Cracking the Code: Facebook Advertising Demystified

Ready to unlock the mysteries of Facebook advertising? In this episode, we’re breaking down the essentials of Facebook ads—from the basics of ad types and targeting to the metrics that actually matter. Whether you’re just starting out or looking to refine your approach, we’ll cover the must-know strategies and practical tips to help you build campaigns that connect and convert. Say goodbye to overwhelm and hello to confident ad creation! Tune in to crack the code and get the clarity you need to make Facebook advertising work for your business.

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Transcript

Hey, welcome back to the new School of Marketing Podcast. I'm so grateful to you for tuning in. Before we dive into this episode, I would love to pay my respect and acknowledgement to the Palawa people of lutruwita, who are the traditional owners of the land on which my business operates. I pay my respects to their eldest, past and present. Okay, we're going to be diving into one of my favourite topics. I know nobody gets excited about Facebook ads the way I do, but yes, we're going to dive into Facebook advertising, and I know there could be some mystery around it, or maybe this, you know, what is it all about? Why is it working for some people? Why is it not working for me? That kind of thing. So let's just talk about Facebook advertising. And when I say Facebook advertising, I also mean Instagram advertising, because the platforms are both owned by meta, and I really should be saying Meta advertising, but I don't know. I've been doing this for 10 years, so I guess Facebook just kind of stuck. And it's been Facebook advertising for so long that I still kind of call it that now. I know that for some of you they are confusing. I know that for some of you, Facebook ads are overwhelming, or maybe you just feel like they're out of reach. So I'm going to walk you through the essentials of Facebook and Instagram ads in a way that makes sense. So I'm not going to use any jargon, no fluff, just real talk about how you can use Facebook ads to also get results. So let's crack the code together and demystify Facebook ads. First things first, let's talk about why Facebook advertising is actually worth your attention. You probably know that Facebook is one of the largest social media platforms, and Instagram is not far behind. It literally has billions of active users worldwide. But the real magic of Facebook ads isn't just in the reach, because, you know, not everyone needs to reach people across the globe. The real magic is actually in the targeting. Facebook allows you to be very specific about who sees your ad, and that can be based on interests, location, behaviours, or even life events. So you can get really, really specific. This targeting power is literally what sets Facebook apart And letting you reach the people who are most likely to engage with your offer. And that could be through buying or other ways. Another thing to keep in mind is that organic reach on Facebook and Instagram, meaning unpaid content, is quite low. Only a small percentage of your followers will see your posts. Naturally, with Facebook ads and Instagram ads, you can actually bypass these limitations so that your content actually reaches more of your audience. If that's, you know, the targeting you set up, but also a much larger audience audience. And yeah, we all know the algorithms. Up, down, roller coaster ride, it's really hard to kind of get it right. And then once you do, things change again. So even with a small budget on Facebook and Instagram ads, you can make a difference, a big difference, if you're doing it right. So that's my $0.02 on why I think Facebook ads are amazing. Now, as with any marketing activity, you need to set some goals and you need to have some goals for your ads. When it comes to running successful ads, having a clear goal, a clear objective is really important. Facebook ads, the setup side of things, actually offers you multiple objectives. Like you can choose from multiple ad objectives. And that goes from brand awareness to conversions, to lead generation to traffic. And the mistake I often see people make is choosing an objective without understanding what it really means, because each objective actually drives a different outcome. And your choice of the objective should align with your overall business goals. So ask yourself, what do I want this ad to achieve? Am I trying to get more people to sign up for my email list? Am I trying to get people to visit my website? Am I trying to get people to watch a video? Am I trying to get more people to engage with a certain post? Or maybe you actually want people to make a purchase. Now, there can be some limitations in terms of conversions, and by that conversions, I mean purchases or potentially leads. And people sign up for something because Facebook tells us that it needs a certain amount per day before it can optimise for that specific objective. That said, even if you have not had, and I think the number is 50, 50 sales, like in one day, or even if you don't get 50 sales in one day, I still would recommend that you choose the objective that you want to choose. And if that is purchases, then do purchases. I've seen people and even ad managers recommend that people run traffic ads instead. And yes, you are sending traffic, but you are not necessarily utilising Facebook's in a way, the advertising algorithm. You're not utilising Facebook's knowledge to get what you really want. If you want people to buy from you, I would suggest that you select the conversion objective, the sales objective, and go for what you absolutely want. Because Facebook will then optimise your ads for purchases. If you are running those ads and you're not actually getting the results that you want, and Facebook is sort of like in that perpetual learning stage, not getting out of it, then you can step back and think about running traffic ads to get some more traffic happening. But my. My objective is that you always go for what you want first. And if that doesn't work, you try something different. That's the way I look at it. Another way to look at it is to align your objective with the stage of the sales funnel that you're targeting. For example, if you're targeting cold audiences, people who have never interacted with your business or your brand before, an awareness objective might actually be the best fit. And for warmer audiences, maybe you might be looking at engagement or conversion objectives to kind of drive them further down the funnel. So think about what is it what you. That you really, really. I still would always prefer that you choose that, even for a cold audience. But you do also want to think about, where are they in the funnel? Do they actually need to get to know you a little bit more first? Do they need to build some trust before they actually will buy from you? So especially with coaching packages, masterminds, courses, I would never choose a sales conversion objective for that. But if it's E commerce, I would choose a sales conversion objective. So it depends on the type of business and the type of funnel that you're running ads for. Okay, the next one is finding the right audience. So let's talk about targeting. A big, big part of Facebook's power lies in the ability to pinpoint specific audiences, specific audience segments. Now, to do this effectively, you need to have a really, really good understanding of who your ideal customer actual is. That doesn't just include. That doesn't just include demographics like age, location, gender, but also psychographics. You need to know their