Thirty-seven million people logout of Facebook every day from public computers – and they all see the same logout page. In other words, Facebook’s logout page presents a huge opportunity for advertisers. Which major brands have chosen to experiment with this expensive ad slot, and has it been effective?
One of the first brands to use the Facebook logout page was Ford, with an ad for the 2013 Mustang back in March. A Facebook post featuring the TV ad for the 2013 Mustang was shared 7,000 times on Facebook in about 13 hours, as reported by ClickZ. A significant portion of this traffic may have been related to the presence of the ad on the Facebook logout page, accompanied by this post: “Seen the latest Mustang spot? Watch now, then grab a Mustang badge.”
Facebook announced the logout page ads back in February, along with several other new ad products. Advertisers can target the logout ads by age, gender and current location. According to AdAge, they are “big, splashy and the closest thing to a traditional banner ad the social network has ever produced.” And they’re pricey: Facebook’s initial asking price for a given day was over $700,000 (the hefty price does also include premium home-page ads that users see on their news feeds – the logout ad isn’t available as a stand-alone purchase).
Procter & Gamble’s Swiffer also gave it a try, with Facebook users who log out seeing the post “Cleaning better doesn’t have to take longer! Who else agrees that cleaning better doesn’t have to take longer?” next to a video featuring Swiffer’s mop-like products. The video went from 60 likes to over 12,250 and the post was shared 245 times (from May 30th to June 5th), according to ClickZ.
Subway is one of the latest advertisers to jump on the Facebook logout page, with a video featuring Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps and other athletes. The video promotes Subway’s “Add Vocado” campaign, with the athletes tossing around avocados and encouraging viewers to add them to their subs.
While the data isn’t yet available for Subway’s latest effort, the results for Swiffer and Ford suggest that the logout page can be fairly effective for advertisers. But is it worth the cost, especially when new research indicates that sponsored stories and earned media are the best ways for brands to promote themselves on the social network?
Oh – and how many of you actually ever log out of Facebook?
