Facebook Advertising in the Digital world is a bit like Marmite people either love it or hate it – usually the haters have either never tried it, not using it effectively or are ‘Google AdWords’ stuck in their ways. Maybe it is new (er) and different but with over 1 million advertisers on Facebook and a predicted $29.91 billion worldwide social media advertising spend in 2016, something must be going right…right? Since 2010 there has been a 680% growth in advertising spend on Facebook alone and this growth is only set to increase.

So let’s look at why we think Facebook ads are a go-to tool for you marketing strategy. For so long now Google AdWords, the main competitor to Facebook, have been king. Basically AdWords works by using the key words a user searches for matching this to display your advert, the user is prompted to see your advert, click and buy your service/product – easy? Well simple in context, however with everything in life there are wee gremlins in the AdWords world. Each product/ service you wish to promote will have their own set of AdWords needed to ensure you’re found in the right searches, great if you have a unique niche product but in reality there are always competitors out there and they too will be using the same keyword searches to attract your customers as such the bidding game for keywords can quickly become enormously expensive. Additionally, users often will already know what it is they are looking for and as such won’t even Google a solution for their needs, meaning you just simply won’t be seen by potential new business.

 

Enter Facebook Ads to the stage.. With more than 1.4 billion users, 1.28 billion in an average month, the way users interact with Facebook immediately eliminates of these scenarios because on Facebook it doesn’t matter what users search for. Facebook Ads target real people by their age, gender, hobbies, location, jobs etc.  – Not the keywords they are searching by.

 

This means that targeting ads on Facebook is easier – You need to understand who will have an interest in your product /service be as specific as you can: by breaking down the target audience effectively you will also be saving on costs.

 

Reach customers in areas of where they live or do business breaking the location down by Country, region, postcode or even just around your business area.

 

Consider the demographic of the audience you are talking – Gender, age, interest and even language. More advanced targeting will enabling you to target ‘look alike’ audiences or customising those who receive your message from targeted contact lists. Breaking down those who see your message enables you to reach potential new business for example selling razors your customer would be say 25 year + male, However via Facebook you can target the 15 year old male who will not actively search for razors on the internet but potential a new customer –  possibly a life time customer at that.

 

Creating an advert for Facebook – Facebook offers a very broad range of Ad types that can be suited to all needs. Advertising on Facebook is still relatively cheap so we suggest that if possible test different formats and see which ones perform better for you and deliver the best results at the lowest investment.

Your goals? Consider the call to action opportunities available to your business needs and how your advert can best meet these.

GoalWhat do you want from your ad? Call to ActionHow will Facebook Ads direct users to react to your ad?
Page and post Engagement Engaging through page comments and likes will enable to target a new audience allowing you to gain an insight into your customer’s likes and how you best can communicate with them.
Page Likes Advertising for page likes enables your posts to appear in their timeline increasing awareness of your business and promotions.
Clicks to website Advertising your website people will be able to click your advert leading them straight to your online products, home page etc.
Website Conversion By adding a piece of HTML code to your website you will be able to access report when people visit your page via Facebook – seeing what interests them etc.
App Install or engagement An insight of how people want to install or engage with your app will enable you to understand and grow usability and positioning of it.
Event Response Using an event response advert enables you to interact with users calendars – adding, displaying and reminding them of an opening, promotion, event..
Offer Claims Engagement with an offer is a great introduction for you product/service – FB ads ensure that you control the time period and amount of people who claim
Video Views Video is a fantastic way of engaging and showcasing yourself on a personal level.
Local Awareness Reaching out to those in your local area is a great way to ensure you are target relevant people as well as keeping cost down.
Lead Generation Enabling you to privately collate personal data with a tailored pre-populated form allowing you to direct offers, newsletters quotes etc.
 

The majority of Facebook users will browse Facebook to see what is new with friends, family and share information on interests they may have your adverts will appear alongside or with in the news feed alongside with these stories – seamlessly – on both desktop and mobile.

 

Analysing the success of your advertising – Insights – No matter how fabulous you think your advert is you need to monitor it all the way, no campaign can just be left to look after itself for ever. Facebook offers great insights to your campaigns to allow you to ensure it is performing to its max with Advert Manager. Enabling you to compare how and when your campaigns have been performing successfully or not, set trends, open up tools allowing customising of audiences, insights pages and media etc.  Adverts Manager reports can be broken down into individual campaigns or more advanced chunks, Facebook has invest a great deal of time fine tuning these tools and as such are pretty user friendly so don’t be afraid to explore and have play with them.

 

Only you will really understand how your business will fit within the Facebook advertising scenario so experiment with different formats and goals and even when you think you have it sussed – Facebook will introduce something new such as Instagram – pixels – carousels– so you will always be tweaking and learning with Facebook ads but as I said before in marketing terms it is an extraordinarily low cost form of adverting so don’t be afraid of it.