In the old school of advertising, you’d place ads on billboards and television and tell customers why they need to buy something now. Social media advertising, on the other hand, requires a much more subtle form of selling. Because social media is used for socialization rather than shopping, it is tremendously important to establish strong relationships with your customers through community-building – in other words, ‘likability.’
All this being said, here are four Facebook advertising tips to build up your online presence.
1. Focus on Creating a Community Feeling (Rather Than Selling)
To successfully advertise on Facebook, stay as far away as possible from the sleazy salesman type of advertising. Most people don’t go on Facebook with the intention of shopping. Rather, they’re on social media to socialize with their friends, family, and community. Thus, Facebook advertising should always be about building your fan base and engaging with them. That might not lead to direct sales, but it can create loyalty and excitement for your brand – which is just as valuable.
A good example of a brand with a strong community feeling is Nike UK which created a social media football club called Nike Academy. This helped Nike UK’s Facebook community grow by 260%.
2. Personalize Your Ads
With social media platforms like Facebook, you can target exactly who you want to reach. This will help you better personalize your social media ads so that you can better connect with your followers. With Facebook in particular, you can target your ads to people based on specific criteria like work, education, relationship status, age, location, and likes and interests.
Dove is a brand that targets a specific group for its ads: women. Soap by itself is not exciting, but when you combine it with a tagline like “helping all women realize their personal beauty potential” like Dove does, buying soap becomes a more personal experience.
3. Show Gratitude to Your Online Community
Special fan shout-outs, gifting, and getting your followers involved in your projects can be a great way to build your online community. Some ways you can do this is by offering your followers new deals or free gifts on special occasions, and by featuring them on your Facebook page (give them a well-deserved moment of fame!)
Getting your followers involved, in addition, shows that you care about their input and value their voice. The potato chip company Lays, for instance, asks their Facebook fans to create new flavors for them. This dramatically helped Lay’s reverse their six-year decline in sales.
4. Zoom In on the Details
Creating great Facebook ads is a science: all of the ingredients matter. When you focus on the small details – like choosing a professional-looking photo for your ad rather than one with bad lighting – you can better catch someone’s attention.
Coca Cola has great branding all around, but their Facebook page illustrates that when your graphics are consistent in color, text, and even size, it affects how your entire timeline looks like. Not to mention, the photos are consistent in lighting as well.
Facebook combines graphics, words, and videos, allowing you to build your company page to fully represent your brand. Utilize the Facebook advertising tips we outlined above to build relationships with people where they already hang out.