If your small business could only spend time with one marketing vehicle, what would it be? A managed PPC campaign? Ongoing SEO for your website? Good old fashioned direct mail?
If Facebook advertising isn’t top of mind…maybe it should be. The targeting options available through Facebook are SO refined, that finding ideal prospects with targeted offers can yield incredible results without incredible spend. Using Google Adwords to get traffic to your website might cost you $10 or even $20 a click. What if I told you that you could get tens to even hundreds of real, interested visitors to your site for not much more than that using Facebook? Not to mention, you can nail down your online reputation as well. Check out some sample results below:
Let’s take a closer look at how this can work for your business. Getting targeted traffic from Facebook isn’t rocket science, but there’s some key considerations in the approach that will determine if this makes money for you, or just wastes your time. Of course, I want to help you do the prior, not that latter. First, let’s consider what you really want to do.
Traffic is KING. Choose wisely!
Right off the bat, there’s suggestions and options for what to do. Do you want to drive traffic to your website? Get people to install an app? Increase the number of likes to your page so that over time you have a larger Facebook community? All of these are key for a good website marketing strategy, as they lead to conversions on-site down the road.
If you’re looking for RGA (revenue generating activity), focus on clicks to your website. Then ensure the page you take them to is primed for conversion. Get remarketing code on the page so you can follow users with additional messaging. Make sure you make it easy for them to opt-in to your newsletter or take part in a Facebook-only offer (hint: this is a great conversion tool). Capture their address and phone number with a short from as part of the offer. This isn’t small biz marketing 101 stuff, but you need to know how to do it to make Facebook a lead driver.
The goal is traffic. Qualified traffic, with a real interest in what you’re selling, at a low cost. Making hay with that traffic comes in other ways. Don’t rely on Facebook to SELL for you, rather to SET UP THE SALE. See screenshot below for selection items:
Now, there are some outfits that have become incredible advocates for using Facebook in a different way. They suggest spending time and resources cultivating a cult-like following for your pages, and marketing over and over to people who already like your page, your brand, etc. My personal take is that unless you have a business that offers the chance or frequent repeat business, there’s a lot of wasted spend here. If you’re a service company (a roofer, house painter, locksmith, remodeling company, etc) and you may not see customers more than once every 3 years or so…this isn’t going to cut it for you. You need to generate leads with a fresh pipeline of prospects. That’s what I’m suggesting. If you need to outsource your Facebook advertising (or other digital marketing tactics), then do it.
Targeting demographics and psychographics…
This is where the rubber meets the road in terms of Facebook being a legitimate marketing tool for small business…getting interests and behaviors right. This is especially important in light of Facebook’s recent relevancy score implementation. If you can’t find target correctly, it will cost you. It may even make this vehicle worthless. If you do it right…you’ll be rewarded with impressions and traffic that vastly outperform the “estimated impressions” shown prior to starting.
This rabbit hole is deep. You can target so much on Facebook. The goal is getting as refined as possible while STILL having a large user base. (NOTE: This can be tricky for small businesses in a tight geographic area, especially if you only target people in a suburb or small town, or if your product is SO niche that layering in several interests or behaviors leaves you with less than 1,000 targeted users). Fear not. There is always a solution. Sometimes it just requires looking at the problem in a different way. Crafting a different landing page. Tweaking an offer just for Facebook (hint: as noted above, this is a REALLY good idea). Screenshot below of sample targeting:
Other key elements include the ad (promoted post) itself, and the budget selection. These are critical to performance as well, but for the sake of brevity we won’t dive right in. Long story short, if your small business isn’t using Facebook to drive more leads and sales, consider a digital marketing partner that can put you in this space quickly. Contact us today to learn more!
