Gone are the days where you can simply post something on Facebook and get tons of likes, shares, and comments. These days, if you want your business to gain traction among your fans, you need to pay to play. And while some might complain about that, I'm here to tell you that it's not actually a bad thing. In fact, when you pay, it opens your business up to amazing opportunity.
What's more important to you: time or money? The internet has trained an entire generation to think that virtually everything should be free. But, in lieu of spending money, we are usually spending our time. And with much social media marketing, it can feel like a huge waste of time.
But wouldn't it be great if you could simply spend a few bucks to get your highly targeted message in front of the exact people you wanted to reach... especially if they had already demonstrated that they spend money on the types of products or services you might be promoting? Well that's what you get when you decide to invest in Facebook's ad platform.
In early 2015, Facebook announced that they had gotten to 2 million active advertisers. That's pretty impressive, and something that was probably unexpected when they started sell ad space back in 2011. And while the initial advertising options back then offered for targeting options and little appeal for most businesses other than the big boys, things have changed - A LOT.
These days, just about any business marketing to consumers can take advantage of Facebook's platform to target individuals based on where they work, if they just got engaged, places they've recently visited, how likely they are to sell their home, and much more. Just imagine the possibilities.
I know, it sounds a bit "Big Brother," but if you put your marketer's hat on you'll recognize how powerful this stuff can be. And besides, the data is aggregated from multiple sources, and nobody can actually see specific details about individual consumers - intelligent software takes care of all of that.
So while it might cost you something to reach and get a response from people now, if you can position your ads to be profitable whenever someone clicks (and Facebook has tools to help you do that too), why wouldn't you make the investment?
Here's a quick look at three powerful ways you can use Facebook ads to profit in your business:
Custom Audiences - A custom audience will enable you to target your ads to people already in your database. This means you get to target existing leads or customers based on their email address or phone number. You simply upload your contact list, and Facebook will cross-reference your data with Facebook IDs, allowing your ads to be shown to that audience.
Website Custom Audiences - This variation on the above option actually allows you to target people who have visited specific pages on your website, and, therefore have demonstrated an interest in specific products or services. Let's say that they looked at a product on your website, but didn't end up buying. With this tool, you have the ability to track their behavior, and try to re-engage them through an ad campaign. It's a lot easier to convert someone to a buyer through re-engagement than through cold advertising.
Lookalike Audiences - Let's say you've exhausted your current list of prospects on Facebook. Just order up a "lookalike audience" of people who share attributes to your existing audience. Facebook's vast database can help you identify as many as 24.5 million people in a single country who look like your initial custom audience of 100 or more.
by David Baer
http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=D._Baer
No comments:
Post a Comment