Facebook Ads is an advertising platform with a great deal of potential for virtually any business. Facebook offers ubiquity, with more than 2.7 billion active users worldwide, an ability to reach very specific audiences, affordable pricing compared to other channels, multiple functionalities and advertising formats that are frequently updated. All of this means that businesses have the opportunity to implement highly effective digital advertising campaigns on Facebook and Instagram.
At All Around Digital we’ve reviewed the primary ingredients for creating effective Facebook ad campaigns and what things to take into consideration when creating them:
Alexis (Digital Consultant & Business Strategist)
“Don’t be afraid to try formats you haven’t used before. Sometimes we get typecast and bound by the same graphic templates, image style or ad formats that we’ve always used because they’ve performed well historically. The brilliance of the Facebook Ads platform is that we can harvest results very quickly. Let the results inform your subsequent decisions and modifications: you may be surprised by what resonates best with target audience.”
Carlos (Paid Media Manager)
“Adapting language, formatting and communication to each target audience is key to achieving your campaign goals. It’s also important to maintain a spirit of continuous improvement, testing new possibilities and tools.”
Paula (Social Ads & Lead Gen Specialist)
“Getting audience segmentation right is tantamount to success. Of course, this should be accompanied by an optimisation strategy in accordance with your goals and an optimal budget so that your ads have the opportunity to generate results.”
With these points in mind, let’s explore a bit deeper, as well as review some resources to help amp up your Facebook Ads ad campaigns:
“Adapting how you communicate your offer, using the correct targeting, creating effective Facebook and Instagram ads, and continuously improving your campaigns based on results are some of the keys to creating Facebook ad campaigns that work.”
Adapt how you communicate your offer
You need to present your product or service in accordance with your objectives on Facebook. Whether your goal is generate leads, boost sales or increase traffic to your website, the goal you select at the campaign level determines which optimisation types you can select in Facebook Ads Manager. The type of optimisation you choose will partially determine who will see your ads to potentially take the intended action you’ve selected. Ultimately, to help your ads work and achieve your goals, you will need to adapt the tone, format, and communication of your Facebook advertising to each target audience.
Resources to successfully target on Facebook:
When choosing your campaign goal you will need to know what it is you want to achieve and understand how the Facebook Ads platform works. What you choose will determine who will see your ads, within your targeted audience. You can find relevant articles on Facebook for Business to help you make informed choices, as well as industry blog posts like AdEspresso which has an always up-to-date Facebook Goals Guide that is incredibly useful for understanding the process.
Targeting correctly on Facebook
When you’re embarking on a Facebook campaign, a fundamental aspect is your targeting. You can opt for several approaches and choose the strategy that best suits your product or service offer. To get started, consider reaching a “known” audience like visitors to your website. You can choose to create personalised remarketing audiences to re-impact with your message, or you may want to reach a new audience to engage new potential customers, through demographic and behavioural and interest-based audiences, or through audiences of people similar to your current customers (Lookalike). In each of these cases, the targeting options in Facebook Ads are wide-reaching and very sophisticated, so your choice will depend on what you’re trying to achieve.
Resources to successfully target on Facebook:
One tool that can help you create relevant audiences is Facebook Audience Facebook Audience Insights. Another way to learn about targeting functionalities for your Facebook or Instagram ads is to review the information offered on the Facebook Business Help Centre. If you want to dive even deeper, Facebook has an extensive arsenal of training content available on Facebook Blueprint.
Create effective Facebook and Instagram ads
The first step to successful ad creation is to learn about the different types of formats and pacements, as well as their design specifications and technical requirements. The main formats are image, video, carousel and collection As Alexis pointed out at the beginning of this article, it’s always a good idea to try new formats that you haven’t used before. These can stimulate your campaigns, leveraging Facebook Ads’ ability to generate results quickly.
Another element is the message and the creative itself, meaning the ad copy, the visual appearance and the calls to action (CTAs) you use. We often get stuck on aspects like if one copy works whilst another doesn’t… when the reality is that it depends. Sometimes a particular image or video works well, sometimes it’s a CTA, a long copy, or a shorter one… Hence the importance of monitoring results and observing what the data tells you about ad efficacy.
Resources to create effective Facebook ads:
To stay up-to-date with available formats, placements and their specifications, you should keep the official Facebook Ads Guide handy. A quick internet search also reveals independent blogs and articles where the details of Facebook’s ad formats are regularly updated. If you’re looking for inspiration, check out the best ads selected by Facebook Creative Shop or search for what your competitors or brands with the most history in Facebook Ads are doing in the Ads Library.
Continuously optimise and improve based on results
Naturally every business and campaign on Facebook is unique and there is no one model or approach that ensures the success of Facebook or Instagram ads. Even when you find your own formula to generate results, almost certainly you will have to recalibrate your campaign approach and the different elements that form it to revive its effectiveness from time to time. Maintaining that spirit of continuous improvement that Carlos mentioned, testing new possibilities and tools and basing your decisions on the historic results of your campaign is essential to ensuring that you are getting the highest performance possible out of advertising on Facebook or Instagram.
Resources to optimize and improve your Facebook ads:
We’ve seen Facebook itself as an inexhaustible source of tools, useful content ideas and resources to help you make decisions and manage your campaigns. Another useful source of information for optimisation strategies and everything Facebook related are the blogs of Jon Loomer or Neil Patel.
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Client Success Manager
Alexis is our Client Success Manager at All Around. She is a Digital Marketing Specialist and Manager with 15+ years of experience in international markets. She is a dedicated client partner, ready to take businesses to the next level, with vast expertise in digital strategy, operations, project management, reporting, budgeting and negotiation.
