The more money you spend for social media and facebook advertising costs, the more valuable the result is, right? Wrong.
When it comes to advertising, there seems to be a myth that you need to spend hundreds....if not thousands to get any return on your investment. There is very little data backing this claim overall.
Lowering your Facebook advertising cost can still keep you a wide audience and increase your possibility of getting valuable results. Save your extra money for additional marketing efforts!
Here is a how-to on lowering your Facebook advertising costs while still getting results.
First, Discover What Influences Your Spending
Advertisers are billed by CPM (cost per 1,000 impressions). How much are you currently spending per 1,000 impressions?
Many companies view impressions as very important data. Other's care more about the actions taken in their ad.
It is important to figure out what you value most about your ads and what you want to continue growing whether that is the potential reach, the value of each action, or overall impressions.
Invest In Custom Audiences
If very little action is being taken on your ad, then you are not reaching the people who need your product or services.
You know your target audience, so let's help you find them. Facebook advertising has the ability to only show your ads to people who fit the certain qualifications that you specify.
For example, if you only want certain age ranges, or college graduates, or people who live in a suburban city outside of Chicago or Nashville to see your ad, Facebook advertising can do exactly that.
Don't waste a penny on consumers who will not value your products! Reach those who you know will be most impacted by what you have to offer.
Re-share Your Popular Posts
Although ads can be captivating, some people are much more inclined to click on a link to your website if the message came from your actual Facebook page.
Look back at your previous posts' engagement level and if any of them received a significant amount more than the average, re-post it! Keep the high engagement going as long as you can without having to spend the extra money to boost posts or create ads.
Use Video
Video has been proven to be 5 times more effective than images. Imagine how much more effective they are compared to regular content pieces.
Captivating your message through a short video can boost your ratings immensely. Especially if that video is cross shared on your website, Youtube, and any other social media platform.
Quick videos that present a sale can be done in a way that is not as pushy and is more inviting. Creating videos also does not have to be labor intensive either.
Keep It Fresh
Just because every other company does it, doesn't exactly mean you should join in on the trend (when everyone's running left, it's always a great idea to consider running right). Using the ads that say "50% off!" don't tell your consumers anything about your product. It's also gimmicky and will likely put a bad taste in people's mouth.
Those who click on your ad are either curious to see what is 50% off, or they have been on your website previously and know what you sell.
If you want all of your page views to turn into potential clients then you need to be sure and invite only those who want your product to your site. Sending a 50% off banner to consumers who have landed on your site before is great, just be sure to customize the ad for them accordingly.
But publishing this banner for all those within the 50-mile radius to see will make your Facebook page seem like spam.
Look For Audience Overlap
The Facebook Audience Overlap tool was created to see if there is significant overlap in your audience to choose the right group that would be most relevant to your current marketing goals.
For example, if you were running an ad for people who are interested in using your cleaning services and also running an ad to those who may want to purchase cleaning supplies, you will likely have an overlap in audience members who may be interested in both.
Using the exclude tool, you can exclude those who are interested in purchasing cleaning supplies from the ad that is talking about the services. This will allow your ad to be reaching the correct target audience and will not waste any extra money on sending the ad to those who are not interested in that part of the cleaning business.
Use The Facebook Pixel
You must track the success of your ads. Putting an ad up and letting it go for weeks is not going to do you any good unless you are actively checking it to confirm that it is going to the correct consumers.
Facebook Pixel is tracking that is integrated into your website. The pixel not only tracks the success of your ads on Facebook, but it will show you how far they get through the purchasing process of your web funnel.
If they make a purchase, add an item into a cart, or browse through 10 different landing pages on your site, you will know through the pixel.
It begins tracking right away so you can determine if the ad is bringing you the traffic you desire or not.
Test
If the same strategy worked every time, most companies would not have an entire marketing department. Market research is a real thing and it is always going to be evolving.
Facebook ads and advertising platforms have the ability to do A/B testing. This allows for the ad to go to two separate groups of people so that you can compare the data from each set. You can test two different custom audiences, two different interest groups, or even ad creative.
For the cost of the ads themselves, be sure to test everything you do before you put your entire budget into it!
Facebook Advertising Costs
Although the hope is that we can determine who see's our ad and what action they perform once they see it, that is not reality.
Making these small adjustments to try and save you some money can also lead to fantastic results! Do not forget how powerful social media advertising can be overall.
Social Media advertising costs can be quite scary at first. These tips will help you lower the cost without losing results.
Need some more convincing? Check out this article about Facebook advertising's benefits to a company.