Facebook Ads are quickly becoming an integral part of every marketer’s social media strategy, and it’s easy to see why. With over 2 billion Facebook users monthly, Facebook has become the world’s most popular social media platform.
While everyone jumps on the Facebook advertising bandwagon, many marketers aren’t seeing the results they expected when they started experimenting with the platform. Typically, there are two scenarios to blame for this: a low cost-per-click (CPC) that isn’t leading to conversions, or a CPC that is too high. So what’s a marketer to do?
Understanding Social Search
When it comes to running Facebook ads, many marketers employ the same strategies they use when managing Google AdWords. This is a problem, because with Google, prospective clients and customers are looking for you, your services, or a business like yours. They already know what they’re looking for, and they’re actively interested. This is much different than Facebook, where users are viewing a variety of information from photos to news stories and there’s lots of competition for their attention. Facebook ads need to be immediately engaging in order to garner consumers’ attention and drive leads.
So how do you achieve the best results with Facebook Ads? Here are 5 things Facebook advertising pros do to elevate their social media marketing:
1. Carefully Choose Ad Placement
While Facebook offers quite a few ad placements on their platform, there are three locations that are most commonly used: Desktop News Feed, Desktop Right Column, and Mobile News Feed. They each have their own benefits and drawbacks, but if you master them, you’ll be able to deploy your ads more strategically.
Desktop News Feed – This priority placement tends to result in higher conversion rates, but because it’s the top option for most marketing campaigns, ad placement here is the most competitive and expensive.
Desktop Right Column – This ad space is not nearly as in-your-face as ads in News Feed, and works well for retargeting, but is not ideal when targeting initial engagement.
Mobile News Feed – Consumers are accessing Facebook from mobile devices much more often than from a desktop, and right now, initial engagement and brand discovery can often be attained at a much cheaper rate on mobile. This makes Mobile News Feed ads the best bang for your buck.
2. Carefully Choose Who Sees The Ads
When it comes to optimizing Facebook Ads, choosing the right audience can be more important than the ad creative. Equally important is keeping in mind the conversion you’re ultimately aiming for and defining your audience around your advertising goal. There are three ways to define your audience within Facebook Ads Manager and how you use them can impact your marketing efforts:
Core Audience – This allows you to choose your audience based on multiple characteristics, such as location, age, behaviors, and interests.
Custom Audiences – This gives you the ability to upload a list of contacts you’d like to target. There are many data categories here, but the most often used are phone numbers and email addresses.
Lookalike Audiences – This allows you to find people who share similar characteristics to your customers.
3. Choose The Call To Action Carefully
Your call to action (CTA) is just as important as knowing who and where you’re targeting, so every ad you run should have a CTA that clearly directs the action users should take. After deciding on your marketing objective, choose the CTA that best supports your marketing objective:
Website Conversions or Clicks to Websites – This is the most common CTA, and drives traffic to your website. Just be sure that your landing page is optimized for the best user experience. For mobile ads, this means making sure your landing page is tailored for a mobile experience.
‘Call Now’ Buttons – With so many Facebook users already on their mobile phones, phone-call CTAs are an easy way to encourage engagement. Try Local Awareness Ads, they help you reach people who are near one of your business locations, and allow customers to call you right from their Facebook News Feed. Learn more about Local Awareness Ads here.
‘Send Message’ CTA – This is a new CTA for Local Awareness Ads, and gives customers a convenient way to get in touch with your business quickly, which in turn can lead to more sales for your business. One caveat – if you use this conversion method, be sure you’re prepared to respond to customer inquiries in a timely manner.
4. Choose How To Differentiate Ads Carefully
With the who, where, and how covered, it’s time to focus on how to make your ads stand out from the crowd. Instead of focusing on just a logo in your Facebook ads, invest some time in creating product-focused graphics or images that help convey your brand’s accessibility. The most well-rounded campaigns feature multiple ads with relevant and consistent messaging. These ads can then be rotated to avoid ad fatigue.
5. Test And Update Ads Regularly
It’s hard to predict what kind of ad designs will work best for your product, or which audience will be most likely to buy your products. That’s why whether you’re a beginner or pro, A/B testing, or split testing, is the key to successful Facebook ads. While the endless opportunities of Facebook testing can make it somewhat cumbersome, the payoff is well worth the trouble.
Facebook is the world’s most popular social media platform and it’s only getting bigger, so a knowledge of Facebook marketing is essential to any marketer’s toolkit. Whatever your comfort level with Facebook advertising, these tips can help keep your Facebook strategy fresh as you continue to experiment with ad types, creative, and audiences.
