Facebook ad spend it on an upward trajectory, on pace to compete with Google in 2017 and blow spending on other social media networks out of the water.
As a business owner, manager or entrepreneur, you know that just because everyone else is spending money on something doesn't mean you should.You also know how easy it is to spend a lot of money on something like Google Search Ads or Facebook ads and see little to no clicks or sales conversions.
Yet with Facebook, the types of advertising grow increasingly varied and the opportunity to target, customize and optimize is getting easier and easier.
If you're a noob to Facebook advertising, check out these tips for how you can use it for your business.
1. Boost Your Posts
This is an easy one and if you manage a Facebook page for a business, you've probably been prompted by Facebook to boost well-performing posts for as little as $5. There's good reason behind that: Facebook's organic reach has plummeted — with some research saying it's as low as 2% — and Facebook, very openly, says they're prioritizing content shared by family and friends over brands.
Hootsuite’s advice for how to create effective Facebook content
So where does that leave businesses?
With two options:
Create engaging, valuable, entertaining content that your followers would want to share (the whole premise of content marketing is this — to build trust with your audience, not just blast promos or self-serving "stories" in their faces)
Pay for their attention with advertisements or boosted posts
Boosted posts ensure that your post shows up in more people's feeds, so it's worth it to try to fight through the noise.
Good for: Breaking into an extremely crowded newsfeed for a little spend
Not good for: Gaining page likes or driving long-term, repeated traffic to your website
2. Gain Followers
Ah, the followers metric.Five years ago, followers meant a lot to marketing managers and CMOs.
Since then, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn have updated their algorithms to prioritize engagement over number of followers. Followers are now known among seasoned marketers as a “vanity metric.”
It still holds value, though. The more followers – within your target demographic – means more changes to get eyeballs on your content marketing, which should create awareness for your brand and demonstrate value to your reader/viewer. . . who in theory should be in your target demographic. You do have the option to buy followers.
However, before you enter your credit card information into Facebook, Twitter or Pinterest, ask yourself:
What am I going to do with all those followers?
Say, tomorrow, you had 100,000 Facebook followers - what would you do with that asset?
If you have a plan in place, that's great. Maybe you’ll drive them to a lead generation page. Maybe you'll have a competition. Maybe you'll ask for feedback.
Be aware that unless you have a campaign — and ideally a strategy — around engaging all those eyeballs, consider investing your marketing budget in another option that has a more specific ask. This Reddit thread explains it a bit better.
And this short video explains the risks of buying followers – and what you can do instead.
Good for: Growing your potential (read: not guaranteed to engage with or see your content) audience
Not good for: Direct sales conversions
3. DIY Targeted Advertisements
If you know who your ideal customer is, you’ll probably find it easy to navigate Facebook’s ad manager. Just select the demographics you know you want to target. This could include:
Location, at the city, state or country level
Gender
Household income
Life milestones like buying a house, having children, getting married, going to school
Education level
Product preference, from generic to luxury brand
Audience look-a-likes
Here’s a short video on how to target your Facebook – and Instagram! – advertisements.
Good for: Getting your feet wet with Facebook advertising
Not good for: Immediate sales conversions or low costs-per-click or cost-per-conversion
4. Ad Optimized by Facebook
Beware: no one is really sure how this works. For marketing professionals and agencies, Facebook is one of the several digital marketing channels with what's known as "walled gardens," or platforms where you're allowed to publish and advertise, but you're not allowed to see the details behind-the-scenes. And ultimately, media giants like Facebook are in control of the user experience.
Seasoned marketers prefer to manage their own advertising optimization because Facebook's version of optimization doesn't factor in the quality of a lead. The algorithm is designed to optimize action on your advertisement, and nothing beyond that, such as opting in to an email newsletter or signing up for a consultation.
But, if you’re not comfortable with – or experienced with – selecting the right demographics or the right networks, allowing Facebook to optimize for you may be a better option than trying to figure it out yourself.
Good for: Controlling your cost-per-click if you don't have the time or experience to optimize your advertising
Not good for: Immediate sales conversions
5. A/B Testing Ads
This.This is what you want to do if you have the time, energy and resources. You should A/B test everything. It’s a hell of a time to be alive as a marketer or business owner. You have the power to test your marketing and optimize it. Gone are the days when, as John Wanamaker famously put it, you guessed which half of your marketing was successful. . . and which half was a total waste.
You can test:
Social media posts
Paid social media advertisements
Paid search advertisements
Display advertisements
Landing pages
Email subject lines
Calls to action
Test your advertisements. This means testing variations of your advertisements, changing one component to see how your target audience responds. The variants you can try testing include:
Headline
Image/Photo/Video/Gif
Copy
Call to action
And if you’re into getting really sophisticated, you can A/B test landing pages or destinations.
Good for: Building a a database of digital marketing results that your marketing department can use to make increasingly better marketing decisions
Not good for: Short-term or small advertising budgets — small budgets and short campaigns mean less data to analyze
6. Boost a Video
In a similar vein to boosting posts (see above), you can boost a video.The difference is your post will probably link somewhere else – to a blog post, landing page, contest form – whereas a boosted video post will just show off your amusing or informative video that you created. So, your viewers will stay within the Facebook platform but gain awareness of your brand.Here’s an example
Good for: According to Facebook, this is great for getting on your target audience’s radar and for communicating complex messages
Not good for: Driving your audience to a destination outside of Facebook's wall — i.e. your website, email opt-in form or another landing page The beautiful thing about Facebook advertising is that you can use it for a bunch of different business reasons. These are just a few examples to get your creative juices flowing.