To follow up on my Instagram Hacks guide, I wanted to share some tips and tricks you may not know about for using Facebook for your business.
Facebook…a love-hate relationship for most of us. You know you should have a presence on the platform for your business, but between the algorithm and everything else that comes with Facebook, it can be frustrating and confusing.
But, with over 2 billion active users, you can’t deny the power of Facebook to reach your audience. And if you aren’t sure if your target audience is on Facebook, read that number again. 2 billion users. Unless you have an extremely niche audience, chances are, your audience is there.
Why Is Facebook Such A Powerful Marketing Platform?
- Users: Facebook has more active users than any other social platform.
- Affordable ad option: Because of the user numbers, Facebook allows you to target very specific audiences no matter the size of your budget
Facebook Marketing HACKS
Below are some tips and tricks to get the most out of your Facebook presence for your business.
Ad Transparency Tool
Have you heard of Facebook’s ad transparency tool?
Facebook’s Info and Ads tab allows any user to see all of the ads currently being run by any given page, regardless of whether that user is in the campaign’s target audience or even follows or likes the page.
To see what ads a business is running, head over to their Facebook page. Then click the Info and Ads tab.
You can of course use this when strategizing ad campaigns, but that’s not the only way to use these insights. You can take advantage of this “top secret” data regardless of whether or not you are running social ads.
How to use this tool to your advantage:
- Research: Take a close look at your competition’s ads to see any special offers they’re running.
- Pay attention to the types of content they’re using, the messaging, formats (video, image, etc.). What is the goal of their campaign? Are they trying to attract clicks, drive purchases, or create awareness?
- Overall, look for long-term trends in what your competition is doing. If they maintain use of a certain strategy, ad format, or copywriting style, it could be for a good reason. Consider what they’re doing as inspiration and adjust the approach to fit your brand.⠀
Pretty cool, right?!
In addition to being able to go directly to a brand’s page and see their ads in their info & ads tab, Facebook has also launched the Ad Library.
The Ad Library provides advertising transparency by offering a comprehensive, searchable collection of all ads currently running from across Facebook Products, including Instagram. Anyone can explore the Library, with or without a Facebook or Instagram account. You can access all active ads, even ones that may not have been shown to you because you weren’t part of an advertiser’s intended audience.
Add Your Services or Products
If you are you a service-based business and want to market your services through Facebook, you’ll want to take advantage of the Services tab on your Facebook business page.
The Services section on Facebook allows professional service businesses to create a Services tab to highlight their offerings.
Make sure people know what you do and offer. You can add your services right to your Facebook business page along with descriptions, and the option to add pricing.
Maximize Your Ad Imagery
If you are running Facebook ads and using images with text, make sure they follow Facebook’s guidelines. Facebook wants images to have no more than 20% text on them. Not sure how to figure that out? Facebook has a great tool where you can upload your image and see how Facebook rates it as far as text ratio goes.
Just upload your image here, and then see how Facebook rates it. Below are the different ratings Facebook gives and how it will impact your ad deliverability:
Utilize Insights
Knowledge is power, right? Monitor your metrics to find trends in engagement so that you know what content is most successful, who your audience is and what they are engaging with.
Stats to look at:
- Page likes: Measures the total and new likes for your page
- Post reach: Measures the total number of unique views on your page and posts
- Engagement: Measures the total number of unique people who engaged with your page and posts
- Post timing: Look at when your followers are online, what types of posts do better during different times of the day, and which posts are the most engaging
Avoid these words when creating Facebook ads
Did you know that Facebook is super picky when it comes to the words you use in your ad copy? There are some surprising words that will either get your ad rejected or reduce the reach of your ads. The key here is that Facebook wants ads to feel relevant, not targeted.
While some no-no words are common sense, there are some that are surprising. It can be frustrating when you get a notification that an ad was rejected, because Facebook will generally just say the ad “doesn’t fit Facebook’s ad guidelines”. Not very helpful, right?
The words below cause the most ad rejections and highest costs, so you should use them cautiously or not at all.
Crazy, right? You? Your? Easy? I created an ad a few months ago promoting my Instagram Hacks guide and it got rejected. After some digging, I figured out it was because I used Instagram in the ad copy. Well, duh—that’s what the whole thing is about. I figured out that if I added the trademark symbol to Instagram, it would get approved.
I hope these tips and hacks were helpful for you and taught you at least one trick you didn’t know before.
If you need any additional guidance or strategy for Facebook, check out my services. I offer 1-on-1 consulting and coaching for businesses who need a little more help making the most of their digital presence.
amanda holliday 