You might say that Facebook ads aren’t giving you the kind of ROI you expected from it. Facebook isn’t about using all the possible tools available but about using them correctly.
Here are 10 hacks that tackle more than just ‘boost post’ for you to get the best out of your Facebook ads-
1. Use Facebook Messenger Ads
Facebook messenger ads work because of two reasons. One is that rather than conversing in posts using comments, people prefer private chats more. Secondly, everyone uses Facebook on their mobile and since messenger can only be operated through mobiles, the chances of your ads getting noticed become higher.
With the help of messenger ads, you can redirect people to your website or a specific landing page once they click on the ad. Or you can converse with them directly in the chat window, get to know them, get their details, and so on.
To set it up, go to your Facebook ads manager. Under ‘campaigns’, click on ‘messages’ under ‘consideration.’ You can either put up an ad and ask them to reply via message which will redirect them to your chat window on messenger. You can also send the ad directly to the target audience.
Companies usually have bots to continue and manage the conversations. A bot like Manychat can help you keep track of the messages, the email ids and so on.
2. Facebook Messenger Auto Responses
How this works is that you create an engaging post (can use boost post to make it popular), ask them to engage with comments, and tell them that you will reply to them via messaging.
For example, this marketer called Larry Kim asked his audience a riddle and asked them to guess the answer in comments. He said that he would reply to the correct answer via messenger. This created a lot of buzz, people were excited to participate, and it generated lots of engagement in terms of likes and comments. Because a lot of people commented on the post, it generated organic reach and improved engagement for Larry.
3. A/B Test
To understand what works and what doesn’t you need data. The best way to gather data is by running A/B tests on ads.
While it may be a little cumbersome to run a/b tests on video ads, you can always a/b test on the text or the caption before the video. Apart from that, you must always a/b test image ads. Experiment with different colour, text, images, CTAs inside the ad and get data about which one people would click on more. You can also test the placement of the ad.
4. Cool Down on the Ad Frequency
Showing the same ad to the same people isn’t going to increase your chances of getting higher click-through-rates (CTR). In fact, after a few weeks, you will notice the CTR going down, and ad costs increase.
People will be tired of seeing your ads over and over again. Therefore, it would be good to space out the ads and put some time interval between them. Psychology experts say that to remember something people have to see it at least 3 times. So, let your ads run for at least 3 times (with intervals in between) and you can go ahead depending on the response on those ads.
5. Take Note of Cost Per Mille
When you’re taking note of your conversion rates, it is important to take note of the cost per mille.
Cost per mille or CPM refers to the cost per 1000 impressions. Your CPM will determine your ad costs as the CPM will give you an idea about the competition there is to reach your target audience.
6. Facebook Ad Targeting Method
You can boost your CTR by targeting unrelated interests. While the suggestions button will give you related interests while narrowing your audience but try mixing unrelated topics too.
A great example of this was done by a company which printed T-shirts saying “life took me to Arizona but I’ll always be an Arizona girl.” This created a lot of buzz among the target audience. Some loved it, some found it very creepy as to how did the company know so much about them.
But the company didn’t pull off anything shady. They just mixed three unrelated elements- women who live in England, people who recently moved, and people who like local businesses, high schools, etc located in Arizona. And the response was massive!
7. Use Facebook Ads Library
With the Facebook ads library, you can find out very easily which ads are serving well for your competitors. And the best part is anyone can explore the library. This library will give you a detailed collection of ads that have been run by the competitor and their active ones. It will give you an idea of the creative, the content, the duration run (a longer duration might mean that it’s doing well), and so on.
To conduct this research, you need to go to the company’s page on Facebook, hit ‘page transparency’ on the right- hand column below, and click on ‘see more.’
8. Remarket Campaigns to Save Costs
People who have heard of your brand before will have a pre-existing brand affinity towards it the next time and therefore will be more likely to click on ads and convert.
Moreover, since the prices of ads have grown, you need to save money somewhere. Wordstream says that brand affinity can dramatically affect CTR and conversions (2-3X times). Therefore, if you run the same ad copy, same ad targeting, same bids between a remarketing and non-remarketing audience, the former will prove to be more profitable.
9. Video Ads
You can do a lot with video ads. And almost all successful brands have said that video ads work better for them over images. Databox asked 26 marketers which channel serves them better and 59.3% said that videos drive more engagement. Increase in clicks, conversion, CTR is all results of successful video ads.
These marketers say the reasons for these could be that people would just scroll by an image without it registering in their brain. But with videos, you can create an impression, tug at their emotions.
10. Rotate the Ads
Rotating your ads can help you in ways more than one. You can create separate ads to convey the same message without sounding too pushy. You don’t have to stress about ad frequency. You can retarget the same audience with fresher and diverse content.
The best way to rotate the ads is by creating a Facebook campaign with a single ad. Then, copy the ad group and create two different ad groups under the same campaign. Use different images and textual content for both the ad groups. Then, you can custom schedule each ad to deliver throughout the week on different days.