Facebook Advertising has grown at an incredible rate. Starting in 2009, ads were responsible for under $1 billion. In 2012, that number has risen to over $5 billion (US). Facebook ads are undeniably an easy way to grow your fan base, which directly relates to new customers.
With advertising come rules, and Facebook has plenty of guidelines. The good news is that most of them are common sense and putting a little thought and ethics into your practice will go a long way. So what does it take to have an ad rejected by Facebook?
Ads must not contain false, misleading, fraudulent, or deceptive claims or content. -Facebook Advertising Guidelines
The top 5 reasons your ad was rejected by Facebook
- Capitalizing every word or an entire word. Let's face it; this is incredibly rude. Randomly capitalized words take away from the design of the site and interrupts the flow of reading. It also happens to be one of the reasons your ad will be rejected. I've seen ads break this rule and get away with it. This usually happens when the capitalization is tasteful, so use it sparingly and only when needed.
- Misleading ad text. This one is exactly as it sounds, if your copy doesn't match your company and products it's likely to get rejected.
- Deceptive offers. Very similar to the rejection above, if your offer is unrealistic or your landing pages don't match the ad offer, it's going to be rejected. A real person, hired by Facebook is looking at your ads to ensure a positive user experience on their network.
- Inappropriate images. We know that beautiful women in ads are going to grab attention. There was a time when Facebook would allow images of scantily clad women slide through. The've now cut down on this, however. Unless the image is relevant to the ad, there's a good chance it's going to be rejected. Again, Facebook is trying hard to make the user experience safe and fun; keep this in mind and you'll have no problems with your ad flying through.
- Ad destination. Here's the big one; This is by far the number one reason ads are rejected. According to Facebook, "Products and services promoted in the ad copy must be clearly represented on the landing page, and the destination site may not offer or link to any prohibited product or service." Facebook will not tolerate a destination that includes pop-up ads, landing pages that don't match the ad description, etc. Although they don't say it, Facebook tends to prefer ads that direct users to a page on Facebook. Users like this too, because it gives them a level of comfort being on a site they trust. If you're finding your ads are being rejected or you really want to use content from your website, build an app using Inline frames, this way your site appears within the Facebook framework.