There's a lot of press going around about Facebook and whether it's producing a return on investment for its advertisers. From recent reports there's no doubt that some companies are doing especially well, but these companies are mainly in the Business To Consumer marketplace.
Recently we've been engaged in running a few campaigns for clients on both Facebook and Linked In trying to decipher which is the best social network for Business 2 Business leads.
The theory behind using Facebook is that due to the large user base there would be significant number of top-level business decision makers who have accounts. By putting the business brand and offer in front of them this would hopefully help trigger them to make a decision.
The theory behind using LinkedIn is that it's a dedicated business-networking site where business owners and executives go to share ideas, and receive recommendations on who to do business with. This creates a captive audience, which is strongly aligned with the target we are aiming for.
So using both of these networks in the test we completed we did paid advertising and the results were predictable. Linked In returned a solid 2.6% where as Facebook solid returned 0%.
Now I don't say predictable because Facebook doesn't generate returns, it does for the right products in the right market. But a Business 2 Business product doesn't sell so well in the Facebook environment.
It's a little bit like going to a little league game with your kids and trying to close a business deal at the game. While it's appropriate to talk lightly about business in this environment it's not a pace to be doing big deals.
This is where I believe that the lack of results on Facebook stem from for Business 2 Business lead generation. It's a social experience not a business experience.
So if you're looking for business lead generation then I'd recommend sticking to Linked In.
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