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So, you throw $20 on a few posts and aren’t sure whether the boosting did anything.

All the marketers claim miraculous results, but aren’t providing all the facts and are largely peddling their wares, services, courses and classes.

Even though you don’t really want to advertise on Facebook, it’s not like you can afford NOT to be advertising on Facebook. All the ads in your feed say you have to do it, and that’s where the people are.

Let me tell you now, Facebook is awesome for growing your business, BUT it is not easy.

Here is a list of 10 things you are doing wrong.

#1 Insufficient ad testing budget:

If you really go cheap on your ad budget, you might not find anything that works.

You might run out of money before you get to your goal.  Sometimes when I look at someone’s Facebook ad account after they’ve said, “Facebook ads didn’t work.”

I see their account only has 10 ads in it and I say, “No, YOU didn’t work.”

#2 Creating the wrong ad type:

Having taught elsewhere about how Facebook has ten different ad types and every ad type is goal-oriented. You could go for engagement or video views or website traffic or website conversions, but you have to know what goal you want from these ads and choose the right type.

If you boost a post, you’re going to get likes, comments, and shares, but it’s going to be really expensive to get traffic or conversions from that boosted post.  If you want to get website traffic you could run the website traffic ad, but a lot of people have run that type of ad and said, “Wow. I got a hundred people to my site, but no conversions, no leads, no sales.”  NOTE:  Your website copy sucks, not the Facebook ad.

#3 Not creating enough ads (No Target Testing):

If you only create one idea, it’s a real crap shoot. The chances that you created that home-run ad is very low.

If you create more ads, there’s a much better chance that you found the right combination of targeting and image and headline that people will go crazy for. Then you’re going to get amazing results.  The more ideas you put in front of your customers, the better chance you have of them going crazy for one of them.

#4 Putting too many ads into one ad set:

The way that Facebook works, if you put ten ads into one ad set, it’s going to figure out which one is performing the best and it might only show that one. It’s going to decide on its own how much to show each ad. It doesn’t really give you any control over how much each ad in the ad set is shown to people.

#5 Not installing conversion tracking properly and testing it ahead of time.

If you’re going to run website conversion ads, you need to have conversion tracking set up with either standard events or custom conversions.

That’s a little technical. I’m not going to explain how to set that up here.

#6 Making the ad about you, it is about the customer:

Facebook is a customer laboratory.  This where you can put things in front of customers and see what they like and see what they’ll respond to and what they won’t. Whether it’s engagement or videos or leads or sales, you can find out what works and what doesn’t.  Look at your data and insights.

It’s like a top-secret survey they don’t even know we’re doing on them.

#7 Bad copy writing:

This is one of my services and IMO one of the biggest factors in all marketing. Copywriting is a fundamental marketing discipline.

It’s very important to understand that different phrases and different words affect people differently. There’s been work in this area for over eighty, almost ninety years. People in marketing have been trying to write things that get bigger and better results from customers.

#8 Not split-testing landing pages:

The fundamental thing to understand about getting results online is that a landing page is anywhere you send somebody. It could be your homepage. It could be a lead page. It could be a click funnel’s entry page. It could be any web page. A landing page is the first page they go to.

#9 Too many steps before conversion:

One thing to understand about digital marketing is the more steps people have to take to get anywhere, the fewer people will get there.

The longer the journey is, the more people die on the way.

#10 No Goal, No Plan, No Strategy:

People run ads without a written down goal, plan or strategy.  They simply throw something out there. With no intended goal.  No amount of X, be it revenue, number of visits to a page, etc.  They don’t write down a strategy or plan to reach those goals.

Need help running your Social Media?  Find out more by clicking on the $100 bill.

People aren’t on Facebook to shop. So simply getting them to take notice and take action is extremely difficult.

It takes an amazing offer that’s too good to pass up. A compelling value proposition summarized in a headline which can’t be ignored. It needs to be backed up by the perfect hero image and descriptive ad copy. And the CTA needs to be on-point so people know what to expect.

What you can do to get your ads right.

#1: Your Offer Will Make or Break Your Campaign.

To quote a great copy writer and marketing genius, Gary Halbert, “Strong copy will not overcome a weak offer but…in many cases, a strong offer will succeed in spite of weak copy written by marketing morons.”

Great offers, sell without selling.

#2: Track Sales, Not Vanity Metrics.

Clicks and social engagement are important, but what really matters is how much money you make, not how many people share your ad. I used to think: “I just need to be patient, and I will see the sales coming in.

After all, people are engaging, aren’t they?” Or “I will increase the daily budget. I just need more exposure.”  But those sales never materialized, and I ended up losing money.

It doesn’t matter if you’re getting 100’s of shares and clicks. If you are not getting sales, something is not working. It may be your ad. It may be your landing page. It may be your audience. But whatever the case, you need to stop the campaign and figure out what’s going on. Otherwise, you’ll keep losing money.

Sales first. Clicks and engagement, second.

If you take this approach, I guarantee you’ll learn faster and save a ton of advertising money.

#3: You Don’t “Create” Successful Ads, You Build Them.

