The definitive guide for Facebook ads for digital product entrepreneurs
Facebook advertising can be an inexpensive and effective tool for creators. Here's a step-by-step guide to Facebook ads to advertise your digital goods.
True or False True or false: Facebook ads are just used by businesses who sell physical products and services.
Yup, it's false.
Facebook is one of the most efficient and cost-effective marketing platforms for entrepreneurs, creators, and entrepreneurs -- but only when you're able to use it right.
Facebook advertising offers numerous options for audience targeting, campaign objectives and creative ads that it can be overwhelming, especially if you're dipping your feet into the world of advertising on social networks for the very first time.
That's why we created this step-by step guide to help you get started with Facebook advertisements. We'll guide you through each part of setting up a Facebook ad campaign, so you can start driving more visitors to your website and generating more digital product sales.
The first question is why you create Facebook ads part of your strategy for marketing?
Why should entrepreneurs of digital products use Facebook ads?
With 2.7 billion monthly active user , Facebook is one of the most powerful social media platforms available that's why 93 percent of social media marketing make use of pay-per-click Facebook advertisements.
Facebook earns the major portion of its revenues through advertising as well as having an impressive 9 million advertising users at the end of Q2 2019.
With such a large audience and so much advertising competition, it could be difficult to believe that marketing on Facebook can be a bit iffy to make a difference. However, Facebook provides powerful audience-targeting tools that can help you put your ads to the right people.
While Facebook is mostly a means to keep in touch to family and friends, Facebook users aren't opposed to using the platform to explore new brands and new products.
78 percent of American consumers between 18 and 34 say they've discovered products on Facebook.
Take marketing expert Rachael Welch to be an example. She turned the $223.50 USD ad budget to nearly $46,000 USD via Facebook ads to promote a customer's online course launch.
When you have a cost-per-click (CPC) pricing model that is low-cost and an excellent ROI are important, especially when you consider that an average Facebook user clicks on 11 advertisements every month , or one every three days.
Facebook ad types
There are four primary Facebook ads formats :
Image ads
Video ads
Carousel ads
Ads in the Collection
The ad formats you can utilize in your campaign will depend on the purpose of the campaign. The details of campaigns' objectives in the future -For now, let's give an overview of the top three Facebook advertising formats that can be used to promote your digital offerings.
(Collection advertisements are heavily geared towards e-commerce and live experience, therefore we will not cover them in this guide.)
1. Image ads
Image ads are the most basic ad format. They are comprised of one image, some copy, a headline, a description of the link and a call to action (CTA) click.
Ads with images can be seen in Facebook, Instagram, Messenger and Facebook Audience Network, an in-app advertising network for mobile apps.
2. Video ads
Facebook offers three main format for video ads :
Short videos and GIFs in the news feed
Instagram and Facebook stories
In-stream videos play when users are viewing videos on Facebook.
Videos are among the most enjoyable types of content on social media, and nearly 41% of people say they're more likely to be engaged with a social media ad if it's entertaining.
Business coach Melyssa Griffin made use of this video advertisement to promote her Pinterest workshop for bloggers:
Melyssa's call-to-action button links to a signup page, and her ad text and video outline what attendees can anticipate from the training.
3. Carousel ads
Carousel advertisements let you include up to two (and as many as 10) images or videoswith each having its individual CTA within the same ad. Users can scroll through the carousel using their mobile device or clicking the arrows on their computer.
Facebook recommends making use of carousels ads for:
Offer multiple products and links to various landing pages
Use multiple highlights of one product
Create a narrative using images or videos
Guide people through the process
Present the benefits of being customers
Another innovative way to utilize carousels ads is to display various testimonials from customers on every slide, like in the Teladoc advertisement by Travis Klein:
Social proof -- like customer testimonials -- is a great method to differentiate your company distinct from your competitors. By including more than one testimonial in an ad, you increase the chance that the audience will see a testimonial that they are familiar with and that drives them to go to.
To see Facebook's ad specs for every ad type and location, read the interactive Facebook advertisements guide .
Once you've mastered the different types of Facebook ads, let's jump into creating a campaign in Facebook Ads Manager.
How to make the Facebook ad campaign
In the first place, for you to be able to promote your business to your customers on Facebook, you need to be able to create an official Facebook company page, which is separate from your profile.
After you've got your Facebook commercial page ready, go into Facebook Ads Manager . Select the "Campaigns" tab, then select "Create":
And away we go . . .
Step 1: Pick your goal
If you start a new campaign Facebook will require users to pick an objective:
What are the reasons you should establish objectives prior to launching your campaign?
One example is that Facebook utilizes objectives to decide the different ad formats that are available as well as bidding options for your campaign.
