4 Tips to Make Your Social Media Ads Count

You know that guy who shows up to the birthday dinner with product samples, doesn’t get why his sales-pitch isn’t a hit and manages to make every guest feel uncomfortable?

Don’t let your social media ads be that guy.

Advertising on social platforms can be tough – audiences aren’t always receptive to advertising in their social space, they can be hesitant to leave the social site for even the best ad, and the audience and atmosphere vary from platform to platform.

The organization I work for, Carousel30, works with several nonprofit clients, who understandably don’t want any of their advertising dollars wasted. When advertising is a piece of a marketing strategy, it needs to be as efficient as possible, and we need to know it will successfully engage people with the whole campaign – beyond the advertisement.

If approached correctly, advertising on social can be a great way to maximize the reach and engagement of your message. Make your ad(s) count with these 4 tips:

1. Pick the Right Platform

2. Target Relentlessly

3. Give Directions

4. Integrate

Pick the Right Platform

Almost every social network or social media platform now offers some kind of advertising feature (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn), including some you may not have considered advertising on (like Reddit and StumbleUpon). To decide which platform is best for you, consider your audience, price range and available ad formats.

The minimum bid for a LinkedIn ad is $2.00, which seems a little steep compared to Twitter’s $0.50 minimum. If your goal is reach, you may opt for Twitter’s broader and less expensive per-click cost, but for a campaign with a strong conversion goal, you will probably get more relevant users and a higher click-through-rate on LinkedIn than on Twitter. Say for example you have this great back-to-school offer for teachers. LinkedIn has great targeting tools that you can do by job title (teacher, English teacher, student, etc.) or by job function (Education), both targeting options unavailable on Twitter. But if that were an end-of-summer sale instead, the location targeting on Twitter may be a better fit.

Another platform consideration is what shape your message will take. When ad platforms include images, like on Facebook, take full advantage of it with something interesting and easy-to-see (read: not too small and detailed to make out). StumbleUpon ads aren’t really ads at all – it’s paid, random traffic to your site from StumbleUpon users. Reddit ads take the same format as any other Reddit post (though in a different color and marked as a “sponsored link”) including the comment thread for users, which can be a great opportunity to participate in the conversation. Whichever platform you’re on, ensure your message and image are a good fit for the audience there.

Target Relentlessly

Whether you’re paying per click or per impression, you’re paying for your ads. Why would you show it to people who don’t care or you don’t want to click them? Maybe your product or service isn’t available in certain areas or relevant to certain users. They won’t know until they’ve already clicked your ad and cost you money.

You can help keep this from happening by being as strategic with your targeting as possible. This of course varies by platform, so let’s go over a few:

• On Reddit, you can target your ad to the whole site, or to a specific subreddit (generally based on geographical regions or interests, like the Northern Virginia subreddit or the “Aww” subreddit for cute animals).
• Twitter expanded their promoted Tweet location targeting to “anywhere in the world,” “in specific countries only,” and “in specific US metropolitan areas only.”
• Facebook has expanded their advertising to include a myriad of options – from strictly mobile to promoting single posts, but even normal posts can now be targeted to language, location, age, gender, interested in, relationship status, education and workplace, and Facebook Ads have even more targeting options, like interests.
• StumbleUpon “Paid Discovery” brings people to your site based on interest in your category, as well as location, demographic and device.

Give Directions

Very clear directions. The harder it is for someone to make a decision or know what to do with your ad, the less likely it is that they’ll do anything.

It may sound obvious and unnecessary to write “Please retweet!” at the end of your promoted Tweet (so you can get the most bang for your buck!), but if you do type that out, your audience may be 4 times more likely to retweet and share your message.

The same idea applies to any of your social media ads – don’t just throw in a call to action. Give your audience clear directions – make your call to action compelling and meaningful to them.

Picture one user: What makes your ad compelling (but not overwhelming or annoying) for that one person? It might be a deadline (“Sale ends Friday!”), a can’t-miss deal (“Buy-one-get-one”) or a surprise perk (“Thanks for listening – special surprise for our Twitter followers”). Whatever it is, make it timely and urgent, and provide them with clear directions, like, “Free mug for our Twitter followers – enter code “ilovewoozles” here: ilovewoozles.org/freemug. Thanks for following!” This will maximize how many in your audience see your ad, know exactly what they’re clicking, and follow through to your site or landing page.

Integrate

Your advertising will be stronger and your results better if you integrate your social advertising with other social media marketing efforts and vice versa. Advertising for the sake of “traffic” and “clicks” doesn’t get you anywhere, and it doesn’t provide your audience with any value or reason to come back.

Let’s say you’re running a promotion or contest on a Facebook app. Facebook ads or promoted posts may bring more individuals to the app, but once there, the promotion needs to engage your audience or your advertising budget was pointless.

Or say you’re advertising on StumbleUpon where you don’t create an ad – someone “stumbling upon” your website is the ad. Since you’re paying for people with specific interests to come to your site, add something extra relevant for them once they get there. The Wisconsin Milk Marketing Board created a rich-media microsite: GrilledCheeseAcademy.com with plenty of photos for all of the “Food and Cooking” users who stumbled onto it. The microsite was specifically crafted for the StumbleUpon audience, and once people discovered it, they stayed there.

Don’t Be…

If you choose the appropriate platform, utilize all of your targeting options, give your audience clear directions, and integrate your social media advertising with your overall efforts and campaigns, you have a solid social media advertising campaign on your hands. If not, well, you know who you are. You’re that guy.

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