Making Facebook advertising work for small businesses takes a little extra finesse and a lot more patience…

Coughing and spluttering as the crowd roared with laughter, I wiped sweat from my eyes while the beast stared down at me. It was my 21st birthday – my friends took me bull riding for the first time. Luckily for me it was a mechanical bull in a spit and sawdust country bar in Nowhere, Iowa – but I still had a hell of a ride.

I often think back on that night and the countless times I was thrown to the floor. The laughter and hoots from the crowd of strangers all desperate to see me make a fool of myself. It seemed like such a simple thing to do. Stay on the bucking bull for 8 seconds…that’s all it would take to achieve celebrity status for the night in this small corner of the Midwest.

Like most things in life, success relies on perseverance. You keep climbing back up onto that bull.

If you want to get the most out of Facebook advertising for your business, I suggest you get a sturdy pair of chaps, because it is no easy ride. But it can be done.

What I don’t want to do is paint a picture that is so often peddled by online ‘Gurus.’ I want to be clear, when you start your Facebook Advertising, it will likely be difficult and costly. It’s like any marketing, you need to test and refine along the way.

It takes time, patience and grit. But when you do get it under your control, you will be able to create a regular stream of new leads for your business

My team and I have run hundreds of Facebook ads for dozens of businesses and across all that time there is one common trap that catches most people out when they first start running paid ads.

Nearly every entrepreneur would accept that Facebook has incredible potential to create leads for their business. So, many of them sign-up and start running ads. It’s dead easy to get started. But much like having a little flutter on the horses on race day, the excitement soon fizzles out and they start losing money.

What they thought was going to be a flood of new clients from running that first ad often amounts to barely a trickle.

Facebook Advertising isn’t easy. It might have been at one time, but it isn’t now. Users are becoming more sophisticated and the platform increasingly complicated. It is no longer a case of just throwing up any old photo and some stale sales copy you nicked from your leaflet. You have to work harder. People expect more.

The result, you need to become obsessed with marketing and knowing your numbers. That is the sad truth that catches out so many people.

So, on one hand, too bad for you, you’ll have to work for it. On the other hand, I bet your competitors will try and give up like most business owners. That means you have a chance to make Facebook work for you.

Here’s what’s possible

We are running a campaign for a client we work with in the insurance sector which is bringing in 40-70 leads a day from Facebook. These leads consist of name, address, email, phone number and date of birth. And when they are short of staff, we can dial back the flow so they only get 20, if that’s what they need.

While these numbers would be exciting for most small business owners, the truth is it took months of fine tuning and constant monitoring to get to this point. We tested dozens of ads, we created more than 20 different segmented audiences to find the best ones to send the message to. We trialed times of day to determine the best way to spend the daily budgets to get the best conversion rates. And we aren’t done. We’ll never be done. There will always be more to test and learn.

We are obsessive about Who, What, Why, When and How… all those questions need to be answered to get Facebook working to the best of its ability.

Have I put you off? I hope not, Facebook Advertising is incredibly powerful. It shouldn’t be your only marketing method, but it definitely needs to be part of the mix.

No other marketing platform knows more about its users, which means you can define exactly who you want to see your ads. And get instant feedback! You can know within days if a marketing campaign is working.

So, where to begin?

You need to start somewhere, and I always suggest starting with ‘Boost Post.’ Ease into Facebook advertising by simply paying £10 to boost a post on your Facebook page. You can find plenty of help online on how to do this. Then after you are comfortable with that process you can use the Ads Manager or Power Editor to begin building more sophisticated ads.

Remember though, don’t expect results in days, or even weeks. It takes time to learn the best way to define and connect with your audience. You need to test everything and be systematic about it. You can learn quickly, but don’t forget to keep track of what you are testing or you won’t know what you are learning!

Facebook Advertising is a wild beast that can be tamed. It takes time, patience and grit, but when you do get it under your control, you’ll be able to create a regular stream of new leads for your business and even be able to control how fast (or slow) they come in. For every business, that is a powerful asset to have.

Facebook Tips

  1. Always Start with a Great Offer

Before you write one word of copy, spend time considering what your audience wants. A great offer will make all the difference in the success of an ad.

  1. Track Conversions, Not Vanity Metrics

Page likes and little love hearts feel nice, but they do little to bring home the bacon. Focus on the numbers that bring more customers in.

  1. Create Unique Ad Sets for Each Audience

When you are testing, you need to know which audiences respond the best.

  1. Your Landing Page Must Compliment the Ad

Consider the journey of the customer. If your ad has a smiling child in it, make sure that child is also on your landing page to greet your new visitor. The transition from Facebook to your landing page needs to feel seamless.

  1. Assume Nothing. Test Everything

Successful Facebook Ads are not ‘created’, they are built. One piece at a time. Find the elements that work and expand on them. You’ll likely discover that the ad that works for your business is not the ad you think is the best. Your customers will decide which ad is the best.