What is Ads? What is Facebook Ads? What You Need to Know About Facebook Ads in 2024

What exactly is Facebook Ads? What tools are used in Facebook Ads? How can you effectively target Facebook Ads?

Given this, Facebook has a thorough understanding of their customers. Therefore, they can “distribute” targeted ads to users who are likely to make a purchase. 

Sometimes, these products might also include websites users might be interested in or events they might want to attend.

For example:

If you recently participated in a marathon, Facebook will quickly gather this information and continuously send you updates about similar marathon events, frequently displaying related content.

These cannot be confused with regular posts, right?

You can see the word “Sponsored” right below the name of the Fanpage, and the “Like Page” button in the top-right corner. Lastly, there’s the CTA button – Signup. Regular posts usually do not have these display settings.

In addition to in-feed ads, there are also ads that appear in the sidebar, resembling banners. Since Facebook is linked with Instagram, when you use Facebook Ads, you can also utilize the account linking feature and run ads on Instagram as well. It’s a two-for-one deal, right?

How many types of Facebook Ads are there?

The formats you are curious about for Facebook Ads depend on the advertising goals of the user and the ad formats that the advertiser plans to use.

1. Goal-Based Advertising

The goal can affect the placement (Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, etc.) where Facebook Ads may appear.

There are 3 types of Facebook Ads based on goals:

• Awareness: Targeting is at the top of the sales funnel. These ads build awareness and interest in your goods or services by increasing:
• Brand Awareness: Encourages people to discover your brand.
• Local Awareness: Encourages people to discover your local business. (Targeting options are limited, focusing on proximity to the business.)
• Reach: Displays your ad to the maximum number of people possible. (Limited reach)
• Consideration: This type of ad makes people start thinking about your business, product, or service, and seek more information about it. The advertising objectives may include:

• • • Traffic: Directs people to a page on your website.
    • Engagement: Drives engagement with your business.
    • Page Likes: Increases likes on your Facebook page.
    • Post Engagement: Boosts interaction with a specific post.
    • Offer Claims: Encourages people to claim an offer.
    • Event Responses: Attracts people to attend an event.
    • App Installs: Generates app installations.
    • Video Views: Generates views on videos.
    • Lead Generation: Acquires new leads through forms that users can fill out directly on the platform.
    • Messenger Ads: Sends ads directly to people’s Facebook Messenger accounts.

• Conversion: These ads drive conversions, encouraging people to take a specific action or purchase your product or service. The advertising objectives may include:
  • Conversion: Drives actions on your website.
  • Product Catalog Sales: Drives sales.
  • Store Visits (Limited Availability): Attracts traffic to physical stores.

2. Facebook Ads Formats:

2.1 Image

You should use images of the product or brand you want to advertise. Supported image formats include:

JPEG, JPG, PNG, PSD, TIF, TIFF, WBMP, WEBP, XBM, BMP, DIB, GIF, HEIC, HEIF, IFF, JFIF, JP2, JPE

Facebook recommends images with an aspect ratio of 1.91:1 to 4:5, with no more than 20% text in the image, saved as jpg or png.

2.2 Video

Adding motion to your ad with video makes it more eye-catching in the News Feed.

2.3 Slideshows

Slideshows combine images or videos, text, and sound, and can include 3-10 images or one video in a slideshow ad.

2.4 Carousel

Carousel Ads display up to 10 images or videos in a single ad, each with its own link.

2.5 Instant Experience

Instant Experience opens when a viewer taps on the ad on their mobile device. This creates an immersive experience that highlights the advertised brand, product, or service.

2.6 Collection

The Collection format includes multiple products and opens as an Instant Experience when interacted with. Customers can explore and browse products for purchase from their phone in a visual way.

How Facebook Ads Work

Facebook Ads target users based on location, age, demographics, and personal information.

You select the audience through actions in the ad settings. After creating the ad, you can set a budget and bid for each click (CPC – cost per click) or for each thousand impressions.

The most important aspect of Facebook Ads is targeting. You can view an example of the Targeting Options table below:

You will need to fill in:

• Location
• Age – Gender
• Interests
• Broad Categories – You can choose activities or interests that your customers typically have.

Facebook Ads will then use this information to find potential customers for you and display your ads to them.

Which businesses/organizations/individuals should use Facebook Ads?

Facebook Ads offers numerous benefits, especially for businesses, organizations, and individuals. However, creating effective ad campaigns that fit your budget and achieve your goals requires experience and knowledge.

1. Low-Friction Conversions

Successful businesses using Facebook Ads often employ a strategy of asking users to register without pressuring them to buy. This is known as Low-Friction Conversions.

Not clear? Here’s an example:

If a customer visits your website but is not there to purchase anything, they might have just clicked on the ad by accident. If you immediately push them to buy your product to increase ROI, you’ve made a mistake.

