1600 Layoffs At P&G - Power of Facebook and Digital Marketing

Banking on the power of Social and other digital marketing tactics, Procter & Gamble Co. is planning to eliminate about 1,600 non manufacturing jobs, including some in marketing.

Chief Financial Officer Jon Moeller suggests that it would be within the range of the company's usual restructuring efforts and will result in $240 million annual savings. Overall the cuts only make up about 3% of the estimated 129,000 employees.


Chairman-CEO Bob McDonald said that he expects P&G's advertising costs to moderate as it moves more spending into digital media, where the sheer number of options and availability of largely free distribution drives down expenses.

Mr. McDonald said, "In the digital space, with things like Facebook and Google and others, we find that return on investment of the advertising when properly designed, when the big idea is there, can be much more efficient," 


He also cited the example of recent Old Spice campaign which generated 1.8 billion for P&G in free impressions. He said "there are many other examples I can cite from all over the world."