Facebook advertising has come under a lot of scrutiny this year, and things just got worse. In addition to admitting to over-estimating video views in September, Facebook has now confessed to “miscalculating several of the metrics it uses to measure how content performs on its property.” This recent disclosure raises further concerns about the validity of the data reported by Facebook and YouTube, the two dominant players in the digital media playground.
In a blog post published today, Facebook addressed its metrics and reporting issues and summed up five areas of misreporting:
- The 28-day organic page reach metric should have been lower by 55%
- The average time spent per instant article had been over-reported by 7-8%
- Referrals were overstated by an average 6%
- Total number of followers for profiles that created interest lists was overstated by 5%
- “Video watches at 100%” had been understated and its count should have been 35% higher than earlier reported
Marketing and advertising professionals have long called for greater transparency from Facebook; specifically how much data third-party analytics companies have access to. Last week, the Wall Street Journal explained that while most web publishers implement codes called “tags” that allow third parties to pull data directly from sites, Facebook and YouTube modify third party codes slightly and then deliver data. Executives at Facebook cite the company’s plethora of private information about users as one of the primary reasons for its aversion to mainstream practices, but even still the situation raises doubts that the third party tracking is truly independent. In fact, many senior executives at reputable media buying and advertising firms feel that there is a very real lack of unbiased measurement associated with Facebook metrics.
Despite its recent failures, Facebook remains confident that its advertising results are legitimate.
If you gave Facebook money to generate a certain number of clicks or impressions, Facebook still delivered what you paid for, says Facebook ad boss Carolyn Everson.
– Recode
According to Forbes, Facebook will be remedying its reporting bugs during the upcoming weeks. While this is good news, its still unclear how Facebook (and YouTube) will address the third party reporting concerns. Facebook claims it is “exploring additional third-party reviews,” but hasn’t disclosed specifics.
At Top Shelf we advise Clients to crosscheck all digital advertising metrics, including Facebook’s, against their Google Analytics and website data. It’s only fair to acknowledge that it’s in an advertiser’s best interest to report favorable ad metrics so that ad demand increases. As marketers, it’s our responsibility to hold digital ad partners accountable for results just as we would any traditional media outlet.
Like this post? Check out past blogs in the archive below.