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Hmm,

You could go on facebook and target women 25-35 who are engaged and live in miami. If Facebook's booster can't find a different glittering hypothetical, they are going to be in trouble... What about "barbers in St. Louis"? Uh wait, barbers in St. Louis actually need almost exactly what barbers in Houston need. The virtue of online business isn't "targeting" but finding something lots of people need.

Engaged? I think I remember friends talking what it's like having your Facebook profile say "engaged". Boy, that's one status that every retailer thinks they can exploit.

It's difficult for me to believe that "nobody cares about Facebook ads and no one clicks on them" because Facebook Ads (and Google Adwords/Adsense) operate as markets, with a bidding system on price.

If your reasoning was correct, nothing sold at an auction would ever be a bad deal.

But given that Facebook is seen as the next platform, every minute one has to presume that a new-customer appears to try and take advantage of this great platform. But frequency of these customers appearing doesn't prove that they are getting a deal that works for them.




Cleaning services in st louise don't want to target barbers in Houston. Not everyone is selling a web app.

Agreed about "engaged" status though


Yes, but a cleaning service in St Louis can't afford to only target barbers.

My point is that the number of business that actually engage in very-narrow-targeting are small. And the target groups tend be overwhelmed by this token. What percentage of the population makes major purchases very specific to their demographic? Is it not high (weddings, college, funerals? Anniversaries? You start to run out after a short time). The rich can also be target and are targeted and you are again back in the "not-a-slam-dunk" range.

A San Francisco dominatrix still buys a car and a washing machine in the same fashion as a mid-western minister.

If you look at the idea behind Facebook advertising, you'll see it's actually the old model of brand advertising - somehow injecting an irrational connection between the customer and the product. It's just that brand advertising rightly imagine they can get more traction if they know the exact demographic someone is one. They might indeed do so but it's still in the same realm. The goal is to sway someone's purchase decision when that someone is at a store and has to decide ten different otherwise identical whats-its. The smallest prejudice you can insert will be worth a lot to you here.

But the Google model is the opposite - informational advertising. The model of offering an honest argument for a product that the person is actively seeking.

A Facebook ad is essentially about hijacking attention. Hoping you'll get some free-floating interest from someone who isn't otherwise thinking about your offer.

A web page gets you the chance to make your case to those who are interested in your case. What objectively makes your service better.

Does a cleaning service want barbers? It wants customer in the million-person city of St. Louis but that's a big group. It mostly wants anyone who actually needs a cleaning service. And then there are a lot of things to say but this basic is pretty simple.




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