Requesting a purchase from customers right when they enter your store can be off-putting.

Give them time to explore the store, then provide additional advice to help them choose. Alternatively, you can introduce offers to let them know you’re available to provide information when they need it.

Facebook users are similar; they are likely to leave the website and return to Facebook if you suddenly ask them to make a purchase.

Instead, ask for simple conversions such as account registration, newsletter sign-ups, filling out a form, or providing an email address (preferably with incentives). You can then use the collected information for marketing.

Websites that handle daily transactions, such as Groupop, AppSumo, and Fab, are prime examples of businesses successfully running Facebook Ads.

When you click on an ad, they only ask for your email address, avoiding any hard sells or discomfort. They then send marketing information and promotions through email.

2. Business Model

The most suitable business model on Facebook is long-term revenue generation. You should aim to earn income from users over time, not just at a single moment.

Customers might have provided their email addresses, but you still need to build trust before they make a purchase.

Don’t expect large orders; focus on smaller, ongoing orders. Achieving this requires significant time and effort in customer care and marketing.

Top 5 Reasons to Use Facebook Ads

1. High Effectiveness

Twenty years ago, in 2004, no one could have predicted that Facebook would become such a giant.

With over 2.2 billion people active on this social network monthly and nearly 1.5 billion daily users, Facebook has become a significant part of many people’s lives. This trend is unlikely to change as so many people are familiar with Facebook.

This social network is considered one of the leading online advertising channels. Data shows that digital ad spending accounts for 51% of total advertising in the U.S. According to a Kleiner Perkins survey, 78% of American consumers said they discovered products they bought on Facebook.

Facebook will continue to be an effective advertising platform and the best way to connect with consumers. Facebook’s revenue has been growing rapidly without signs of slowing down from 2009 to 2018. It is expected to continue its growth in the future.

2. Simple Setup and Quick Results

Setting up a Facebook Ads campaign does not take much time and can yield expected results. Digital ads often deliver a good ROI, especially for suitable campaigns and products. For this reason, many small stores, small businesses, and large corporations run Facebook Ads.

Anyone can register or log into Facebook, create a Facebook Business account, set up a payment method, and publish a campaign within minutes. You can also test your campaign to find the most cost-effective method using tools like AdEspresso.

The following chart shows the changes in CPC (Cost Per Click) on Instagram by ad placement over a year (2017). As you can see, the cost for Instagram ads in a quarter can reach up to $1.1. However, you only need to pay $0.5 if you place the ad in the Desktop Newsfeed during the same quarter.

As the table above illustrates, you can start driving traffic to your website with just 10 cents per click initially. Therefore, you don’t need to worry too much about having a large budget when you first start running Facebook Ads.

Given the vast user base on Facebook and its effective targeting methods (by interests, age, gender, etc.), you can expect quick results. The CPC model is also beneficial because you only pay when users click on your ads.

3. You Can Reach Potential Customers

We all know how many people visit Facebook daily. It’s no surprise that it’s an excellent platform for reaching customers.

Facebook offers numerous ways to target specific groups based on their behaviors on your website or Facebook Fanpage. This includes what they like, view, comment on, their age, gender, location, and many other details. You can create a highly detailed model of your target audience to achieve a high ROI with Facebook Ads.

In a 2017 study, 57% of consumers said that social media influences their shopping. Of these, 44% believe Facebook is the most influential social network.

With its many targeting features for advertisers and its inherent reach, Facebook has proven to be an ideal channel for reaching potential customers.

4. Highly Customizable Facebook Ads

Facebook Ads offer a richer experience compared to other digital giants like Google. You have more options when creating ads on Facebook: customize videos, images, content, events, and more.

Here are some things you can do with Facebook Ads:

• Create a dynamic, cheerful ad post with images to attract young dog owners.
• Create a product video ad for dog products that’s appealing even to users in their 30s.
• Or, create a “Canvas ad” for premium dog owners, explaining in detail the benefits of your dog food product.

Facebook Ads allow for many other customizations. We will explore these in more detail in section IV.

First, let’s look at Facebook’s campaign objectives:

There are 11 different objectives to choose from based on your goals. You can customize ad designs, landing pages, and most aspects of the advertising campaign, including technical aspects like:

• Target Audience
• Bidding
• Delivery Optimization

These options make Facebook the most customizable advertising network, allowing you to create very distinct and specific ad experiences.

5. Facebook Ads Add New Features Every Month

Facebook frequently adds new features and improves the user experience (for both advertisers and Facebook users). This is one of the reasons Facebook has sustained growth over a long period.

In 2018, many changes on the Facebook platform positively impacted advertisers. 

New types of Facebook ads emerged, such as Carousel Ads on Instagram Stories and new categories for Dynamic Ads.

The sooner you learn to run Facebook Ads, the sooner you can unlock the potential of social media advertising. The best way to learn is through practice!

