#099: The Cheapest Way to Get Started with Facebook Ads
Are you looking for the cheapest way to get started with Facebook ads?
If so, you’re going to want to listen in today because I have my very own Facebook ads experts on the show.
Jessica Gleim and Amy Christie are the founders and creators of their own “mom-powered, marketing agency,” called Flairst.
Today, we are going to be talking about how to run ads to cold audiences, people who haven’t yet heard of your business.
If you want to begin with ads on Facebook, this is going to be the least expensive option for you and a great way to start.
If you find Facebook ads confusing or you tried them and they didn’t work, you’re going to walk away from today’s show with some solid ideas!
Table of Contents
The Value of Facebook Ads
Ten years ago when Jess and Amy began their online business, the social media platforms were not only supportive of content creators, they were promoting your content to your followers.
Imagine a time when, if you posted to Facebook, your followers saw 100% of what you posted?
Or the days when your followers on Pinterest actually saw your pins?
As we all know, the algorithms have changed over the years, and those social media platforms no longer work to serve content creators. They now work to serve themselves.
If you want your content to be seen today, you have to do what some people call “pay to play,” also known as ads.
You can still get organic traffic through posting and SEO, but your main source of traffic from social media is going to come from ads.
Are Facebook Ads Cost-Effective?
One of the biggest misconceptions about ads is that it’s expensive to run. But there is a way to do it so that you aren’t draining every cent you bring in.
It can actually be cost-effective to run ads on Facebook.
The minimum ad campaign daily spend is $5, so for a small amount of investment on your part, you can run more than one campaign and see what kinds of results you get.
If you are trying to reach a cold audience — people who don’t know of your business — this is the best way to do it. Your small investment brings new eyes to your brand and your content.
Should Bloggers Run Ads for Content?
I think we all understand why businesses want to run ads, but what if you’re a blogger whose income is mostly from ads on your site and sponsored posts?
Is it ever worth it for a blogger to run ads to their content?
Let’s consider that bloggers make about $1 per one thousand views for ads on their site. So, if you are only trying to get traffic to your site to see your personal ads, it is not be worth the money.
But if you need more clicks to your site to show an advertiser, ads can help you. Ads are a great way to increase the number of eyeballs on your content.
ADVICE: Have a Ad Strategy in Place
When you decide to run ads, you have to go into it knowing exactly what you want from the ads.
Before you start your campaign, you should have an end goal in mind. Know what results you are expecting and who your target audience is.
If you are running ads in order to direct traffic to sponsored content on your blog, be sure to allocate some of the payment from the sponsored content toward those ads.
I personally share with the brand I am working with how much money I intend to put toward ad spend and I increase my fees to cover that ad spend.
Should I Boost A Post on Facebook?
Even if you haven’t run Facebook ads, you’ve likely seen the option to boost your posts.
The difference between boosting a post and running regular ads is that when you boost, you’re just getting more eyes on the post itself.
If you need more viewers on your page to show a brand partner that you have an audience large enough to deserve their sponsorship money, boosting posts might be enough for you.
But a cold traffic campaign is a more customized process. It allows you to do a lot more than just grab some extra likes on your posts.
Cold Audience Campaigns
A cold audience campaign might be for you if you have a specific plan for how you are going to monetize your content.
If you sell a product, have a tripwire of some type, or a gift guide, that is the ideal type of content to run cold audience ads to.
If you have a seasonal, evergreen post that converts extremely well during certain times of the year, you could do a cold traffic ad for that content.
Should You Run Ads to Grow Your List?
It makes sense to run ads to content that you are monetizing, but what about running ads to grow your email list? Is that ever worth it?
The answer is, it depends.
You can send a traffic campaign to your site, to a landing page where they can get your free offer, and be added to your list.
Or you can build a campaign into the Facebook platform so that the user can actually sign up for your list without leaving Facebook itself.
This is a great strategy because we all know that nobody wants to click through anymore. So, this allows you to run ads and build your list without the user having to click through to your site.
