Snap, Twitter Target Facebook in Dueling Advertising Campaigns

(Bloomberg) -- Facebook Inc. prides itself on bringing people closer together. Unfortunately for Facebook, that includes some of the social network’s business rivals.

Snap Inc. and Twitter Inc. are running separate but simultaneous ad campaigns this week with a common theme: You aren’t your true self when you use Facebook and Instagram.

For the campaign titled "Real Friends," Snap paid influencers to post quotes about friendship alongside the Snapchat logo -- on Facebook-owned Instagram. "When we launched Snapchat more than seven years ago, it wasn’t about capturing the traditional Kodak moment, or trying to look pretty or perfect," the company wrote in a blog post, a not-so-veiled shot at its social media rivals.

Twitter was even more direct. In a series of New York and San Francisco subway ads, the company put up real tweets from users comparing their Twitter identity to their Facebook or Instagram persona. The tweets sent the impression that people are authentic on Twitter -- they can talk openly about their sexuality, or strike a goofy pose -- but that they have to put on a front on Facebook or Instagram.

Both campaigns hit on the same theme, that Facebook and Instagram are where you go to put on a show; Snapchat and Twitter are where you go to be your true self.

The timing of the ads is interesting. Snap and Twitter have spent years in Facebook’s shadow, and with much smaller user bases and businesses, comparisons to Facebook were rarely a good thing for either company.

But Facebook is an easy punching bag these days. The company has consistently mishandled its users’ personal data, been accused of propagating political and social divisions and drawn the ire from nearly every politician and regulatory body imaginable. There’s a lot to attack. It’s now dealing with a new but ongoing antitrust investigation from the Federal Trade Commission.

For perhaps the first time ever, Snap and Twitter are not only welcoming the comparison to Facebook. They’re paying for it.

To contact the reporter on this story: Kurt Wagner in San Francisco at kwagner71@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Jillian Ward at jward56@bloomberg.net, Molly Schuetz, Robin Ajello

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