March 21, 2017

Facebook ads are an effective, affordable way for small businesses in Windsor-Essex to reach their target audience. Since 2014, I’ve partnered with several businesses to create Facebook specific ad campaigns that not only generated brand awareness and buzz but also led to an increase in website clicks, leads and sales.

In a recent Canadian Leading Markets Survey, 79% of marketers surveyed stated that they planned to use digital display ads in their marketing within the next year. One of the reasons behind the growing use is the measurement tools digital display ads like Facebook ads provide. Small businesses and the marketers they work with want to know exactly “who their campaigns are reaching, how advertising is influencing brand opinion and what impact those efforts have on sales.” (Nielsen, 2016) Those types of numbers just can’t be provided by traditional mediums like radio, print and TV.

Some businesses I’ve come across locally are skeptical about Facebook advertising. They’ve all heard a horror story or two about how someone spent $1,200 on a Facebook campaign that yielded zero prospects. I’m not here to say those stories aren’t true, I’m just here to say chances are that business just wasn’t ready for Facebook ads. How can you tell if you’re ready? Well, I’m glad you asked! Here are the 7 signs your business is ready to experiment with Facebook Ads.

1) Your Facebook page is setup as a business page

I know what you’re thinking… “Sebastian that’s a no brainer!” I agree! But you wouldn’t believe the number of Facebook pages meant for business that are setup as personal accounts. If your Facebook business page is adding “Friends” instead of adding “Likes”, it’s setup incorrectly.

2) Your business information is entered in the “About” section

Because Facebook ads are linked to your Facebook page, a whole new set of customers who may have never heard of you before will be visiting your page. Make sure you have all your “About” section information filled out including: website address, description, year started, and contact information.

3) Your page is updated with content

You don’t have to have a high number of Followers to experiment with Facebook ads. What you do need to have is a page that’s updated with unique and useful content so new visitors have an idea of who you are as a business. Add industry blogs, infographics and photos of your staff to get things going. Also, be sure you have properly sized profile and cover photos so your page is branded and professional.

4) You’re ready to commit time to respond to questions

There’s a strong chance that your Facebook advertising will lead to an influx of emails, phone calls, direct messages and comments to your business. Due to the “immediate gratification” of social media, these questions will need to be responded to in a timely fashion which means you’ll have to commit a set amount of time to respond. In my experience, an acceptable amount of time to respond to a social media question is no longer than 24 hours.

5) You’ve determined your audience, budget and duration

No advertising campaign, digital or traditional should ever be started without a plan in place. Facebook provides incredible tools to target your audience by location, demographic and interest. Be sure to test these options during the planning stages of your campaign. Budget and duration depend on your company size and what you hope to achieve with the campaign. I’ve run successful campaigns with as little as $100 a month for 4-6 months but talk to your marketer about what’s best for your business.

6) You’ve determined the goal of your Facebook campaign

Similar to ensuring you’ve set the audience, budget and duration of your campaign, you’ll also want to set some campaign goals and use the proper Facebook ad type to reach them. If your goal is to boost the amount of “Likes” on your page, use a Page Promotion ad. If your goal is to get more visitors to a landing page on your website, use a Website Clicks ad. Once you’ve determined the type of ad, set a hard number of “Likes”, clicks etc. you want to receive and reach it!

7) Your ad design is set to the proper size

A HUGE pet peeve of mine is seeing a Facebook ad that is improperly sized! Facebook details the recommended ad size for each type of ad they provide within their Ad Manager, be sure to use that size. Another recommendation from Facebook is to use less than 20% of your ad space for text. This is a bit hard to determine if you’re “eye-balling” it but Facebook created this useful tool to help you out.

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And there you have it! Like the magic 8-ball if “all signs point to yes”, then you’re ready to get started with Facebook ads! Not quite sure if you’re ready? Get in touch with me for a free evaluation of your Facebook business page.