The hype of Facebook as a marketing tool that could skyrocket a business is quickly dying down. Running a Facebook business page, while presenting the scope of an online presence, may not be as efficient in reaching your customers as you have been led to believe. With certain pros that may make marketing easy and effective, there is a whole other side to it that must be brought to business owners’ attention. Here are the major disadvantages of Facebook ads.

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Not “IN” Anymore

In this day and age, who even uses Facebook anymore? With the new generation hopping on the bandwagon of Instagram and Twitter, Facebook is no longer the go-to social media platform. While it may be too harsh to call it obsolete, Facebook does have a much lower log-in rate than other platforms, making it a disadvantage for Facebook ads’ reach. 

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Media Junk

Spam leads are a major disadvantage of Facebook ads and require careful and time-consuming navigation. Cost-per-click ads on Facebook might give you the illusion that several clicks mean money well spent but that would be far from true. More than half the leads that Facebook may claim to provide you with its ad promotion are highly likely to be fake profiles or spam accounts, which are not worth pursuing. 

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Poor Engagement, Poor Results

Logging in to check in with your friends when an ad pops in. A mere nuisance that is skipped without a second thought. Social media platforms, then, are a space where ads are not only unwelcome but considered a bother more often than not. This would result in negligible engagement, which translates to low reach. A major disadvantage of Facebook ads is how active “active” users of Facebook when it comes to your content. Social media runs on the fuel of engagement – how people react to your ads, their likes and shares. Unless your marketing strategy and content can rope in the audience with relevance and captivating meaningfulness, there isn’t much that Facebook ads can do for you.

Not Reaching the Target Audience

Targeting your audience, those with an interest and resources to buy your products is a must when looking to convert leads to sales. However, Facebook has switched its algorithm to make feeds relevant for users which may have made this difficult. An ad aiming to reach the young female population may be receiving likes and shares among the male community, indicating poor targeting. Failing to reach those who might be interested in buying, despite high engagement then, would make sales targets tough to achieve.

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All About The Money

It all boils down to a monetary rat race, doesn’t it? Facebook too, has given in to the bidding war where the quality of the content may be superseded by the money paid by the competition. This is certainly bad news for small businesses with a limited advertising budget who only have a knife to bring in this gunfight against large corporations. 

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These disadvantages of Facebook ads are hard to override, given that they markedly impact how a business is perceived in the social media market in this era where social media is steering commerce to a capacious extent. The epoch of Facebook as an advertising platform, in my opinion, and the opinion of several large corporations too, has run its course with better alternatives just around the corner. It is worth looking around to match with the best means of your business ad campaign because Facebook is most likely not it.

I recommend availing extensive services of a creative digital marketing agency to help your business boom with the actual power of paid advertising, even if you do consider Facebook ads as a viable option. With their expertise, you can leverage the right strategy and gain a competitive edge.