If you haven’t yet seen Facebook’s ad ‘about’ its one billionth user you should. Pure genius. (Go to http://bit.ly/PZPh3d)
Once you’ve seen it, ask yourself these questions: Would your company have gone with such an approach? Would your agency have suggested the idea? Would any of your clients have accepted such an ad?
I’m cynical for sure, but I guess that 99% of the time the answers would be NO, NO, NO.
How can you have an ad that doesn’t mention the one billion mark? Doesn’t say how great Facebook is?
The new ad is 100% emotional… no mention of Facebook’s server power or its world class customer service. There’s no mention of a breakthrough technology… no pictures of Zuckerberg saying, “we care.”
The message is not about FB at all, so it’s even more powerfully about FB. (Please revisit an earlier post “If I Say I’m Cool… I’m Not Cool” http://bit.ly/PZQffM)
Yet… 99% of agencies and clients would have passed on the ad, preferring, instead, some sort of derivative piece with messaging like this: strong, forceful, macho… you get it… dig me.
THEME: One Billion People Can’t Be Wrong
VOICEOVER: When we started Facebook, we knew it was a communications breakthrough … but even we didn’t envision that it would revolutionize the way people get connected and stay connected.
Today, we’re one billion strong… and let’s face it, that many people can’t be wrong.
From Timbuktu to Toronto, Beijing to Boston, San Francisco to Sydney, our growing infrastructure brings friends together, lets us share our feelings and makes any business instantly international.
Join the Facebook family album and find out what you’ve been missing.
The world is waiting to hear from you… don’t be left out.
There it is – the ‘perfect’ ad for the 99%. It’s strong. It tells the world who we are. It brings a little fear to the consumer. And this ad will pass muster with the Board, the CEO, the SEO guys. Lots of keywords (Facebook, communications, connected, breakthrough, billion, users, international, business) and text chunks we can tweet, too.
Before anyone suggests that the new ‘humble’ ad is OK for Facebook but not for other companies, let me remind you: FB is no longer the darling it once was. Check the stock price. It is beginning to look old, feel old. Billions of users or not, the bloom is off the rose. After seeing the new ad, I had a feeling that FB was somehow ‘redefined.’ I was reminded of what I loved about it years ago. (I use it less these days because it seems too business-oriented and thus kinda cold.) This ad made me think about what FB was once and could be again.
Simply put – as direct response this ad works because people like me, and I am everyman, will be moved to start thinking about FB again… start using FB more frequently and with renewed enthusiasm. More numbers=more sales=more money for FB and that’s the bottom line for any marketing piece.
Still, I can hear the marketing department's reservations: “Shouldn’t we at least mention one billion in the headline?"
(At this moment I finally understand why my wife won't let me have a gun in the house.)
“Consumers want a new story... authenticity, not spin... participation, not propaganda.”
