Why Advertise with Facebook?
890 million people log into Facebook every day of every year. Certainly some of them have to be in your community and some of them must be your target audience. If only there was an inexpensive and effective way to get your message in front of those eyes.
There is ! It is Facebook advertising and you see it on your own Facebook news feed every time you log on. What you have to understand about the Facebook audience is that they are there to look at pictures of grand kids, laugh at funny cat memes, and catch up on the lives of people they knew in high school but really couldn’t care less about today. They aren’t necessarily there to buy your service. But they can be.
You don’t even have to have a Facebook page to do Facebook marketing. You can still drive traffic to your website, but your advertising options will be more limited and honestly if you are in business you absolutely must have a Facebook page.
When you do it right, Facebook ads are a cost effective way to reach a specifically targeted audience. Just like print advertising, spend your money wisely. It is very easy to spend money ineffectively with Facebook if you don’t think your campaigns through.
Don’t waste your advertising budget on ads to get people to “Like” your page. Spend your money on actual Facebook ads. The wise marketer will spend money on ads that provide an offer and on ads targeted to existing leads.
What Makes a Good Facebook Ad?
Your offer may be a dynamite but it will fizzle if your ad doesn’t contain the right mix of elements.
Visual – Facebook is a visual medium and your ads should be visual. Don’t let your ad be more than 20% text. Get artwork, pictures, and visuals that are eye catching are a must.
Relevant – Deliver your message to the right audience. Don’t sell your services to college and high school kids please. Target people who are interested in your services, by age, location or other factors.
Tempting – Make your ads tempting and offer a valuable proposition. It’s not enough to say you are the best HVAC service company; say why you are the best and dangle a carrot to get them to click through to your site or your offer. If you offer same day service or after hours service; that is what makes you different. So say it in your ad. Then tempt them with an offer that includes a discount or free product or service (remember those drain pan tablets/strips or filter incentives mentioned in Part 2 of this series?)
Clear and Urgent Call to Action – The best ads are those that don’t create confusion. Make it clear what you want the reader to do. If you start with a verb where possible “Get” “Buy” “Click” you will get a call to action. You can instill a sense of urgency by terms like “Before its too late” and “Limited Time Offer”
Facebook offers the following 2 types of ads:
Right Hand Side
These ads appear to the right of your News feed. They are cheaper than news feed ads but still can be a quality convertor when done right. Focus on call to action and visual since your space is limited.
News Feed
These ads are more expensive. They appear in the News feed and look like traditional ads. You have more room for text and visuals on these ads.
Hit The Target – Here’s How
The best thing about Facebook is that they have captured an incredible amount of information about their users. This allows you to tap into their database to target your audience, including Geo-targeting down to a mile.
Have you ever seen an ad that seems to follow you all over the internet and Facebook? That is called a re-targeted ad. Facebook lets you re-target a specified audience. You can upload a customer list of emails and create ads for just this target audience. For example, beginning 2 weeks before an annual service is due, you can start serving those customers a Facebook ad and then follow up with a post card or email. You can use Facebook to Fish in Your Own Pond.
What makes Facebook so great is that you can target your ads to people of certain ages and geographic areas. Let’s say you want to focus on a neighborhood that was built 10 years ago and the owners might be thinking about replacing the furnace or AC that the builder put in. All you need is the ZIP code of the neighborhood and you can target the people in just that neighborhood. You don’t have to waste money advertising to people that don’t own homes, filter your audience down by age.
There is no question about it. Facebook can be a powerful and cost effective way to market your business.
The only real question is when will you get started?
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