Mistakes happen in all aspects of life, and digital marketing is definitely one of those areas in which you’re going to make some bloopers. Part of the process of learning is making mistakes. When developing promotional campaigns, it’s likely you’ll have to engage in some trial and error before you master what works for your business. However, if we can help you avoid some of these common Facebook ad mistakes, why not share our knowledge and help. We hope this information saves you time, money, and some frustrations.
Choosing the Wrong Ad Type:
Having a goal for your business and campaign is imperative. You can easily go wrong in not thoroughly defining your goal to choose the correct type of Facebook ad. Because Facebook ads offer versatility and multiple types of ads, you have the tools you need to accomplish whatever campaign goal you’ve set. Rather than basing which Facebook ad to choose on a guessing game, read my post about types of Facebook Ads and which to choose. I also recommend taking the time to read Facebook business tutorials and ask around to see what works well for other businesses and why. Research takes time, but doing it right the first time will ultimately save you more time and money.
Placing Too Many Ads in One Ad Set:
A mistake that is often made is thinking that you save time by creating an ad set that contains lots of ads and then use the data from that set as testing for insights. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way, but why? Facebook doesn’t show all of your ads in one set equally. If you place 10 ads in a set, only the best-performing ones will be used. Facebook’s algorithm determines what gets out and when. You have no individual control over the decision. Therefore, you may have ads in this set that are never even seen.
Failing to Test Enough Ads:
More isn’t always better, but when it comes to testing for performance, it is. You want to create many individual ads and run them each on their own to see which ones work. The more ads you run, the higher your chances of discovering one that resonates with your target audience. Unfortunately, they can’t all be winners, and there’s really no shortcut when it comes to determining which are hits and which are misses. In fact, you may want to break your testing down even further by testing your images, headlines, and target demographics to discover the individual aspects that are best for your brand.
Installing Conversion Tracking Incorrectly:
Website conversion ads can be great for converting users to customers. When choosing this type of ad, you can select standard events or custom conversions. Their custom conversion tracking tool is incredibly helpful for isolating the ads that are successful from those that aren’t. That is if you install it correctly. If you don’t, your ad will run simply as a website traffic ad, defeating your initial purpose. The key to avoiding this issue is to test the conversion tracking immediately after setting it up. Custom conversion tracking allows you to set up a custom URL such as a thank you page or confirmation page. That specific URL must be set up and defined in your dashboard. Once this is done, go to the URL and then check back in your custom conversions dashboard to ensure the URL is active.
Neglecting to Determine What Customers Want:
It may seem obvious that you need to appeal to your audience if you want to run a successful ad campaign, but sometimes the most obvious things are those we miss. Too often, marketers simply run with their ideas instead of testing to see what resonates with their audience. When their ads don’t work, they throw more money at the problem, believing that running more of the same ads will increase the engagement. Don’t waste your money! As a business owner, it is important to spend and invest your time and money wisely. Instead, invest time in offering up several options and see which ones work. While this is time-consuming and a detailed process that involves testing in various categories, it’s definitely worth the investment. Know what your audience wants and give it to them; this will lower your ad spending, in the long run, gain you a more loyal fan base and increase your profits
By avoiding these mistakes, you are already ahead of the game and saving yourself time, money, and frustrations. Now that you know a few mistakes to avoid, look for our next post about targeting Facebook Ads. Stay tuned!
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