, Pinterest, and Twitter.
The other alternative is to just keep advertising on FB and/or IG. If the brand or target audience is confidently going to DGAF then why fret about the boycott anyways? In some cases, this makes sense.
The next thing to think about is what will actually happen in July and August? Could be that the whole thing just fizzles out and nobody cares in 30-45 days. Could be that other social platforms swoop in and start eating up market share. In 2020, anything is possible.
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Here’s a link to a Reuters article: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-facebook-ads-boycott-factbox-idUSKBN2402T2
Here’s a link to the Facebook Ad library tool: https://www.facebook.com/ads/library/?active_status=all&ad_type=political_and_issue_ads&country=US&impression_search_field=has_impressions_lifetime&sort_data%5Bdirection%5D=desc&sort_data%5Bmode%5D=relevancy_monthly_grouped