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There is no simple answer to the question – Will Facebook Ads Work For Me?
In answering it, you have to consider there are 1.47 billion people who log into Facebook every day… it’s staggering. That’s 1,470,000,000 people!
Surely there’s a few people in this 1.47 billion who need your product/service – no?
And there is – but to understand how to reach them. We need to have a quick look at how people engage with a business for their service.
Consumers engage with companies in two ways. They either have a absolute need right now for your product or service – in which case they find you. Think about when your tap explodes and water’s pouring out every where. You need to find a plumber right now.
Or they have a general want/desire for your product/service, though they are not quite ready to purchase just yet. Think about the tap that has a really slow drip, that’s starting to get faster. When you get time you’ll call a plumber – right (until it explodes and water starts pouring out everywhere).
It’s this later group which are influenced by interrupt advertising, or Outbound marketing. Where by you put out an ad and people respond to it. (Leaking tap – no worries. Well fix it just like new.)
Facebook is like a modern equivalent to a newspaper or magazine. That is, in between the stuff you want to read, are ads for goods and services. In this case, if you don’t have a leaking tap, you probably won’t even register that you’ve seen the add (though when you discover the leaking tap, you’ll be sure you saw an ad somewhere).
Now – this is where it gets really cool. Unlike a newspaper, where you’re advertising to everybody. Facebook gives you the ability to create audiences who are likely to be interested in your products/services.
Pets for example – if you run a steam cleaning business targeting residential properties. You might run an ad to pet owners – “Attention Dog Lovers – did you know it’s recommended you wash your carpets every 3 months if you have pets? Grab our 20% off voucher when you book online now.”
* Did you know there are 23,000 people in Australia who are interested in origami – who would have thought!
My point being, there are so many options for creating an audience for your product/service. It is literally mind blowing.
Even if there isn’t an exact fit, there are still techniques for building your own audience using a broader targeting to start with, then focusing on the people who have shown interest with a retargeting campaign.
And now this is where is where it gets really cool for business owners. Retargeting.
Lets say you’ve run an ad. It was a good ad and people have responded, but not everyone has purchased. Using the retargeting options in Facebook you can build a campaign which you can advertise to those people who have interacted with you, but not yet purchased.
Better still, you can use retargeting to build warm audiences so that when you do advertise your offer, people are more likely to take it up. Warm audiences typically have a higher engagement rate because they already know you to some extent.
Testing, Testing, Testing… the most successful campaigns are the result of endless testing. Testing audiences, testing copy, testing creative, testing offers.
And here is where Facebook comes into a league of it’s own. You can test everything faster than at any other point in time.
Take the magazine is use to be the Production Editor for. Our mag was designed and sent off for printing 3 months out. It would basically be 4-5 months lead time before your ad hit the audience. Fine if you’re on a winning formula. Not so good if your testing.
Now you can end to end test Audiences, Copy, Creative and Offer in 15 days (3 days run time for each ad set, with a generous day in-between for analysis and setting up the next test).
It is worth mentioning here, that the Facebook Algorithm is next level in its ability to send the clients you need your way. It does need time though to figure out who you’re looking for. The longer you’re running ads for the better it will get at learning who you need. And believe it or not, Facebook want you to be successful. The more successful you are, the more you’ll spend on ads. This is a whole other discussion though.
So – do Facebook ads really work?
Unless you’ve spent at least $10k on testing ads (not running, but testing audiences, copy, creative… analysing the results, then going again) and come up with the answer that your leads are too expensive.
You haven’t really tried advertising on Facebook.
Send us a message and we’ll call you straight back…