People believe that successful campaigns are “created,” but they are not.

I mean, you can’t produce a winner ad out of thin air. No. You need to find the right information about your audience, so that you can build a campaign based on those findings.

The keyword: “Build.”

When you build a building, think, how you go about it?

You’d start with a solid foundation, right? Then, you’d start framing together a series of building blocks to give shape to your building.

Finally, once the entire building is done, you’d start taking care of the less-important details — like painting and decoration.

If you skipped the first steps, your building would fall really quickly.  When it comes to Facebook marketing, you need to take the same approach. You need to build your campaigns exactly as you’d build a building.

Step by step, you’re collecting and putting together key data points that, eventually, will give shape to your winner ad.

#4: LTV (Life Time Value) Is More Important Than You Think.

In a bid to make a quick buck, many advertisers are missing on the tremendous opportunity that long-term planning can bring to their businesses.

One of the primary reasons people fail at Facebook advertising is they don’t consider LTV when planning their strategy. They just focus on the quick sale. The truth is until you need to calculate LTV and build your campaigns around it, you won’t take full advantage of your Facebook advertising.

Example:  You sell a service worth $200 and it costs you $100 to get it.  But what are the indirect values, the upsells, the repeat business, the word of mouth from that $100 cost to acquire.  If you are not looking at the LTV you are losing out.

#5: Set, Clear Goals.

Setting goals is crucial, and with so many people overlooking this step, it needs to be discussed. From a marketing standpoint, setting goals is vital because it helps you measure results and discover whether or not your ads and campaigns are on the right path. Without a clear path to follow, you’ll never get results.

Start at the end.  Say you want to increase your sales this year. How would you go about it?  Most people do it like this, “40 jobs sold within 12 months or $50,000 in sales by 2018.”

Now, setting “end” goals like these is advisable. They help you visualize the big picture. Problems start when you only set these types of goals. I mean, “40 jobs” can be a really discouraging number when you’ve never made that amount of sales before.

Worse yet, with “big picture” goals like these, it’s hard to measure results in the short run. Instead, you need to break them down into smaller goals. This way, you can analyze data and modify your strategy.

Instead of trying to make 40 annual sales, you should aim for just 3-4 per month. By taking this approach, you can evaluate your campaigns on a daily basis, and therefore, pinpoint problems in your strategy.

When setting your advertising goals, remember to start at the end and break down your “big picture” goals into smaller goals.

It’s a simple concept and it will make your life way easier.

#6 The Pixel.

If you’re not using the Facebook pixel, you’re wasting your time. It’s how you measure conversions, optimize your ads and targeting, and gain insights about the Facebook users who visit your website.  You can’t use Facebook’s remarketing and lookalike audience features.

#7 Targeting.  Behavior, Interests and Demographic.

Behavior targeting is all about reaching people based on past purchase behavior, purchase intent, device usage, travel preferences, and other behavioral characteristics.  Interest targeting allows you to reach your target audience based on the things they’re interested in.  This could be activities, hobbies, the pages they have liked, or a host of other things.  Facebook also offers some impressive demographic targeting options for advertisers.

#8 Custom Audiences.

Remarketing is very valuable.

People who see your remarketing ads are, on average, twice as likely to convert and three times more likely to engage.

Facebook’s version of remarketing is called Custom Audiences.

Website visitors: People who have visited your website or specific pages within a certain period of time. (Another reason you need the Facebook pixel!)

Contact lists: People who have shared their email or phone number with your company.  You upload this list to Facebook.

#9 Engagement Ads.

Facebook allows you to reach the people who react, comment, or share your stuff with Engagement Ads.

These people are just a small group of your entire Facebook audience. Usually 5 percent of your followers account for 80 percent of all your engagement.

No customer interaction may be scary to potential customers when they’re checking you out. Really, it’s probably just because only 5 percent of your followers will ever see your organic posts thanks to Facebook’s algorithm.

By spending $20 on engagement ads, you’ll reach your biggest fans. They’ll react and comment, you’ll look amazing.  You just might win over those people who visit your page and discover an awesome, engaging business.

#10 Guiding.

Your marketing needs to guide a person to do what you want them to do.  Now, going from attention to a sale these days is almost not happening.  So, you need to guide them to the next step in your sales process or their buying journey.  Your ads need to tell them what you want them to do and what their next move is.  Use your Calls to Action and where they land a push to the sale.

Need help running your Social Media?  Find out more by clicking on the $100 bill.

Ok, let’s wrap it up.

So in this article we can see where Facebook would suck for those that are using it wrong.  We can also say, there is more to it than simply boosting a post (I cringe).  Finally, we can see how powerful this platform is.

I’ve been in the game since 1986 and IMO, Facebook and Google are bigger for small businesses than TV or Radio have ever been.

Want to get started today?  Want to see faster results? Here is what I am offering.  For $200 I will get your social media up to speed, get a Facebook and Instagram Ads set, up and running and you will see results in less than 7 days.  No strings attached, no contracts.  Zero to 60 as fast as possible. 

Email RJCooper@ContractorMarketingNetwork.com put FACEBOOK ADS in the subject line.