Getting the Most Out of Your Facebook Ads

Facebook remains the most popular social media platform, and it’s also become one of the most powerful ways for businesses to reach current and new customers.

The potential for return is huge–a small ad spend can sometimes turn into a startling number of sales. Unfortunately, it can also be a terrible sink for your advertising dollars. Facebook ads can show little to no return on your investment if you don’t know how to approach them properly. Here are some of the keys to running a successful Facebook ad campaign.

Don’t Reinvent the Wheel

First, it’s important to start with what you already know about your customers. If you have a well-developed profile of your average customer, transfer that over as a starting point for targeting your Facebook ads.

Facebook ads work best when they are highly personalized, so the clearer your picture of your customer base, the closer you are to having a successful campaign.

Use All the Targeting Tools

There are several different places where you can set the targeting for your Facebook ads. You can use the custom audiences tool to target users based on those that you have on file, those that have visited your site, used your app, interacted with your store offline, or engaged your content on Facebook.

You can then target users based on certain types of behaviors, interests, and demographics.This is where it really pays to know your average customer–you can structure your ads to reach those people who have the potential to become your customers, even though they’ve never been in the past.

And you can further target your audience by choosing where your ads are going to appear, including which devices and platforms they will show up on, such as showing up for mobile or desktop, Facebook or Instagram.

Keep Their Attention with Remarketing

Although Facebook has tremendous potential to reach new customers, it wouldn’t make sense to put all your advertising eggs in that one basket. You want to not just get in front of potential customers, but stay in front of them until they become actual customers. Remarketing can help you do that.

Remarketing is when ads that customers have engaged with on one platform follow the customers to multiple platforms. If you have a Facebook ad that hooks potential customers, but doesn’t convert immediately, it might be able to convert those hooked customers as a banner ad on other sites that customer visits.

It keeps your product on their mind, and can help convert people who need time to make a decision but might otherwise move on to somebody else’s product or service.

Design Quality Ads

The design of your ads is critical to their potential success. First, Facebook has some strict criteria that you must meet if you want to get your ad approved. Making ads that won’t pass muster is a frustrating waste of time and money.

Next, you need ads that Facebook users find appealing. Not only will this increase your conversion rate, it can decrease the cost of your ads–Facebook charges more for ads it thinks will make its users mad and less likely to use the site.

And don’t neglect your