The objectives should be incorporated into the contents of your advertisements particularly when you consider that 91% of shoppers tend to shop with brands who have relevant information.
Let's break each objective down.
Awareness objectives focus on getting your brand name noticed by the largest number of potential customers
Brand awareness: Reach people with a higher likelihood of recalling your ads and increase the visibility of your company's name.
Reach: Show your ad to the maximum amount of people within your audience.
Goals for consideration are to encourage users to interact with your brand through your site by sharing your content or by filling out a lead ad request form . This is your opportunity to show your worth and expertise.
Traffic: Increase the number of visits to your website.
Engage: Get more people to view and interact with your post or page with page likes, as well as content sharing.
Views on videos: Get more views on your promoted videos showcasing the product's demos and testimonials from customers.
Lead generation Collect lead information including email addressesfrom those that are interested in your brand.
messages: Get more people to engage with your business over Messenger.
In this case, HubSpot uses this email signature generator as a lead magnet:
By using a CTA that reads "Learn More," the ad from HubSpot drives visitors to their site, from where they then collect leads' data as a way to gain access their generator. Double-whammy.
Finally, conversion objectives focus on closing the deal:
conversions Get more people to use your website, Facebook app, or mobile app. (You could use the Facebook pixels to monitor the conversion rate and gauge it More details on the pixel to come.)
Catalog Sales: Display products in your catalogue (a.k.a. the digital products on your website) in accordance with your targeted market.
Select these goals when seeking potential buyers who are already familiar with your offerings. It's the perfect time to introduce an exclusive offer or give a sales appeal.
If you're still not sure what objective to pick then here are the best ad objectives that advertisers selected on Facebook and Instagram in Q4 2019 for an idea:
It's the time to name your campaign.
Step 2: Name the ad campaign you want to run
Once you select your objective, scroll down to name your Facebook ad campaign, then select "Continue".
To keep your campaigns organized and make it easier to keep track of your campaign's metrics It is helpful to adhere to names conventions. Facebook marketing specialist Jon Loomer has a whole piece on naming conventions for Facebook ad campaigns, but the basic idea is this:
"The secret to accomplishing this -- be a productive and organized Facebook advertiser can be found in the naming style of your advertisement.
If you don't have a naming convention, forget about the idea. The only thing you can do is fly by out of the blue.
However, if the correct information is in the title of your ads, campaigns sets, and ads, Facebook Ads Manager reporting is infinitely important."
When you've chosen your campaign, you'll have the option of turning on budget optimization, which "will allocate your budget over advertising sets".
If you're running multiple ad plans, then budget optimization can be a useful tool. In this case, we'll bypass it, and then click "Next," where we'll move on to creating an ad set , by setting up the budget and schedule for ads, as well as targeting your audience and ad placements.
Step 3: Establish the budget for your advertisement and plan
Create your own ad and then go to "Budget & Schedule". Based on the purpose that you have chosen in the initial step, you'll see different ways to budget here.
Facebook provides two options for budgeting The daily budget and the life-long budget.
If you create a daily budget by giving Facebook the average amount you'd like your daily advertising budget to be.
On certain days, Facebook might see high-potential possibilities and make you spend as much as 25 percent more than the daily budget. You can then reduce the spend on lower-potential days to even it out.
A lifetime budget informs Facebook the amount it will spend during the entire campaign. When setting up a life-time budget, it is necessary to establish a start and an end day for the campaign. It is possible to plan your campaign ahead of time or begin it as soon as it is launched.
Depending on the objective that you choose to pursue with your campaign, there are other bidding, optimization and delivery options for your ads in this section. Certain objectives could lead to greater cost per click (CPC) than others:
For more information about bid bidding on ads look at this helpful one-sheeter on Facebook.
After you've established your budget, you're now ready to target your audience.
Step 4: Target your audience
In the event that you start a new campaign on Facebook it is possible to create a brand new audience, select a customized audience or build a lookalike audience.
If you are creating a new market, you can target Facebook users on the basis of various factors, including . . .
Localization: Local businesses can target their own cities or offer ads to neighboring neighborhoods.
Age: If the product is geared toward a certain age range -- retirees seeking to become more active, for example -- you may segment your ads accordingly.
Interests Facebook lets you select potential customers based on users "likes" and their activity on Facebook. For example, a user who has a number of digital marketing sites could make a perfect candidate for your brand new marketing guide.
Demographics: It is also possible to choose to target your audience based on other details, like education level, relationship status, or the parenthood status.
Once you've identified your ideal group, be sure to keep your eye for your "Audience Definition" meter in the top right corner. This will show the possible number of people who will be a part of your campaign. You can also see your daily average reach as well as the engagement of your posts:
However, what happens if you wish to reach an existing market rather than start from scratch?
