All of Facebook’s ad options may seem like a lot to digest, but when you apply your specific business goals to these types of advertising, you’ll see that some of them are more relevant than others. The first thing you should do is address your broad, long-term business goals. With those larger goals in mind, decide how the different kinds of Facebook ads could help you reach them.
For example: If you need to drive more traffic to your new website, a “promote your page” ad, asking people to give you Facebook “Likes,” isn’t the best way to spend your money.
There are two main goals to consider when choosing what type of Facebook ad to run.
1. Increasing Brand Awareness
“Brand awareness” is a trendy term for making your business easily recognizable to potential, current, and past clients. Increasing your brand awareness involves teaching your audience more about your business, making it more likely that they will contact you when they need your products or services. Even though they may not need you right now, enhancing your brand awareness will increase the likelihood that potential customers will remember you (or something about you) when they do.
Currently, the most popular way to do this is on Facebook is by “boosting” your posts. This method is more manual than setting up ads through the Facebook Ads Manager or Power Editor, but it’s also less expensive, allowing you to pay only a dollar a day rather than a five-dollar daily minimum. Due to the Facebook news feed algorithm, the people who “Like” your page (also known as your fans) don’t see every post you produce in their News Feeds. When you choose to pay to boost a post, that post gets placed more highly in your target audience’s News Feeds. You can choose to target your existing fans, friends of your fans, or an entirely new audience that you can design by interests.
Increase Impressions on Facebook
Impressions are the amount of times a post or ad has been seen. Here is a list of advertising options Facebook offers with the goal of increasing impressions:
- Boost your posts
- Promote your page
- Increase brand awareness
- Reach people near your business
- Promote a product catalog
Increase Engagement on Facebook
Engagement is the amount of times a post or ad has been interacted with by a user. These interactions can include Likes, clicks, comments and Shares. Here is a list of advertising options Facebook offers with the goal of increasing engagement:
- Get people to claim your offer
- Get video views
- Collect leads for your business
- Raise attendance at your event
2. Generating Leads and Customers
While ads geared toward generating leads and converting customers also aid brand awareness, their primary purpose is to drive traffic to your website or gain leads specifically for your business. Some businesses offer a product or service that can be utilized immediately and therefore should offer their audience a way to act now rather than wait for the need to come such as with the brand awareness focused options.
The most popular of these options is the “Clicks to Website” option. This type of ad is set up through the Facebook Ads Manager or Power Editor with a budget (a minimum of five dollars per day) and a duration. With this option, you can design your target audience to reach your ideal potential clients. You can also utilize the Facebook pixel—a tracking code that allows Facebook to recognize people who have visited your website and apply your ads to their News Feeds.
The most successful way to use a Clicks to Website ad is to make sure your ad clearly states what visitors will find upon arriving at your website and then give them the opportunity to contact your business directly when they get there. Drive traffic from your ad to a landing page that includes a form for submitting a name and contact information.
Increase Traffic to your website
Here is a list of advertising options Facebook offers with the goal of sending more traffic to your website:
- Send people to your website
- Increase conversions on your website
Increase Traffic to your mobile app
Here is a list of advertising options Facebook offers with the goal of sending more traffic to your mobile app:
- Get installs of your app
- Increase engagement on your app
Facebook advertising works and is less expensive than alternative advertising like Google AdWords or display ads. If advertising is not something you have time for, reach out to Blue Frog’s team of experts to handle it for you!
