Facebook boasts one of the most sophisticated advertising platforms for marketers. With its incredible demographic targeting tools, the ability to create custom audiences, re-targeting tools, and informative analytics, Facebook allows you to be surgical with your marketing strategy.
Recent changes to the Facebook sorting algorithm have not been favorable for advertisers. Marketers are finding their advertising costs are ballooning, while organic and paid reach continue to drop. This makes it very tough to maintain a decent ROI with Facebook. It’s more imperative than ever for marketers to optimize their Facebook advertising costs.
How to optimize your Facebook Strategy
Choose your objective strategically
Facebook Ads allows you to indicate the objective—or goal—of your strategy. This also shapes your payment plan for your campaign, since in terms of cost, not all objectives are equal. For instance, getting someone to install an app or signing up for a mailing list are tougher, and therefore more expensive than just driving engagement. If your goal is closing sales, Facebook might not be the best option. You should consider launching your next brand awareness campaign using Facebook Ads, since it’ll be much more cost-effective.
Schedule your campaign appropriately
Scheduling also has a big impact on your campaign’s success. Facebook Ads gets competitive around the holidays, so it may not be very efficient to launch your new campaign around that time of year. Unless your industry or your campaign relies heavily on online purchases during the holiday season, in which case you should be prepared to increase your budget during that time of year.
A/B test your campaigns
Facebook has a built in platform for A/B or “split” testing, a simple method in which you test the viability of two different versions of an ad. By continuously split-testing your marketing materials, you’ll learn new areas for optimization and improvement.
There’s no substitute for a great ad
A great ad can still cut through the noise like nothing else. Part of optimizing your marketing strategy for Facebook Ads includes making sure that the campaign is engaging, exciting, dynamic, eye-catching, and enticing. Studies show that customers prefer content that entertains them, offers them a discount or a special offer, or is otherwise enriching and educational. You need to hook their curiosity and stop the scroll, but don’t stoop so low that you’re using clickbait headlines or running “one weird trick” ads.
Facebook is a visual-first platform—in other words, images and videos perform much better than text posts. Like many media companies, Facebook is undergoing a comprehensive “pivot-to-video”—a trend that is reflected in its feed algorithm. Video viewers are almost twice as likely to make a purchase compared to non-viewers; if you haven’t already created a comprehensive video marketing strategy, now is the time.
You’re more likely to find success with Facebook Ads if your posts resemble typical Facebook posts. Although they’ll be indicated as sponsored content, their form should be close to a friend sharing a link, or a family member posting a photo. When it comes to social media marketing, authenticity is the most coveted attribute. If you can maintain a sense of authenticity on Facebook, profits are sure to follow.
Looking ahead
Advertisers aren’t ditching Facebook altogether. You should be constantly refining your Facebook ad strategy to keep up with all the changes to the platform and algorithm. Because turning a profit is more challenging, you can’t leave any margin for error. You need to use the platform in a smarter way, and make sure no penny is wasted.