We have been thinking of getting a coffee table for sometime.
While browsing my timeline on Facebook, I saw this advertisement for a coffee table from UrbanLadder.com
The table looked interesting so I clicked on the ad and was directed to the UrbanLadder website.
And I clicked out of the site about 30 seconds later. Here’s why:
- The table, because of which I had clicked the ad was Out of Stock. If the product is out of stock, why advertise it in the first place
- Secondly, as the ad mentioned, there were no coffee tables on the homepage for Rs 3499. Instead, Page 2 had a side table for 3499
Now, I don’t know if UrbanLadder is handing their Fb marketing in house or via a 3rd party agency, but whoever is doing it, isn’t doing a very good job.
They wasted a ‘click’ out of their budget, but more importantly, they lost a bit of credibility which went from Neutral to the negative zone for me.
If they had linked that ad directly to the appropriately priced product, I would have been more likely to browse around other products.
They probably wanted to drive traffic using the ‘low price’ hook, with the hope that some visitors would buy the higher priced items. Unfortunately, that doesn’t work with a lot of people. The customer is not stupid and can usually spot a gimmick pretty soon.
Why can’t companies incorporate more honesty into their advertising ? Why always pander to the lowest common denominator ?
It is this prevalance of ‘dishonesty’ in advertising which has contributed to most consumers tuning out of advertising and viewing almost all ads with suspicion.
Facebook as an advertising medium is pretty efficient, and if you get your messaging right, your cost of customer acquisition can be really low.
So if you working on an ad campaign, try something different – Honesty.
In this day and age of over the top advertising, who knows, you just might end up pleasantly surprising your customers 🙂
