Just days away from the much anticipated Facebook IPO, General Motors reported they were pulling their $10 million dollar Facebook ad spend after seeing little to no results. Of the nearly $40 million per year GM spends on Facebook advertising, approximately $10 million of that is paid ads.

“In terms of Facebook specifically, while we currently do not plan to continue with advertising, we remain committed to an aggressive content strategy through all of our products and brands, as it continues to be a very effective tool for engaging with our customers.” via Forbes

So, why aren't Facebook Ads proving effective for GM?

Lack of innovation in providing marketing partners with tools to increase brand engagement. It's no lie that engagement around content on branded fan pages has seen a steady decline despite Facebook's 901 million monthly active users. 

"The reason, of course, is that Facebook just doesn’t pay nearly as much attention to marketing as it does to user experience. (Not surprising, given its founder’s famous loathing for advertisers.) If Facebook did pay as much attention to the marketers who handed it billions of dollars last year, and who make the site’s very existence possible, maybe we’d see innovative new marketing solutions every six months rather than every few years. Perhaps the company would’ve spent a billion dollars on an ad exchange or marketing measurement tools rather than a simple photo-sharing app. Maybe, just maybe, marketing on Facebook would actually work." via Forrester

There are a lot of marketing professionals giving Facebook the answers to what the future of marketing on Facebook should look like, but what are the chances that Facebook will listen post-IPO?  What do you think the future of Facebook Ads looks like for marketing pros? 

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