Are Facebook PPC campaigns worth it in 2020? Are they a good fit for targeting your audience?

Fair question, taking into consideration all the Facebook drama happening lately. Since Facebook ad policy is so elusive and raises so many questions, is it still worth investing your money into a Facebook PPC campaign?

Let’s turn to the statistics to find the definitive answer:

  • It’s a common thought that people hate Facebook ads. However, the numbers show that in 2018 only 1% of respondents held negative connotations towards PPC advertising, compared to 7% in 2016 and 2017. 
  • Marketers enjoy pay-per-click campaigns since they are expected to bring 50% more lead conversions than organic web traffic. 
  • In the future, marketers plan to increase investments in PPC campaigns, with 40% of respondents supporting this statement. 

Since Facebook is one of the key players in online advertisement and digital marketing (with Google Ads being its rival), Facebook is one of the most attractive places on the Internet for a PPC campaign. 

So, what does it take to successfully target audiences on Facebook?

Let’s take a look at some tips to take into consideration. 

1. Selecting the Right Campaign Objective

What message do you want your PPC ads to communicate to your audience?

Facebook Ad Center offers three objectives, each of which targets smaller objectives:

  • Awareness: by choosing this objective, your PPC ad will be primarily used to increase brand awareness and reach. 
  • Consideration: this objective is often used for PPC ads that are aimed at increasing traffic, engagement, lead generation or attracting more attention to your content, such as app installs or video views. 
  • Conversion: by choosing this objective, you’ll aim your PPC ad at increasing conversions, store visits or catalog sales. 

As you can see, all three objectives resemble the three stages of the buyer’s journey.

How to choose the right objective for a Facebook audience?

The choice of an objective will depend on two factors:

  • how you want the ad to affect your target audience personas
  • the size of your business

Ask yourself a question: how do you want your target audience to perceive this ad? Do you want them to get acquainted with your brand? Do you want to raise awareness about your brand? Or do you want them to purchase your product or service right away?

No matter what type of business you are running, you will benefit from the awareness and consideration objectives. Ads with these objectives will get you noticed. The conversion objective is for companies who have already spread brand awareness and now solely want to focus on the increasing sale.

2. Figure Out An Ad Placement Option 

When it comes to targeting the audience with a PPC campaign, not every ad placement option will work well. 

On Facebook, there are several options for ad placement:

  • Facebook Newsfeed
  • Instagram feed
  • Facebook Marketplace
  • Facebook Video feeds
  • Facebook right column
  • Instagram Explore section
  • Messenger Inbox and sponsored messages
  • Stories on Facebook, Messenger, and Instagram
  • Instant Articles
  • Facebook In-Stream Videos

Also, there are two options to place the ads:

  • Automatic: Facebook recommends this option (and it’s also pre-set) because it automatically reaches out to your target audience through all the above-mentioned channels. 
  • Edit placements: allows you to exclude certain placements. 

What is the best option to target audience?

While for the purposes of digital marketing, choosing the automatic ad placement may be the best idea, it doesn’t always work for a specific target audience you have in mind. 

If you want to target a specific audience on Facebook with your PPC campaign, edit placements by unchecking those options that your target audience is less likely to use. If you have followers on your Facebook page, take a look at the content that engages them the most:

This sort of customer feedback will help you make your ads more targeted by choosing the right ad placements. 

3. Ad Type Matters 

You can use the stats from Facebook Insights to determine the ad type that will drive the most engagement. According to the preferences of your target audience, you can choose one of three ad formats:

You can also choose an existing post that has driven the most engagement to use as a paid ad with awareness or consideration objective, for instance. 

Your attention should also be focused on text that will accompany your ad. Facebook sets the text that you use as your company description by default. You can, however, change this text to make your PPC campaign more targeted. 

On Facebook, you can also create multilingual ads. If you decide to run your PPC campaigns in several languages, you will need to employ localization techniques. “By localizing your ads, you make them culturally appropriate and clearer for the addressee”, says Neightan White, a marketing manager at The Word Point, an international translation company. 

Running PPC campaigns in several languages diversifies your digital marketing strategy and allows you to target audiences abroad, thus, increasing brand awareness and audience engagement.

Wrapping Up

Despite all Facebook controversies, PPC advertisement on Facebook is definitely here to stay. Moreover, it’s proven to be one of the best techniques to target any audience. 

By choosing the right objective, ad placement options, and ad types, you’ll be able to create a PPC campaign that will bring you new customers, increase brand exposure, increase traffic, drive leads, and help you generate more revenue. 

Hopefully, our tips will help you structure your PPC campaign on Facebook to target audience, drive engagement and boost conversions.