How to create added value through social media advertising?

Almost 7 out of 10 Belgians use social media, giving companies plenty of reasons to promote themselves on Facebook, YouTube, Instagram and the likes. Are your content efforts on various social media channels not bearing fruit? Social media advertising will give your posts the big boost they deserve. How to go about it, then? Read on to find out!

The deal with social media advertising

Chances are you invest a lot of time and energy in posting, snapping and tweeting your very own content. If that’s indeed the case, receiving only a few hundred views and a handful of likes is, well, a bummer – and hardly something to brag about in your next performance report. Still, that’s the way it is for lots of people who take to social media to promote their brand. The competition is fierce, the algorithm merciless. So, instead of hoping for organic reach, advertising via social media channels is a must to approach your target audience more frequently and more effectively.

Hello, target audience!

Social media have an incredibly wide reach. Smart as they are, social media platforms also know a lot about their users from their profiles as well as their posts and likes. Their age and social status, where they live and work, whom they spend their free time with, … Thanks to all that data, targeting and retargeting consumers through social media advertising is a breeze. All you have to do is use one of the various segmentation tools to reach the exact target group you’re aiming for. The best part of all: you can rest assured it’s money well spent! Your ads are only shown to the audience you’ve specified.

Affordability and other advantages

Did you know social media advertising is one of the cheapest means for targeted advertising, too? Thanks to the various targeting options, even a very limited budget can yield major results. An additional advantage is that it enables interesting content to spread at a record pace. What starts as a simple advertisement can go viral in the blink of an eye, boosting your organic reach tremendously.

Vary, measure and adjust

Deciding to advertise on social media means you have countless options to choose from. In addition to the many different channels available these days, there’s the ever-increasing range of advertising possibilities. You can vary endlessly in terms of format as well, using text ads, photos and other visuals, videos, etc. When weighing your options, be sure to keep in mind your sector, your target group, your objectives and, of course, your budget. Follow up on your campaigns to see what works well or not, and make adjustments accordingly. Social media advertising is, after all, a continuous process.

5 tips to boost your social ad campaign

1. Define your target audience

It is vital to use all targeting options each social advertising channel offers to your best advantage. Facebook Ads, for example, applies customized target groups based on unique IDs, while LinkedIn uses so-called affinity groups for specific niche markets.

In other words, you need a crystal-clear picture of your target audience. Targeting options may vary per social media channel, but some of the basic options include:

  • Location: the region where your target group lives and works
  • Demographics: age, gender, language, relationship status, …
  • Education: degree of education, school, specialization, year of graduation
  • Interests as indicated by the user
  • Connections: people who have already established some kind of connection with your company or brand
  • Behavior: online activities, purchasing behavior, which devices are used, preferences (e.g. travel), etc.

When describing your target audience, you must on the one hand define the specific group of people you think will generate the most conversions, and on the other hand keep in mind that your channel must generate enough reach. If your target audience is too broad, it’s best to divide it into meaningful sections. This will enable you to spend your budget more effectively based on campaign goals and results.

2. What’s your message?

Chances are your target audience is not exactly waiting in eager anticipation for your ads to appear. That’s why it’s all the more important to focus on engagement, and to publish conversion-oriented landing pages – the best way to smoothly lead Facebook users through the interactive process.

3. Determine your KPIs

Because social advertising focuses primarily on engagement, it is crucial to judge the success of your campaign on engagement KPIs. As the engagement phase is centred around inspiring a target audience or getting them excited about something new coming their way, it may prove interesting to look at your target audience’s behavior on your website once they’ve landed there via social media. Tip: Google Analytics enables you to give any landing page a specific label through UTM tagging, making it much easier to gather all the data you need to efficiently evaluate your social media campaigns.

4. Testing, 1, 2, 3!

Despite all the preparatory work you put into your social media campaigns, you can never be sure of the results they will yield. Thorough analyses are therefore indispensable. There are many elements that influence results, arguably making continuous testing and optimization the most effective advertising strategy. There are several elements worth testing, including (but not limited to):

Different elements you can test

  • A/B testing
    A/B testing is a very effective means to optimize your website’s conversion rate. How it works? You create two variants of each web page that requires testing. Visitors then land on either page A or B – fate decides, but a system ensures both pages get an equal number of visits. The system measures which page version generates the most conversions. A/B testing on social media can be applied to various elements, from (banner) visuals to text types and calls to action.

 

  • Targeting settings
    In addition to the standard targeting options, the various social media platforms out there also offer their own targeting settings: be sure to make the most of them! If a setting turns out to be not that fruitful, you can consider playing with it for a little while longer or stop using it altogether.

 

  • KPI objectives
    You must also check whether your campaign management is based on a KPI that fits the channel and is realistic. If results are disappointing, make sure you have enough data to go by for a decent

 

  • Bids
    Social media advertising always involves finding a good balance between bids – e.g. a low cost per click – and adequate Be flexible with your bidding. A slight raise can sometimes lead to a great increase in the number of impressions, just as a small reduction can significantly improve cost efficiency.

 

  • Budget
    Make sure that your targeting matches your budget (most platforms will provide a budget estimate) and divide your budget across multiple campaigns.

5. Remarket in a more targeted manner

You’ve managed to increase traffic to your website, get visitors to watch a video there or use a tool… only for them to leave again. Now what? Remarketing your visitors through social is what! You can now target them even more accurately, because they already know your website. Address them with a personal message to guide them towards conversion.

Make sure your content is on point!

Advertising on social media is not fool-proof. It will only yield the results you’re after if it is part of a complete and segmented social media strategy.