Facebook’s Outage Shakes Up Conversion

Facebook’s hours-long outage yesterday caused some scrambling—especially for the platform’s largest customer base, small and medium businesses. But any lasting impact will likely be more 2022 social budgets shifting to platforms like TikTok. In the shorter term, ad buyers would do well to check their numbers as Facebook turns on the ad-delivery taps and conversion trackers are thrown off-kilter. Naturally, ad delivery dropped off a cliff yesterday. Today, it's been slowly returning, hitting half the usual amount of campaigns delivered, Jason Jutla, svp, head of media activation EMEA at Essence told Adweek. The bigger concern, for now, is the drop in reported conversions—those people clicking on Facebook ads to a brands’ site to make a purchase or other action—are not being reported. The Winners and Losers From the Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp Outage The agency is seeing a drop of at least 50% in conversions compared to what it normally expects, across roughly half a dozen clients. For some clients, it’s more than 50%. “There is a tracker and that tracker is not working,” said Jutla, adding that it's waiting to see how the numbers normalize. “We’re keeping a close eye on how the outage affects business for customers.” Numbers out of whack Facebook’s ad engine would normally run, on average, $13 million worth of ads per hour or $200,000 per minute, according to figures from its second quarterly earnings. That’s a big hole. One media buyer noted Facebook’s delivery numbers have gone up dramatically this morning as the platform pumped up delivery to make up the losses, a pretty natural outcome for any tech companies’ auction-based ad delivery platform. In its blog post on the issue, Facebook notes clients might see accelerated delivery. But spending too much too quickly could lead to waste trying to chase short-term goals, especially for direct response campaigns. Low ad delivery and low conversions will have a knock-on effect on marketing spend returns. “That’s the ‘watch out,’” said one media buyer speaking on condition of anonymity. “Agencies and marketers have to be careful not to take up desperate measures. But ad buyers today will certainly be calling up Facebook for makegoods or bonus media.” For Essence, that also means not being hasty. “We’re making sure we don’t spend a whole bunch of money trying to play catch-up in the next couple of days," said Jutla. "We’re having conversations with clients and making sure we're sensible with their money.” Media spend didn’t move, which could be the problem Marketers call the blackout troubling, frustrating, a nuisance and a wake-up call. But there was no real-time change in spend allocation to other platforms, according to sources, (there were plenty of brands or platforms tweeting each other). Instead, the outage added to a growing list of reasons why it’s prudent for marketers to spread their bets across multiple media channels. “People won’t change their spending strategies this week, but it’s another reminder to not be over-reliant on that platform,” said Ian Crocombe, founder of social commerce consultancy deft and former Facebook exec. “The more challenging [working with Facebook is], the more it serves as a signal to diversify and not to have all your eggs in Facebook." While it’s still early to assess the full scale of damage, for performance marketers which might spend 80% of their marketing budgets on Facebook and Google between them, the upshot of yesterday is that they would have missed out on a day of sales, making it harder to hit sales goals. “This rams home the point for agencies, which is linked to the supply chain news, we need a more agile approach to planning, buying and optimizing,” said Liam Brennan, global lead consultant, MediaCom BLINK Consulting. “For marketers coming out of the pandemic, this is a great opportunity to really evaluate who they work with and be agile and nimble, and to keep some money set aside to be more reactive to last-minute changes.” Diversify diversify diversify Besides, Facebook is never far from falling out of favor. Since May, when Apple released its iOS 14 update, Facebook ads have been performing between 20% and 30% less effectively, said Crocombe. One company that previously spent £40 ($55) to acquire one customer is now spending £120 ($164). Others note CPMs increasing but not to the doomsday levels projected. This has spurred some to look to channels like digital out-of-home and TV. TikTok is another contender for reaching younger audiences. Recently it's beefed up its commerce capabilities, brand safely targeting, reach beyond the under 24-year-olds and has added more marketer-friendly tools. Massive audiences aside, how much quitting Facebook hampers marketing returns is debatable. Big brands didn't notice much of a change in marketing efficacy during the summer 2020 boycott. "A brand as big as Facebook will ride the shock waves," said Katy Howell CEO of social media agency Immediate Future. "Yes there needs to be governance, but it’s too much of a behemoth." Beyond audience scale and Facebook's ad product, there's still scope for marketers to outmaneuver competitors, even if they can’t outspend them, on other platforms. “It’s about diversification of partnerships,” said Brennan. “On TikTok, Snap and Twitter you can drive more cost-effective incremental reach if done correctly.”

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Facebook’s Outage Shakes Up Conversion and Ad Delivery Numbers

The blackout deals a reminder to diversify

Lucinda Southern

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Lucinda Southern