Facebook advertising strategy for Sushi Fashions Super Bowl sale

Media Advertising: Posting an Ad on Facebook

Social media advertising provides a great platform for enhancing a brand message's reach and influencing prospects at the buying cycle's middle-of-the-funnel or evaluation stage. Facebook presents a unique marketing plan for advertisers; one that entirely focuses on middle-of-the-funnel offers as a way of influencing buyer decisions. This is quite logical since it is at the evaluation stage that a buyer i) clarifies exactly what they need, and then embarks on the search for a satisfying provider, and ii) is most likely to share information through their established network though a 'like' (Social Media Today, 2013).

In order to take advantage of this aspect, Sushi Fashions, a dealer in ladies wear, handbags and accessories intends to put up an ad regarding its Super Bowl sale, in which buyers could get up to 50% off on the conventional prices - over the entire product range. Having used Facebook as an advertising platform several times in the past, Sushi Fashions has an established business page by the name 'Sushi Fashions,' whose fan base currently stands at 289.

Part Two

Facebook would require an advertiser to have an active Facebook account, a valid email address, and a business fan page (Catholic Democrats, 2008). Sushi Fashions already has these, and the step-by-step process below will be used to deploy the ad.

Step 1: Click on the advertising link at the bottom of the Sushi Fashion fan page, and select 'create Facebook ad' (Catholic Democrats, 2008).

Step 4: Ad Review

The ad, as it will appear once posted, is displayed, incorporating the information input in all the previous sections. Changes can still be made at this stage (Catholics Democrats, 2008).

Step 5: Order Placement

Facebook already has, in its possession, Sushi Fashion's credit card details; hence there is no need to provide such again when placing the order (Catholic Democrats, 2008). One may be required to wait a few hours before the ad begins running, since Facebook does "reserve the right to approve the ads" (Catholic Democrats, 2008).

The ad's performance can be checked by comparing the number of times it has run, against the number of clicks it has received through the Ads Manager application (Catholic Democrats, 2008).

Part Three

Through the Facebook page post ads advertising option, the ad, once posted on the Sushi Fashions Fan Page, will "get additional paid distribution among fans, friends of fans, or even non-fans within the sidebar or newsfeed" (Social Media Today, 2013).

Despite the wide coverage, advertising through Facebook does not lack its share of risks. The most significant ones are;

Losses -- there is a significant risk of incurring losses, especially because past campaigns have shown that the CTR (click-through rate) for Facebook ads by users is extremely low, and is not reflective of the advertising costs (VanHoose, 2011). In 2010, for instance, the ad CTR was only 0.051%, almost half the standard CTR (VanHoose, 2011).

Cybercrime -- unscrupulous imposters masquerading as Sushi Fashion officials could develop their own page in the business' name, and use it to conduct illegal or redundant activities; a factor that could impact negatively on the business' reputation and profitability (VanHoose, 2011).

Loss of privacy -- Facebook redesigns its site several times every year, and each time it does, users' privacy settings are changed to default with no notification, literally publicizing all the information regarding a user. A business requires some degree of confidentiality, which if not observed, could give away valuable information to competitors (VanHoose, 2011).

Internet advertising has significant large-scale benefits, outweighing the costs and associated risks; which is why it still remains a fundamental marketing strategy for most business units (VanHoose, 2011). First, internet marketing enables the realization of scale economies. Since people who have access to the internet are in a position to view an online ad as many times as they wish, "the expense of putting the ad in place can be divided by a large number of consumers to yield a lower" per-consumer average cost (VanHoose, 2011 p. 192).

A second advantage is that internet advertising makes it possible to customize ads and target selected groups (VanHoose, 2011). It is possible to identify a target group, their browsing patterns, as well as buying patterns using cookies and then design ads in a manner that incorporates these elements (VanHoose, 2011).