6 Min Read Are your Facebook ads bringing in the results you wished for? If not, then they might not be optimised to reach their full potential. Here is our guide on how to optimise Facebook ads.
Use the Facebook Pixel
If you don’t know what the Facebook Pixel is, it’s basically a small piece of code from Facebook that you put into your website’s code. With the pixel code properly installed, you can track conversions from Facebook ads, create lookalike audiences for future ads, and remarket to people who have already visited your website.
There are 9 standard pixel ‘event codes’ for you to use, or you can create your own. These event codes will allow you to see the specific conversion that they relate to. Some of these events include viewing a product, adding an item to the cart, making a purchase, or completing a form.
Tailor your title
Whether you’re posting a video or sharing a product, you need to make sure that your Facebook ad’s title grabs the audience’s attention. Aim to convey a sense of need in your titles. Examples of this are titles such as “5 things you need to know about [x]” or “You need to do [x]”. However, if you don’t think these types of titles would work for your product, use active voice instead.
Active voice is essentially when the speaker is the one performing the action. It helps the sentence to appear clearer, stronger, and more persuasive, which makes it a great voice to use in ads. Have a look at the following 2 ad titles and see which one you would be more likely to click.
- “Our new clothing range has just arrived. Why not take a peek?”
- “Take a peek at our new clothing range. Fresh arrivals ready for your wardrobe.”
Hopefully, number 2 stood out to you. This is the one written in active voice. Of course, you are likely to get clicks from both titles, but the second option will tend to get more because of the stronger tone of voice.
Keep your text snappy
The average human attention span is getting smaller and smaller each year, and so we have to accommodate that. Get to the point of your ad as quickly as you can – don’t add too much fluff. If you’re using video, then we recommend keeping this between 30 and 120 seconds. For more information, check out this guide from Hootsuite on the ideal social media post length.
Think mobile
Mobile use surpassed desktop in 2016 and has been rising ever since. So, whenever you create an ad, think of how it will look on mobile.
Mobile screens are longer and thinner than desktop screens which means that horizontal Facebook ads won’t fare very well. However, square or portrait ads are perfect for mobile. For the best of both worlds, we recommend you optimise Facebook ads to be square, since these will show up great on both mobile and desktop.
Use enticing imagery
Facebook is really clamping down on ad imagery in 2019. Since the platform has found that images with less than 20% text perform better, it has decided to refuse many of the ads that fall over this percentage. Facebook even has a text overlay tool that you can use to see whether your ad image will be accepted! This means that it is more important than ever to ensure your imagery is both high quality and visually appealing.
Use Facebook Business tools to inform your targeting decisions
A big problem that most ads have is that their targeting needs refining. Facebook allows you to get incredibly targeted with your ads, so why not take advantage?
You can target by age, gender, location, interests, marital status and more. The combinations are limitless and an absolute lifeline for marketers. For example, if you want to send out an ad to people whose birthdays are upcoming, Facebook has an option for that. Need to target people who like luxury brands? Facebook can do that, too.
Don’t know where to start? Tap into your page’s insights to find out more about your existing audience. Insights give you information such as the age, gender and location on your audience, which might give you an idea as to who your content resonates with.
Serve the right landing page
As our final tip, we’re giving you something that goes past the actual Facebook ad and straight to where you want people to go: your website. When you set up an ad, no matter what format you choose, you have to make sure that the landing page you select corresponds with the ad topic. Don’t just send people to your homepage if your ad was about a specific product or service. Here’s why.
You want to make the customer’s journey with your ad as easy and seamless as possible. So, if you create an ad to do with your new clothing range, then the landing page should be the ‘new in’ section of your website. In fact, a blog from AdEspresso suggests that the landing page of an ad could potentially be more important than the ad itself for conversions and dwell time.
Need some help with optimising your Facebook ads?
We explain a lot in this blog post, and a fair deal of it is technical. We have simplified it for the sake of readability, but if you still feel as though this would be too much for you, then give us a call.
We have a team of Facebook ad experts who can assist you with researching, setting up and helping you to optimise Facebook ads. Our web team can assist you with setting up your Facebook Pixel and our design team can create some fantastic visuals that will truly wow your target market.
Call us on 01244 347 545 or send us an email at [email protected] and one of our team will get back to you as soon as we can.