interests, their behaviours, their values. So, for example, if you're selling an online course for new parents, you might target people with an interest in parenting, blogs, baby brands, family life. But even deeper, are these people that are city dwellers, are these people that are more regional, they like to go out and about camping and hiking. They're like very, very different kind of parents. Facebook actually offers several layers of targeting that can make a big difference in your ad performance. So from basic demographics to, like, detailed behaviours and stuff like that, you can literally drill down to kind of almost Find the exact type of person who's likely to be interested in what you're offering and then the other things you can layer in. And I did promise no jargon. So this might sound a little bit like jargon, but there are things like custom audiences where you can build your own audiences, lookalike audiences which are based on audiences that you have that you already have. So for example, a custom audience could be your website visitors and then a lookalike audience could be people who look like or have similar interests to people who have visited your website. And then the other option is interest targeting. And there are always to expand your reach without in a way losing relevance. So you can expand from people who have already like visited you to people who look like the people who've already visited you. It's really, really clever how Facebook can do this. Now let's talk about what makes an ad work. And really at its core, every high converting Facebook ad has three main elements. One is eye catching visuals, whether that is photos or videos, it needs to in a way stop the scroll, be relevant at the same time for your business. Number two is a compelling headline and number three is clear and concise copy. So your visuals should stop the scroll, the headline should capture attention and the copy should make your audience think, yes, I want this or I need this. And then don't forget the call to action. So every ad should guide your user or the user on what next step to take. Whether that is signing up, whether that is learning more, whether that is making a purchase, the cta. The call to action clarifies the next step. And funnily enough, it can often be the deciding factor between someone actually scrolling past or clicking through. Even though we've, yeah, we've all seen those buttons. So definitely give people the next step to take. Now I'm going to talk about money, money, money, money. One of the biggest questions I get is about budget. And here's the thing, you don't actually need a huge budget to start seeing results. If you have a small budget, I usually recommend five to ten dollars a day if you can. If you have less, start with $2 a day. It's going to be slower, but at least you got your foot in the water and you're doing it. Five to ten dollars a day can actually give you enough data to see what's working. But the key is consistency and then learning what's resonating with your audience before you can scale up. Once you know what's working, Facebook ads become a maths exercise. You can Literally. Then look at, if I put in this much money and my conversion rate is X, I will get out Y. It literally becomes a formula. Don't forget, though, that testing is crucial in Facebook ads. AB testing, or split testing as people call it as well, means that you get to try out different versions of an ad to, to see what works best. So there's different things you can test. I always say start with one thing, and my preferred first thing to test is creative. But you can, you can test different images, different videos, different headlines, different calls to action, and always do one at a time. Otherwise you don't know, you know, what the actual difference is and why it's making a difference. Um, so yeah, running small tests means that you can optimise your ads, like dial it in, get even better, and then you can see what's working and then invest more confidently when you actually have more budget to invest. So don't forget to test it. Now. Once your ad is running, you need to check out the metrics. We always have to check the numbers. And the reporting is quite comprehensive in Facebook Ads Manager, which might scare off a few people or you might look at and go, I don't know what I'm looking at or what it's telling me. Yeah, Facebook offers a lot of insights into like, everything from like reach and engagement to clicks to conversions, cost per result, all sorts of things. Focus on the metrics that align with your ad objective. So for example, if your goal is lead generation, pay attention to the total of leads that you've generated and the cost per lead. So always look at, okay, what am I trying to achieve? What is my objective here? Then look at the results that align with that. Remember that Facebook ads are not a set and forget tool. You need to check regularly, not too regularly, because you can't keep making too many changes because every time you make a change, Facebook will go into a new learning phase of sorts. And so don't make too many changes. But you can also not set and forget. You need to check in on your ads regularly and make adjustments as needed. So every few days, check in on them. If something is not working, don't be afraid to tweak it, but also don't go too hard on it. Sometimes even small changes can make a big difference. So stay flexible. Be ready to just make those tweaks as you learn. Like I said, every few days, maybe every three to four days. Because you need to give Facebook enough time to actually learn again and try to optimise. If you do multiple changes in a day. Facebook will not have that time. All right, that wraps up my pretty quick episode on demystifying Facebook ads. I hope that you're feeling more confident and that you're actually ready to give it a go. Remember, Facebook ads can be an incredible tool for growing your business if you know how to use them. Just remember to start with a clear goal, know who your audience is and utilise Facebook's targeting options to get in front of that audience and really work on crafting an ad that resonates with your audience. And then don't forget to track your results so that you can actually keep improving it. And we don't always have these, but you got to have a little bit of patience, do some testing, look at the numbers, because I know that you can crack the code to success with Facebook ads as well if you are invested in learning how they work. Thank you so much for joining me on yet another episode of the new School of Marketing podcast. I hope it was helpful and I am excited to share more marketing tips with you next week. If you're ready to take your business to the next level with Facebook and Instagram advertising, make sure that you head to new school of marketing.com where you find practical free resources. And if you want to grow your business but don't want to spend all of your time on slow and unpredictable organic social media, then the Aimful Ads Academy is for you. It's the place to learn how to be seen by your audience, attract the right people as leads and turn them into paying customers. With my proven 4ad stack method plus a part of the program, you will have one on one access with me and I'm a marketing strategist. I have over 10 years experience so you don't have to navigate ads alone. I'm here to help you be seen. I'm here to help you attract leads and get more paying customers. And make sure you subscribe to the podcast so that you never miss an episode. I can't wait to keep this journey going with you. Until next time. Take care and market your business every day.