5 Facebook Advertising Mistakes to Avoid

Facebook Ads are all the rage right now. With more than two billion active users on Facebook, it makes sense. You want to market your product and services on the platforms that your consumers are using the most.

The only problem with Facebook Ads is that they don’t follow the adage, “If you build it, they will come.” The reality is that many people lose a lot of money with Facebook Ads because they don’t know how to use them correctly. In other words, they make MANY costly mistakes.

To avoid budget-depleting Facebook advertising mistakes, I’d like to share five of them with you.

#1: Not Targeting the Right Audience

Facebook allows advertisers to choose groups of people they want their ads to show to while they are using the social network. The groups of people can be based on interests, fields of study, demographics, and behaviors. If you choose the wrong groups of people, you won’t end up with as many conversions as you would if you selected the groups of people who are interested in your products and services.

To avoid this mistake, know your audience. Come up with a buyer persona and be as detailed as possible. As you target your Facebook Ads, look back to your buyer persona and choose the interests, demographics, and behaviors that fit into it.

#2: Under Utilizing Analytical Tools

Facebook Analytics is amazing. Use it.

It tells you which ads performed better than others did. You can use this information to hone in on what is effective among your consumers on Facebook.

One of the most powerful ways to succeed with Internet marketing is to track your efforts, analyze them, and then adjust your strategy. With every new strategy, you gain insight into what brings you more conversions.

#3: Ignoring Custom Audiences

Facebook’s intelligent advertising platform allows you to reach many different audiences, including those who have been to your website before or have purchased from you in the past. These people are warm leads and may just need a reminder to come back to you.

Creating a re-marketing campaign, you can send specific ads to different groups of people. For example, you can have an ad that asks your blog readers to sign up to join your mailing list. This means you will have a better way to keep in touch with them and bring them back to your site. You can target past customers by uploading their email addresses to Facebook, and then they will see your ad with a special offer. Even people who visit one of your landing pages can be targeted, so you can show them again why your services or products are the best.

#4: Forgetting to Exclude Past Converters

Showing the same ad to people who have already converted is a waste of money. Unfortunately, this is a mistake that people make all the time.

Save your money by creating a Custom Audience. You can then go to the EXCLUDE feature and select people who have already converted. This will guarantee that you’re not wasting time showing your ad to people who have already converted.

#5: Designing an Ineffective Ad

By knowing your audience you can also begin to understand what they like best in ads. You can do this by testing different types of ads (image, text, slideshow, carousel, video, etc.), and then analyze which ones perform the best.

Once you know which ones perform the best, always remember that less is more with ads. You don’t want too much text because people are scrolling their feed, which means you only have a split second to catch them. The image in your ad has to be striking and send an immediate message.