How Facebook Ads Convert Leads into Sales

To achieve high efficiency, you need to know how to optimize Facebook Ads to increase conversion rates and reduce costs. Consider the following Facebook Ads strategies:

Customer Offer Strategy

Offers often attract potential customers, depending on the appeal of the offer, leading to a higher likelihood of conversions following your established process.

You can attract customers with compelling content or attractive giveaways in exchange for contact information. Businesses can use this lead information to nurture and follow up.

Any offer campaign must align with your target customers’ needs and expectations. If the content is irrelevant, the sign-ups won’t be potential customers for your business.

Create Lead Generation Strategies

You can use Facebook Lead Ads to automatically fill in and request customers’ phone numbers. Many Facebook users create accounts with phone numbers, so obtaining phone numbers can be more effective than email addresses.

Facebook Lead Ads are highly effective for delivering offers via text messages. You can also link videos so users can quickly and easily click through on their phones. Use landing page forms on your website through Facebook Ads to collect customer contact information.

Provide a Sales Pathway

Many ad campaigns fail to achieve desired sales. The biggest reason is that business owners don’t know how to set up the next steps after acquiring potential customers.

Or, businesses may rely too much on offers to attract customers while neglecting the fact that many people never open these offers. Users might see and save them to read later but rarely act on them.

When users see your ad and search for your product or service, that’s when their attention is focused on you. Take advantage of this moment to guide them to the next steps in the sales process.

Businesses need to plan how to handle sales transactions: in-store or online, via phone, or through multiple channels? How will you guide potential customers through the process to the final sale?

In a highly competitive market, if you don’t use effective connections to engage with potential customers, achieving your goals will be challenging.

Track Non-Converting Leads

Some customers will decide to buy immediately, while others may take 6 months to 2 years to convert. For these customers, continued follow-up may not yield immediate financial benefits.

However, to maximize the relationship with every lead you’ve paid for, don’t waste the opportunity.

If your customers don’t convert right away, invest time in nurturing the relationship to eventually convert them into buyers.

Businesses should plan to continue providing valuable content to keep the business top-of-mind and build trust. You can suggest related products or services based on the audience’s interests. Useful content such as blog tips, quick tricks, videos, testimonials, etc., are good options.

Automate Lead Management and Sales Processes

Automating lead management helps manage and nurture leads more efficiently, ensuring you don’t miss any leads or delay responses. You can track the effectiveness of the process through analytics from the ad management dashboard.

The ad management dashboard alone isn’t enough; you need to know where leads are in the process, the steps they’ve taken, and whether they want to learn more. These details are tracked automatically through CRM tools, customized to fit your sales process stages.

Anyone involved in sales should track metrics such as: the number of calls made daily, the number of leads in those calls, how many requests are made, and the conversion rate from ads.

From a marketing perspective, you can see how users navigate the process, where they come from, how many schedule calls, and how many of those calls convert into paying customers.

How to Target Facebook Ads

The biggest mistake most marketers make with Facebook Ads is: not targeting precisely.

Facebook’s targeting options are unique. You can target customers by:

• Location
• Age
• Gender
• Interests
• Connections
• Relationship Status
• Languages
• Education
• Workplaces

Each option’s usefulness depends on your target audience.

Most advertisers focus on location, age, gender, and interests.

1. Location

This option allows you to target users geographically. You can choose targets near your product’s location or worldwide if you’re running an online business. You can target by country, state, city, or district.

2. Age and gender

Determine the age and gender of your current customers.

For example, if women aged 25 to 44 make up the majority of your customers, start targeting similar users with Facebook Ads. Once you start seeing profits, you can expand your target audience.

3. Interest

This option is arguably the most important among targeting choices. It is also frequently misused by advertisers.

When creating ads, you have two options: Broad Categories or Precise Interests.

Broad Category Targeting:

Also known as broad targeting, this is the most basic form of targeting. As the name suggests, entering interests into this method results in a large audience size. It’s common to have audiences of up to 5 million people.

Using broad targeting often incurs higher costs due to reaching a very large number of users. However, if you have well-designed, engaging content, you may achieve success.

If you use this method, consider segmenting audiences by specific interests to test effectiveness. Once you compare and find the most suitable interest keywords, you’ll be able to select a more targeted audience for Facebook Ads, improving your ROI.

For example, if you target “lipstick” and “eyeliner,” two separate audiences will appear. You can then test which audience performs better and use that one.

Note that a large customer file is not necessarily better. Pay attention to other metrics as well.

Targeting by Detailed Interests – Precise Interest

Targeting by detailed interests – as the name implies – focuses on specific interests.

We can also understand this Facebook Ads feature as targeting based on user information. This information includes the list of pages they like, the apps they use, and the content they post on their Facebook timeline. You’ll need to enter keywords related to this information for targeting.

