Get Customers in the Door with Facebook Ad Targeting

The first rule of getting people to walk in the door is that they have to know your business exists! 
Are you launching a business that is location based? (Do you need to get customers to walk in the door?) 

When creating an ad, target customers in your local area AND with interests. 
What do your customers have in common? 
What do they read?  What do they watch on TV?  Are there celebrities associated with a similar product or brand?  

What other things would they do or enjoy? 
Are your potential customers a certain age demographic?  Do they have kids at home?  Did they recently move or just buy a house?  Do they intend to buy a Honda Accord?  Yes, you can test these types of targeting too!

Are there similar chain businesses that they may frequent because your business is not open yet?  Target by what people already know.  If your potential customer would visit a chain store or restaurant, where would they go?  For example, is your restaurant more like Applebee's?  Or Morton's Steakhouse?

 

Remember that with ad targeting you are NOT defining your business for the public.  This is invisible!  So if you don't want to be associated with a specific chain - don't worry!  Targeting only helps you serve your ad to someone that has expressed interest in this other company.  

You can target by using well known chains with a similar price point.  Or similar products and services.
Or you can target by well known businesses by image:  upscale retail store with designer fashions vs. affordable fashions that are cutting edge.  

Call me for more specific targeting ideas for your business. The first call is FREE!

Making a List and Checking it Twice

It is that time of year again!  No, I am not one of the people decorating my house with lights while it is still September.  But...in the world of advertising it is time to start getting ready for the holidays!

The cost of advertising will go up for many advertisers in Q4. As we get closer to the holidays some advertisers may see a 4x increase (or more) in the cost of their ads.  

What can an advertiser with a small budget do?  
Make a plan!  Here are 2 basic ideas:

1. What I often recommend to my clients is to test different types of targeting.  If your Targeting group #1 sees a huge increase in cost, you will need to consider what is in your Targeting group #2 and #3, etc.  Often, changes in targeting and trying some different ways to reach your customer can assist with bringing the costs of ads in Q4 down.
2. Make a calendar for actions building to the holiday season.  Will you offer sales or discounts at a certain time?  Will you have special merchandise available for the holidays?  Consider the ad lead time you will need for people to purchase.

Contact me if you would like more ideas or you need a plan specific to your business.

Facebook Ads on Mobile Devices

How much do you use your mobile device for business? Consider your own usage when asking customers to take an action to buy or sign up. How easy is it to complete the "call to action" (buy, sign-up, etc.) you are requesting in your ad?

Try looking at your website from a smartphone and a tablet.  Complete the checkout process (or sign-up process if you are after leads rather than sales).  Was that easy?  Could you find and use the right buttons or drop-down menus?  
Some websites are not yet optimized for mobile.  If that is the case with your website, it may be difficult or time consuming to check-out (or sign up).  Users may give up before they complete the process.  

Even with the best ad ever created on Facebook, people will not check out if your website is broken, slow, or problematic on mobile. 

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Check Facebook's reports to find out what ad placement is giving you the most checkouts or leads.  This will also give you more information about how mobile placements are performing.  

I had a client that suddenly saw a big increase in the cost of checkouts.  It was no longer worth his money to advertise on Facebook but he had good results in the past.  I ran reports for him to find the problem. The cost of mobile checkouts was much higher than desktop checkouts.  When you look at your total costs at the Campaign, Ad Set, or Ad level it is not going to show you the breakdown for ad placement. 

Select the columns for Placement, Checkouts, and Cost Per Checkout (or Cost Per other goal you are tracking).

As you will see from this screenshot, the cost per conversion from the Desktop ads was between $4.27 and $8.18 depending on the ad.  The cost on mobile was more than 7 times higher!  

Are you running reports to find these things?  Please let me know if this post was helpful or if you need any help figuring out how to find your results of cost per placement. 

Facebook Business Manager

Did you try Facebook Business Manager for your Business Pages?

I was so excited about this new tool!  I saw a pre-view of this when I was in Facebook's Menlo Park office in February.  At the time, it looked great!  I looked forward to having it go live so I could really put it to use for all of the ad agencies were in my list of clients. 

Fast forward to now...
I put my Business Page...yes, my own Business Page in Business Manager without testing this first! 
That was not very wise!  So then I have struggled to post and manage my ads since I need to flip back and forth between client accounts in Ads Manager or Power Editor and Business Manager.  Not fun and a big waste of time.  There were changes since I saw it in February.  Or maybe I didn't realize that using Business Manager would take away your ability to manage you Page and ads in the regular Facebook.com.  

Have you learned to love Business Manager?  If not, do you want to get your Page out of there? 
Once you are in, it seems there is no getting out...but there is a work-around: 

1. Create a new business page 
2. Claim the NEW Business Page in Business Manager.
3. Make the new page that you don't want into your "Primary Page" in Business Manager. (more here:https://www.facebook.com/help/462627017200717)
4. Hit the Remove button (hooray! it is now an option!) on the Page you want to Remove from Business Manager and you are back to the old way of posting and page management.
If you want to have access to your Page in both Business Manager and Facebook.com, you will need to make yourself into an "agency" or just give "Advertiser" permissions for the Page.
#BusinessManager #FacebookBusinessManager