Facebook adsI have to admit, I’m not sure about this particular subject. I mean, are Facebook ads worthwhile for what? Are they worthwhile for everything under the sun? Probably not. Are they worthwhile for certain types of products? 100% yes, they definitely are. So, let’s take a look at what does work and what doesn’t work when it comes to Facebook ads:

Remember, It’s Social

For all that Facebook is one of the most popular sites on the Internet, it is very different from Google. People prefer to search for things that their friends like on Facebook as opposed to looking for information from random people. This means that certain kinds of Facebook ads will work better than others.

Try To Stick With Social

The key I think with Facebook ads is to try as much as possible to keep things social. See if you can get things targeted to people whose friends already like you. If you can do this, you’ll find that your Facebook ads will be that much more effective.

Freebies Work Well

From what I’ve heard from others, freebies tend to work really well on Facebook, more so than ordinary ads. I guess it has something to do with the social nature of the website that makes those kinds of offers more attractive to visitors to Facebook.

Targeting

Remember that Facebook has a lot more information about their users than Google does. Google only knows what someone entered as a keyword and their IP address. Facebook knows where people live, what their birthdays are, what their hobbies are and all kinds of other information.
Therefore, when you create Facebook ads, be sure to consider how you are going to target your ads. It’s very easy to waste money on Facebook by paying for lots of ads which do not offer you much in the way of return on investment. However, by carefully considering your target audience, you can actually make good money using these Facebook ads.

Don’t Be Too Specific

However, it’s important not to get too specific in your targeting. Picking on people born in February who live in Butte, Montana and who have at least 500 friends will limit you to the point where you may not get good ROI. Therefore, keep it broad enough to be well targeted but not so narrowly targeted that you miss out on potential customers.

Remember Fundamentals

Just like advertising on other websites or on Google, it’s important to keep in mind the fundamentals of advertising in mind. That means that you still need to have specific, measurable goals in mind for your advertising campaign so that you know if you’ve done well or not.
It’s also useful to do split testing of your advertising, including split testing of the landing pages that you create and target with your Facebook ads. Remember that unlike with Adwords, I have yet to ever see free ads offered to entice you advertise. Therefore, you’ll be spending plenty of cash and need to be careful not to waste it targeting ads which don’t offer any benefit.