When targeting this way, Facebook will provide the number of relevant audiences. With interest keywords, it will also suggest additional interests. Once interests are defined, Facebook will display suggested bids. This supports your Facebook Ads campaign effectively.

Instead of targeting broad terms like photography or yoga, detailed interest targeting allows you to focus on specific criteria. You should research your customers before using this type of targeting.

For example, research the names or types of magazines your customers read, the people they follow on Facebook and Instagram, and the products they frequently purchase.

Remember, these interests must be the “common ground” of your target audience.

Here is an example when you have entered detailed interests into the table. The suggested Likes and Interests section shows Facebook’s suggested interests. If they seem appropriate, just click the box.

This type of targeting will result in less targeted groups. These groups are more accurate and higher quality compared to broad targeting. Consequently, the ROI rate will be higher.

Tip: Add the option to sign up with a Facebook account to your website. When users link with their Facebook account, you will be able to analyze their interests. Keep this information and use the dominant interests for targeting in your Facebook Ads.

Tracking performance

Facebook no longer provides conversion tracking functions. Insights also do not have information on people who have left the page. So, how do we track the performance of Facebook Ads?

You will need to use another analytics program (like Google Analytics) or your own system.

1. Conversion Tracking

As mentioned above, remember to split campaigns by interest groups to track the effectiveness of each group.

You can track by adding UTM campaign parameters in the URL and use UTM_content to differentiate ads. You can tag with Google’s URL builder or read how to tag here.

2. Performance Tracking – Theo dõi hiệu suất

You can track your performance in the Facebook Ads interface. Pay attention to the click-through rate (CTR), which is the most important metric. It indicates the number of clicks you receive and the amount you have to pay for the ad.

Ads with low CTR will be stopped or become more expensive. Conversely, ads with high CTR will get more clicks and be more budget-friendly (CPC will be lower).

Monitor CTR closely between interest-based ads and other ads to see which is more effective.

If your performance is high, don’t get too excited. All performance, whether high or low, will decline over time. Especially if your target audience is small, this decline will happen faster. Usually, traffic will start to decrease after 3 to 10 days.

When this happens, refresh the ad with new images and content by copying the existing ad and changing the visuals and text.

Note: Do not edit the current Facebook ad and delete all ads that are not getting clicks. The next day, you will see the new ads (with updated images and content) begin to accumulate impressions and clicks.

You can continue to change images weekly until these ads no longer get clicks.

Notes When Running Facebook Ads

During the Facebook Ads campaign, many accounts are flagged or banned for violating Facebook’s policies. Let’s explore the Facebook Ads policies to avoid such issues:

1. Use of Language in Facebook Ads

You need to use language carefully when running Facebook Ads. Prohibited words often relate to:

• Health: Facebook prohibits words related to – disease names or body organs; terms referring to patients; drug names; negative connotations.
• Finance: Prohibited words often relate to “loans.” Phrases like “loan,” “borrowing,” “interest rates,” “unsecured loans,” etc.
• Emotions and Mental Health: Suicide, self-harm, depression, etc.
• Chemical Ingredients: Posts listing chemical ingredients like vitamins, collagen, etc.
• Racial and Gender Discrimination: Terms like “that man,” “that woman,” “black person,” “white person,” “ethnicity,” etc.
• Job Training and Rental Ads: Terms related to job training or renting office space or housing.
• Surveillance Cameras: Ads about surveillance cameras.
• False or Misleading Content: Content that promises, guarantees 100%, etc.
• Sensitive Images: Images revealing skin or sensitive body parts.
• Violent Images: Images with blood, violence, discomforting for viewers.
• Comparative Terms: Using images to compare bodies, status, products, human rights, etc., is prohibited.
• Trademark Infringement: Using trademarked brand names like Adidas, Gucci, Balenciaga, etc., to advertise fake products.
• Other Prohibited Words: Tobacco, sensitive body parts, weight gain, weight loss, land titles, etc.
• 20% Text in Images: Ads with images containing too much text. Images with 20% text will receive a notification “Your ad may not be approved due to excessive text in the image” from Facebook.

2. During Facebook Ads Campaign

When running ads, you must adhere to Facebook’s rules. Many reasons can lead to account suspension or reports, including:

• Violating ad policies.
• Spamming: Running multiple ads from one IP address.
• Not paying or delaying payment for Facebook ads.
• Unreliable ad accounts due to low activity.
• Unusual behavior like frequently turning ad campaigns on and off.
• Incorrect targeting for age groups. For example, showing 21+ ads to people under 20.

Conclusion

Facebook Ads has become a great, effective, and especially important marketing channel today, considered one of the crucial Marketing tools to help businesses and organizations reach more specific targets. Keeping up with changes in Facebook Ads policies will help you stay updated with Meta’s policies and create more effective campaigns.

Learn more:

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