Should you advertise on Facebook?
Social media are a major force in the world that can provide us with much advertising benefit. And Facebook is the king of social media. Not only that, but Facebook ads are impressively cheap. Yes, many of us, including your customers, spend an absurd amount of time on Facebook and this is a marketing opportunity for you.
Read More.Boost Post Option
Facebook makes it very easy to advertise. If you have created a Facebook business page, then you can take steps to advertise. The easiest, but not the best option, is to click "Boost Post" on any post that you have created. This will cause your post to reach a much wider audience for as little as $1. When you set up your "boost", Facebook will give you an estimate of how many people your post will reach. You won't want to spend just $1, but $1 might be good for a test on how it works.
You will want to use a post that links back to your own website, so that you can benefit from people reaching your site. If you are sharing a post, there will be no benefit to you.
Real Facebook Ads
The better way to advertise is to create a "Facebook ad" by clicking the "Promote" button on the bottom left of your Facebook business page. Facebook will then present you with a number of options that allow you to choose your objective, your budget, your audience, and what your ad will look like by adding images or video, text, and other options. For example, you can choose to promote your Facebook page, that is, you can get more "likes" for your Facebook page. You can also choose to "Get More Website Visitors" and link to your website. This is your stronger option and your better strategy. Getting more Facebook "likes" is great, but we really want conversions. Use the text field to advertise a special, give a discount, or give some other reason to link to your website with the "Learn More" button.
Learn from great ads already on your news feed
Before creating your ad, be sure to take a look at the sponsored ads you already see on your Facebook home page. Look for the word "sponsored." For example, an ad for a Salesforce browser extension gives me a "Learn More" that prompts me to install the extension. Another ad shows me a video from The Grand Tour, Season 2 from Amazon Prime. Clicking shows me a page on the Amazon website where I can choose to add the season to my watch list or watch now. Real conversions are the goal.
You can find many more options by going to Ads Manager at: https://www.facebook.com/ads/manager/ However, it helps to start with the easier ad creation options.
However you set up your ad, Facebook's Insights will give you a full real-time picture of how your ad is doing.
