7 Steps to Take Before Using Facebook Marketing in Your Campaign

In our digital economy, businesses of all sizes can reach more customers than ever before. Social media has become one of the most popular ways to promote a brand or product. It’s no surprise that Facebook advertising is one of the most affordable and effective tools for reaching your target audience. With approximately 2.9 billion active users worldwide, Facebook is still the leading social media platform among all its competitors. While there are many other options for businesses looking to advertise their products, few can compete with the scope of Facebook as a marketing tool. Whether you have an established business or are launching a new brand, it’s important to understand how you can use Facebook to your advantage.

7 Things to Consider Before Posting Facebook Ads

But creating a Facebook ad for your brand doesn’t guarantee quality traffic without putting in some work. Like most other digital marketing platforms, you need to consider several things to ensure you get maximum return on investment (ROI). 

1. Ensure Your Campaign Objectives and Business Goals Are in Sync 

what’s the main idea behind using Facebook marketing? Are you after increasing sales, improving brand awareness, or trying to get more people to read your newsletters? Figuring out what your objective is will be a great determinant of how you will set up your Facebook ads.  Thankfully, Facebook already figured out why it’s important to create ads based on business goals, and therefore has outlined several objectives for almost any goal you might have for your marketing campaign. There isn’t a standard approach to prescribing an objective for every business. Through Facebook, you can learn about each of the listed objectives and how best they suit your business profile. 

2. Understand your Target Audience Better

One of the best ways to start with a new Facebook account for business is to understand your target audience. Through Facebook Ads’ Audience Insights, you can simplify the task even more, just ensure you’ve linked your Business Manager account to your Facebook page to be able to view this data.  Under Facebook Business Manager’s main navigator, go to the planning section then select ‘Audience Insights.’  In the next popup, you’ll have two choices; ‘Everyone on Facebook’ and ‘People connected to your Page.’  You should choose the second option and then you can view the relevant data according to the Facebook page selected.  Here, you’ll have access to demographic information, device data, Facebook activities, and everything else you need to know. If your report is blank, it simply means you still have a milestone to cover to add more audiences for Facebook to create some insightful analysis. All isn’t lost though. You can still use insights from larger brands that you share similarities with. 

3. Learn How to Best Use Facebook Ad Geotargeting 

If you run a small business, you might be tempted to assume that your audience will find you on Facebook as long as you keep posting content that targets them. It’s important to note that most small and medium businesses mainly rely on local audiences and the immediate community for traffic generation.  Some businesses may have a nationwide audience outreach while others extend beyond to reach the global community. Regardless of which business category you operate and where your target audience is, you can leverage geotargeting to create more awareness and improve outreach.  You can access all Facebook live geotargeting settings when creating an ad. Your first point of concern is to ensure your targeted audience is in a location where you intend your brand to reach. The default geotargeting setting is ‘People living in or recently in this location.’ Check each setting and match them to your business case scenario. For instance, if you operate a local home appliance outlet and usually don’t offer shipping outside your area, it’s best to adjust to target audiences who live within that location. That way, you won’t be wasting your ad spend targeting those audiences who are just passing by because they most likely will be in another location by next week. 

4. Create and Maintain a Responsive Facebook Marketing Strategy

You must also create a strategy that is responsive to your audience’s needs and desires. Your approach will be different for a B2B enterprise than for a B2C retail brand, for example. You’ll want to know your audience demographics, psychographics, and behaviors.  You’ll also want to know what your competitors are doing on Facebook. You can also use Facebook’s ad insights tools to see what’s working, what’s not, and why. You can also use Facebook’s free marketing tools in combination with paid advertising. Use the Facebook pixel to track and measure your results. The key to success is to not treat Facebook like it is something mysterious. Instead, you must treat it like any other marketing channel. You must know your audience and be able to relate to them with the right combination of words and images.

5. Learn Intensively About Facebook Ads

Facebook ads might be the single best way to grow your audience. Whether you’re looking to generate leads or increase sales, Facebook advertising is a tried-and-true method for seeing results. Once you have a basic understanding of how Facebook advertising works, you’ll be able to target your ideal audience and boost your reach.  There are a variety of ad types to choose from, including image ads, video ads, carousel ads, poll ads, slideshow ads, and instant experience ads, among others.  You can also create custom ads specifically for Facebook. This can give you a leg up on your competition.  Facebook ads are easy to create and you can use them for almost any type of business. You can also use these ads to drive traffic to your website, build your email list, or increase sales. No matter what your goals are, Facebook ads can help you meet them. So, before launching your marketing campaign, ensure you’ve prepped yourself well on what Facebook ads are and what they can achieve. 

6. Use Video to Increase Visibility, Keep the Content Engaging 

An estimated 80% of people who visit social media sites watch videos. It’s hard to deny the popularity of video marketing. With Facebook’s new algorithm, however, businesses are no longer struggling to get their videos in front of their desired audience members.  You can upload videos directly to your Facebook page, but you also have the option to create a video ad. It’s crucial to use videos in your Facebook marketing strategy because it is the best way to grab your audience’s attention. You can also create video posts by uploading the video directly to your page and adding text or a poll or even an offer or coupon code. Remember, nothing’s annoying like a boring and stale ad repeatedly displayed. If you resort to posting other ad types other than videos, ensure you keep them fresh every week. Repurposed ads will make your marketing campaigns attractive and engaging to your audience.  Some of the key things to consider when creating your Facebook content is to elaborate on new features, product uses, and pros of your services. Additionally, you can explain what your business is generally all about while introducing your products and services to your new audiences. If you choose this, ensure that you grow from it to something more engaging to catch your audience’s fascination. 

7. Find out The Best Times to Post on Facebook

Despite being the most used social media platform, Facebook still ranks among the most challenging social platforms for organic content use. The ever-changing Facebook algorithm also contributes to the difficulty in determining the optimal time to post content.  The best way to navigate this challenge is to schedule your posts. The Facebook page controls allow you to schedule posts to go online at the right time. This feature can also help you identify missing topics and gaps within your posts.  Alternatively, you can use third-party tools such as ViralPost® by Sprout Social, which analyzes audience data and identifies the times with the most activities to help you achieve authentic engagement. 

Bonus:  Integrate Facebook with Other Platforms

If you want your Facebook efforts to go viral, you should take advantage of the fact that you can link your Facebook page to Instagram, Twitter, and other social media platforms for maximum exposure. You can achieve this in several ways. One way is to share photos from your Instagram account on your Facebook page.  The reverse is also true. Another way is to repost your Facebook posts on Instagram. You can also link your Facebook page to your website to increase your audience reach. And you can also link your Facebook page to email campaigns for even greater exposure.

Final Thoughts

Facebook is a great marketing tool if you take advantage of its rich tools to make your brand more popular and attract organic traffic. Before diving into Facebook marketing, you need to bring yourself up to speed on the different things to do to ensure that every ad spend yields good returns. Paying attention to the points discussed will not create magic changes right away, but will align you in the right direction of Facebook marketing success. About the Author Dean Braiden is a director and the leader of the marketing team at Seek Social, a UK-based social media growth company.