This is that's where Custom Audiences on Facebook is where it comes in. You can upload an existing list of contacts including your email list, then display ads that are targeted for those people .
Custom Audiences are particularly helpful when you've got your goal to increase conversion rates -- like leads who have signed up to your mailing list or downloaded your lead magnet, but haven't purchased yet.
Just click "Create New," and then click "Custom Audience".
One more powerful audience targeting option is Lookalike Audiences .
Lookalike Audiences help you find people similar to your current clients. It is possible to select one of your Custom Audiences (like those who subscribe to your blog or students of your online courses) and tell Facebook to look for additional people similar to that audience.
You'll need to complete one additional step on this page before moving on to the contents of your ad itself.
Step 5: Pick your ad placements
Facebook allows you to choose between manual and automatic ad placements:
Automated placements are an excellent method to eliminate some of the guesswork out of Facebook advertisements, especially for those who are novice to Facebook advertisements, since Facebook determines the location where advertisements will appear.
If you opt to select your placements manually, your options depend on the goal of your ad that you have previously set. Placement options include:
Type of device: Mobile and desktop
Platforms: Facebook, Instagram, Audience Network, and Messenger
Placements Desktop and mobile News feeds Facebook and Instagram Stories In-stream (for video), Messenger inbox, Facebook right column on desktops, as well as apps and websites that are not connected that are connected to Facebook (via Audience Network)
Mobile operating systems: iOS and Android
However, regardless of the purpose or platform, Facebook feed ads are the most well-known ad format by the most. One report found that 60% of Facebook and Instagram ad spend is spent on Facebook news feed advertisements:
Now after you've got your set of ads' budget, schedule, audience, and location set, it's time to click "Next" and start creating your advertisements.
Step 6: Create your advertisement
The next screen, Facebook will ask you to identify your advertisement, then select your "Identity," a.k.a. the Facebook page and/or Instagram account linked to your company.
After that, choose your desired ad style. As with everything else we've spoken about thus far choices for ad formats will depend on the objective you've chosen prior to that. After you've selected your ad format, you'll put up your advertisement creative.
When you design your ad creative, make sure that it meets Facebook's specifications for each placement you chose at step five. (I suggest the Sprout Social's constantly updated guide to Facebook advertising specifications .)
If you're struggling to find time, or like me, just aren't very creative, Canva offers a ton of templates for free that you can use for ads.
In this step, you will also be able to set up your Facebook pixel for conversion tracking.
The Facebook pixel is "a part of the code on your website which allows you to evaluate, optimise and develop an audience for ads". It lets you target website users who are already engaging in your post.
"I'm not a developer And I accomplished it in just two minutes, which means you should be able to do it, too. I highly recommend doing that today, so you are able to use this power to the fullest extent."
Here's how the Facebook pixels functions:
You add the pixel to your web page's code.
The pixel monitors which items people are looking at.
The pixel is used for remarketing and targeting these users through Facebook ads.
The visitors click on the advertisements then return to your website for completing the purchase.
(PS It is possible to add the Facebook pixel on your website , too. Do you not have a Facebook account yet? Register for an account today and create your site at no cost today. )
Make sure to use the "Preview" switch to ensure the quality of your advertisement for all possible the various placements.
If you're satisfied with your choices, click"Publish" in the middle of green "Publish" button, and your ad will go live (unless you've scheduled it for an earlier date, obviously).
Start using Facebook ads to promote your digital products
Effectiveness in cost, precise audience targeting as well as customizable marketing campaigns are what make Facebook One of the best social media tools to market your business for business owners looking to increase web traffic, and to increase sales of digital goods.
To recap, here's how you can set up your Facebook advertisement campaign:
Choose an objective based on where your target market is located in the sales funnel -- whether it's awareness, consideration, or conversion.
Name your ad campaign. Make use of naming conventions to help organize your work.
Make your advertising budget and plan your schedule around what you'd like to allocate to the campaign.
You can set up an audience targeting. Make a new audience as broad or specific as you'd like. You can upload an audience that you've created, or build a similar audience.
Select your ads' placements across different platforms and devices or allow Facebook choose them automatically for you.
Make your advertisement and create a Facebook Pixel, so that you are able to use Facebook's retargeting instruments and tracking of conversions.
It may take a bit of time to figure out your perfect Facebook advertising plan. Don't be afraid to test out different ad creative, CTAs, and lead magnets until you have found the most effective combination that works for you as well as your clients.
Once you've mastered the art of it, your digital products will be flying off (virtual) shelves within a matter of minutes.