How to Budget for Ads
Conventional wisdom says that if you make $100 on a piece of content, you can spend one-third of that amount on marketing that content.
If you sell that item for $100, but you’ve spent $99 in ads, chances are you already spent the other $1 on other costs in your business.
So, you have to be mindful that you are actually going to make a profit on your ad campaigns.
What is a Cold Traffic Campaign on Facebook?
Let’s take a step back and define what we mean by cold traffic.
These are people who do not know you, who have never seen your product, and aren’t at all familiar with who you are or what you do.
Your ads will put your products or content in front of this cold audience.
A cold traffic campaign is one of the cheapest ways to get your products in front of people who would otherwise never see it.
The average cost per click across all ad platforms on the internet in 2019 was $1.72. You can use this average to decide if a cold campaign is worth it to you.
Another thing to think about is that people are ready to spend money in the holiday season.
They want to see things that they can buy, so if you have products to sell, it’s a great time to run an ad campaign to those products. Just know that holiday ad spend tends to be higher per click.
If you are thinking about starting an ad campaign for an evergreen piece, you might want to wait to start in January if you want the ad spend to be less expensive.
Learning Through Experimenting
Don’t be surprised by the learning curve when running ad campaigns.
You have to put in the time in order to figure out which ads do the best for you and how much you need to spend to get the results you want.
But here’s a tip: the more you spend, the faster you will learn.
If you are paying the minimum of $5 per day, you will be learning at a slower rate, and possibly paying the same amount of money over a slower period of time.
Learning from the Facebook Ads Experts
Jess and Amy actually have a course that will teach you to run a traffic campaign.
The objective of these ads is that you are asking Facebook to show people your ad in order to have them click through to your website.
Within the ad campaign, they will also teach you how to build two audience segments.
The first segment is interest targeting. This means you will tell Facebook who your audience is and what they want.
The second segment is a look-alike audience. This audience is a group of people who are like the audience who already visits your site, but who have never visited your site themselves.
Not only is Facebook going to show your ads to people they think will like your brand, but also to people who are more likely to click through to your website.
The beauty of Facebook ads is that Facebook will show your ads to the people you tell them to, but they know more about what people want than you do, and so, they will target the people they know want what you have to offer.
Are you ready to get started with Facebook ads after listening to this? Are you still feeling a bit nervous though? If so, Jess and Amy are here to help you.
They have a course designed just for you to help you get started.
To learn more about the course and the other services they offer, head over to Facebook Ads are Fun. (affil)
And be sure to come over to Facebook and join my MiloTree Mastermind Group.
I want this to be a place where you can come to get your questions answered and where we can all grow together.
I go live in the group every Monday at 12pm PT/ 3pm ET to discuss the latest podcast episode and to share my biggest takeaways. So be sure to join our active and growing group today!
Read the transcript for “The Cheapest Way to Get Started with Facebook Ads”
TIMESTAMP
- Intro
- 2:10 The Value of Facebook Ads
- 6:25 Cost-Effectiveness of Ads
- 8:40 Should Bloggers Run Ads for Content?
- 11:27 Have a Strategy in Place
- 13:27 Should I Boost A Post?
- 16:40 Cold Audience Campaigns
- 18:15 Should You Run Ads to Grow Your List?
- 22:21 How to Budget for Ads
- 23:25 A Cold Traffic Campaign
- 27:00 Learning Through Experimenting
- 31:17 Learning from the Experts
TOP 4 TAKEAWAYS
- The days of social media showing your content to your audience are over; if you want your content shown today, you have to be willing to pay to play.
- Running Facebook ads can be a cost-effective way to get your content in front of new eyes, but you need a carefully thought-out strategy going in.
- Monetized content is the best type of content to run ads to, although you may also find value in running ads to your email list.
- The more you spend, the faster you will learn what works, so jump in with as much as you can handle in order to shorten your learning curve.
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