Running Your First Facebook Ad

By Sarah Giometti | Facebook Marketing

May 18

The best way to reach consumers nowadays is online where your customers already are. In fact, social media advertising has the highest ROI of any popular form of advertising today. That’s why you can’t afford not to invest in Facebook ads, especially if you want to reach more customers. Still, running your first Facebook ad can be a challenge to make a success. These five tips tell you what you need to know about running your first Facebook ad successfully.

 

  1. Match your chosen ad approach to your goals. Facebook ads have three categories for “marketing objectives” of ads: awareness, consideration, and conversion. This automatically helps better target who will view your ad and where it should be placed. Carefully consider what you want your ad to achieve before selecting an option. After all, selling a particular limited time deal (conversion) is quite different than increasing page views for your brand (awareness), but both can heavily influence your overall revenue. If you aren’t sure which may be best for you, keep in mind that “awareness” goals often have the highest ROI.
  2. Target your ideal customer carefully. You may think that showing your ad to the widest possible audience will perform best, but studies show that the best-targeted ads have the most success. Don’t just try to appeal to any person who may buy your product. Create specific targeted personas with age, gender, identity, and interests pinpointed. Once you have decided on the ideal persona, add as many details about them as possible to the audience designations on Facebook. You’ll spend less money and get more clicks.
  3. Consider your media options when choosing your first Facebook ad format. Ads allow many media options, but consider what visuals you want to use carefully. Videos and “Carousels” of rotating images tend to attract much more attention than a single stationary photo. In fact, a poorly chosen image can make or break an ad campaign. Consider all your media options and see how you can best invest in visual media.
  4. Get creative and appeal to what people want. We see tons of stuff on Facebook every day. It takes a creative Facebook ad to pull our attention. Think about what drives you to look at a Facebook post and then figure out that same motivation for your ideal customer. Try and provide them with something actually useful for solving their problems– or at least something entertaining enough to distract them for a moment.
  5. Tune your less obvious demographics. Most people think to refine the typical main four demographics (age, gender, language and location) when defining a Facebook ad, but don’t miss out on a chance to refine the “other demographics” as well. Details like relationship status, political affiliation, behaviors, and connections help you better reach your ideal target. When you pinpoint a few defining demographics from these categories, you get a much closer match for your ad.

 

If you keep these tips in mind, you may not get the massive ROI that companies around the world have reported from their Facebook ads on your first try, but you will catch attention and make your ad worth the cost. More importantly, you’ll have a good starting benchmark to improve upon.

Still, some people struggle to pinpoint exactly what types of information may appeal to their audience, which is where Provaro Marketing can help. At Provaro, we have years of experience creating targeted digital marketing campaigns, so we can help you find the best way to make your first Facebook ads appealing to your ideal customers. We can help you grow your business using Facebook.

Contact one of our Facebook advertising experts today. You can reach us at 707.595.7002 for a free consultation today.

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