Facebook is the largest social media platform on the internet today. The social network boasts 1.32 billion daily active users, and these users are prime prospects waiting for your business. Facebook Advertising needs to be a major part of your marketing strategy, and you should anticipate increase your Facebook Ads as the network grows.
But what exactly is Facebook Advertising? There are many ways of using paid ads on all platforms, and how does Facebook compare to other pay per click advertising? In this article we’re going to look at all areas of Facebook Advertising.
Once you’re done reading, you’ll know:
We hope that you will find this guide helpful in learning all about advertising on Facebook and how it can increase your sales prospects.
Let’s start with a few facts. On average, users access Facebook eight times a day. 35 million people are updating their Facebook status each day, and active brands post about 8 times a day on Facebook. According to consumers, 57% say that social media plays a large part in choosing what product they are going to buy, with 44% coming from Facebook.
What does that mean for advertising on Facebook? It means that if you are not advertising using Facebook, you’re missing out on billions of users. Having a Facebook page for your business is not enough. 97% of your fans on Facebook are not seeing your posts due to Facebook algorithms and individual user “like” patterns.
Enter Facebook Advertising, a targeted way to increase your sales funnel and prospects. There are a number of different ways to advertise on Facebook. Businesses can choose to create an ad that links directly to their Facebook page, website, or even create an event where attendees can RSVP.
Facebook Advertising works like other pay per click ads – you create an ad, set a budget, and watch the likes and prospects com pouring into your website.
Like other pay per click advertising platforms, Facebook Ads are come in many different varieties. You can target your Facebook Ad to users in specific locations, demographics, age, interests, and any other profile information that they person chooses to share on Facebook.
As a marketer, it is up to you to decide how you choose to use your Facebook Advertising space. The thing about Facebook Advertising is that it’s scarily accurate – even making some users a little uneasy when new ads appear on their feeds.
Contrary to popular belief, Facebook is not listening to conversations through your phone – instead, it is using you and your family’s demographic information to provide targeted ads that give you exactly what you’re looking for.
Using search history (both on and off Facebook), ads appear to Facebook users with items that they have recently searched for in the last few hours or days. Facebook’s targeted audience feature gives it a huge advantage over competitors and gives you an easy way to target your key demographic.
Other than the reasons we mentioned above, Facebook Advertising offers a wide variety of options. There are six different Facebook Ad types to choose from, and each is equally effective in its own right.
With all of these options, which type of Facebook Ad is most effective? It really depends on your target audience. The biggest thing that marketing agencies agree upon is that ads with images have a higher return and engagement rate than posts that do not.
Facebook boasts billions of daily active users, but Google can say the same thing. What makes Facebook a better option for your paid advertising dollars of the search engine? Again, it depends upon the needs of your business.
Let’s understand the difference between Facebook Ads and Google Ads. Google only allows pay per click options. Paid search focuses on targeted keywords and are only text based. Users must search for the specific keyword or keyword strain that marketers bid on in order for their results to appear to prospective clients.
This can decrease the number of people that are actually exposed to your business if you are not 100% certain the effective keywords associated with your business.
However, Facebook Ads are primarily social. You are paying for your users to interact with your post, and hopefully become a power user of your brand. Instead of setting specific keywords, Facebook Ads are targeted specifically to user likes, dislikes, and demographic information – effectively targeting prospects that will truly find your brand within their interests.
While Google is the most popular search engine, Google Ad words help drive your business towards new customers, while Facebook Ads is targeted to bring prospects directly to your brand. Facebook has a massive amount of active users – users that want to engage with brands that they are interested in, which is what makes Facebook marketing so much more effective than other paid search options.
Once you set your specific audience, Facebook will also allow you to create a “lookalike audience” that reaches out to prospects with the same interests and shopping behaviors as your established client base. Narrow your audience – increase your sales!
Time for the million-dollar question – what will a Facebook Ad campaign cost? There is a process to consider when setting up your Facebook Ads. Similar to Google Ads, there is a bidding process that allows you to set a budget and determine how much you’d like to pay per click of your ad.
There are many factors that play into the cost of your Facebook Ad Campaign. These include:
All of these factors will determine the cost of your Facebook Ad, but look at the following average graph from WordStream to give you an idea of the average cost.
Facebook tries to make it incredibly easy to set up a marketing campaign. Once you have logged into your business Facebook page, click on the “Create Ad” button in the top right corner. You will now be directed to choose an objective for your ad.
This is where things get fun. Decide what your campaign objective will be. You can choose from the following options:
Why does Facebook ask this question? The answer is pretty simple. By giving Facebook this information, it will help you optimize your ads to deliver the best possible results to YOUR objective. Select the objective that best represents your end goal – and remember, you can always try out another objective later!
Decide on a naming convention that you can use whenever you set up a new Facebook Ad Campaign. Make it something easy to identify and add a date range to make things REALLY user friendly when you’re doing research at a different time.
This is when Facebook starts to really shine with its advertising prowess. You can select from two options here:
or
During this set up, select as much information as possible to target your key audience. Facebook allows you to target information like:
These options allow you to keep your audience as broad or as specific as you’d like, but remember that target audience does affect the cost of your ad.
To increase your visibility, Facebook allows you to select where you would like your ad to appear on your audience’s time line. You can choose from:
Remember that prime real estate (like News Feeds and Instagram) will increase the cost per click of your ad, so choose wisely! Facebook will allow you to manually place your ad, or you can choose to have Facebook auto place it for you. Take a look at the following cost data to see how the cost varies between placements.
For first time users, it’s recommended that you let Facebook auto place your ad until you become more familiar with the platform itself.
Here’s when you get to set your budget for your ads. There are a few factors to consider.
Daily budgets allow you to set a maximum amount per day that you want to pay towards your Facebook Ads. Facebook will spend this, and only this amount, during your campaign. It may fluctuate a little during high traffic opportunities, but Facebook is smart enough to decrease the spend on another day, ensuring you are not charged more than your daily budget.
Lifetime budgets gives you the option to set a budget for the entire duration of your campaign. Facebook will take the lead and calculate the average spend per day.
Remember that you cannot change the budget type after setting up your campaign, so be sure you are selecting appropriately for your budget needs!
The final step in Facebook Advertising is to select your Facebook ad type. This allows you to choose from the six types we discussed above, and create your ad based on your marketing needs.
There is a lot of information regarding Facebook Advertising, and we have just scratched the surface with this guide. Hopefully we’ve covered the basics, allowing you to gain a foundation in the use of Facebook Advertising. We’d love for you to visit Kaizen Sigma for more information on how we can help with your Facebook Advertising needs!
[tweetshare tweet=”Why You Should Consider Using Facebook Advertising as a Staple in Your Marketing Plans”]
Intro Producing content on social media can be a painstaking process. Anyone in social media…
Intro Having a platform to communicate with your audience is one of the keys to…
Online marketing can be a little tricky sometimes. That’s why having helpful tools to use…