For most business owners, Facebook ads are a dream come true. With 1.35 billion monthly active users on Facebook you can be guaranteed that your ideal client is there, and with the highly targeted ad functionality you don’t have to waste money targeting the wrong people.
Unfortunately, many aren’t getting the conversions they want with Facebook ads. There are, however, a few things you can do to improve ROI and increase conversions. Check out these three keys for creating Facebook ads that convert.
Target Your Exact Ideal Client
Don’t waste advertising dollars targeting Facebook users who will never purchase from you. Instead, identify your ideal client (from finances to interests) and create audiences representing those exact people. Create different audiences for each ad (this lets you change the image for each ad to ensure you’re using an image that will resonate with each audience) in order to get the best conversion rate.
Expert tip: as you’re creating new audiences, save them so you can access them easily later. Also, make sure each audience has between 500,000 and 1 million people.
Use Eye-Catching Images
Use eye-catching images that will make users stop to read the ad. Avoid photos that are too stock photo-ish, as they tend to be cold and impersonal. Think about what ads get your attention in the newsfeed and replicate that.
Expert tip: split test different images within each ad set. You set an audience at the ad set level, which means ads within the set share an audience and a budget. As one ad performs better than the other, Facebook will put the better ad in the newsfeed more often, improving your ROI.
Focus On the Benefits
What is the end user going to get if they click your ad? How will it help them? Keep your copy conversational and focus on benefits and results. The more specific you can get here the better! And don’t forget to include a call to action where you tell the user exactly what you want him or her to do.
Don’t have the time?
Creating and distributing great content, managing your Facebook advertising, and growing an engaged social media audience all takes time. You know it’s essential for your business, but unfortunately, you’re too busy running your business to manage it well. Learn how I can help you to better manage your social media and advertising efforts.
About Sheena
Sheena helps busy entrepreneurs and small businesses maximize the power of social media to increase the success of their online marketing efforts.
Sheena White is a social media strategist and copywriter who helps busy entrepreneurs who struggle with selling their products and filling their events to rock their sales copy and social media so they can triple conversions. She helps clients define their ideal client and then, through a combination of savvy social media strategy and killer sales copy, helps them to warm up cold leads and turn them from browsers into buyers. While the road to success hasn’t been easy, it is her enthusiasm, sincerity, and commitment to the success of her clients that has won her loyal fans. In addition to two degrees in English, Sheena has completed John Carlton’s Simple Writing System as well as the Customer Acquisition Specialist Certification and Social Media Manager Certification from Digital Marketer. She has been featured on the podcast Design 101 – Designing your Best Life and is a regular contributor for Social Quant and Business.com.
I particularly resonate about not chasing after numbers that don’t matter. We need to get clear on what we want social media to do for our business, and focus on metrics that matters.
Sheena,
Great ideas. I particularly like split testing, in your target and with imagery. How many different groups would you recommend someone start with in breaking up their advertising testing? I’m also curious how long you recommend people run a campaign for. My guess is under 10 days.
I look forward to more insights from your group, thanks!
Gretchen
Great article! I love the point of focusing on the benefits. Sometimes I get caught up in everything my services include, rather than what the benefits of working with me are.
Where have you been all my life?? 🙂 Do you know how much money I have thrown out the window because I didn’t know how to effectively use Facebook advertising?? I have never targeted my market ( and don’t get me started on what I don’t know about A/B testing) so I will be pouring over your site to see what other gems I can learn!
I really like the idea of split testing eye-catching photos. I still have SO much to learn about Facebook marketing, especially with better targeting my audience. I look forward to learning more tips from you!
Great Article, thank you! I absolutely love facebook adds, 80% my marketing efforts are focused on facebook, great advice on focusing in benefits! 🙂
It’s so helpful to know how big an audience I need…that each audience should have between 500,000 and 1 million people. I’d love it if you made a video tutorial showing how to do this! I could learn this…
There are a few ways you can do this. You can narrow down the audience based on a custom audience you’re created, you could narrow down based on interests or “other demographics” (both located in the ads manager or Power Editor as you create an ad), or you could go into Audience Insights and create an audience of exactly the people who are most likely to buy your product/service and then click the create ad button at the top RH corner. The audience will get smaller the more you narrow them down…just make sure they’re between 500k-1M.
“make sure each audience has between 500,000 and 1 million people.” I would love to know more about this, why so large?
The reason you want an audience of that size is because it is a large enough of a pool to allow Facebook to optimize your ad but not too large to lose effectiveness.
Great article! I love all your feedback! I love the tip about saving your Audiences for later! I’m always uploading new audiences 😛 xo