“There’s still something to be said for Mass reach” is how Ad Age put it back in August in its article “Why P+G Decided Facebook Ad Targeting Often Isn’t Worth The Money”.
Fast forward to today – “Why the Super Bowl is Becoming the Toilet Bowl, Where America Airs Dirty Laundry”. Once you get past the unflattering headline and read the fine print (otherwise known as the article) we learn that for the first time EVER, P+G has TWO spots in the Big Dance; Tide and Febreze. Febreze, the very product that P+G spent lavishly on serving FB ads to pet owner and then paused the strategy due to lagging results. There’s no way to claim a cause and effect here, but there darn sure seems to be an obvious correlation; P+G wasted valuable time and $ tinkering with targeting and now needs to make up ground. Of course, they’ll never admit that. “It’s an indicator that the audience for cleaning supplies has broadened”, said Martin Hettich, VP P+G’s North American Home Care, in response to the planning decision
It’s becoming almost trendy to rank on FB, but they made their own bed with dirty sheets. There was so much BS purported about the virtues of targeting that didn’t come to pass, that now there is an equally giant mountain of BS to cover up for the mess.
And so, for us that get to watch it all unfold before us – the fun continues.
