Facebook is one of the most popular places to maximize your marketing efforts and get serious ROI. Some say Facebook organic reach is dead, and everything is a now a “pay to play” model. We don’t think this is true, because our clients are seeing great results with creating Facebook audiences and growing those groups. To help, we put together some easy tips our clients have been using to improve their Facebook results. Read More
In the business world, time is money. This is especially true for key executives. Their time needs to be spent on high-level strategy, developing key relationships and product innovation. Dealing with the day-to-day issues of entry and mid level employees, however, can drain their valuable time and energy. This is especially true with digital marketing. More and more companies are looking at outsourcing digital marketing to support executive staff. It might sound counterintuitive at first, dealing with a “vendor” instead of internal staff as a means to save time. After all, conversations are easier when held in person right? Read More
The buzz around social media marketing has died down a little bit, especially with the advent of native advertising gaining traction in recent months. Still, it’s a viable outlet for engagement and brand building, not to mention effective digital reputation management. Whether you own a brick-and-mortar shop serving a local audience or an online business that reaches customers all over the world, you’re probably using at least one social media outlet to market your business.
But with so many options, you may be struggling to justify where you spend your time and dollars. Do you focus on your Facebook page, set up a Pinterest account and start taking pictures on Instagram, or spend time on Twitter every hour of the day? The answer may lie in understanding who is using these channels most and how they are using them. Read More
(note: This post originated at QuickSprout on June 29th, 2016)
If you’re like me, you stay busy.
Running a business (or a marketing department) is a tall order in and of itself. When you throw marketing into the mix, things can quickly become overwhelming.
If you haven’t felt this way yet, you’re going to feel it soon: There just aren’t enough hours in the day! Read More
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!
