Episode 9 Create The Movement Podcast
Brad Post, Create the Movement: Welcome to Create the Movement podcast. My name is Brad Post, and I’m here with Josh Rich.
Josh Rich, Create the Movement: Hello everyone.
B: Josh, how are you doing?
J: Doing great Brad. How are you?
B: Good. Good. Today, we are going to be talking about…
J: We’re going to be talking about paid social media ads.
B: Okay.
J: So, it’s kind of, I don’t know, the wave of the future? Or, whatever you want to call it. But it’s kind of a necessary evil, is probably the better word to describe it. More and more, what we’re seeing is that just organic Facebook posts and Twitter posts just aren’t getting the same reach that paid posts are. And so, if you’ve been on social media, you’ve seen ads that say “Sponsored Post” on Facebook. I think Twitter has something else. Or LinkedIn has like “Promoted Post”. They’ve all got their little terms. But, it’s just basically when someone’s paying for it.
B: Social media platforms are making it a little bit more difficult for business, especially Facebook.
J: Exactly. Facebook, especially, is making it really hard to get the reach out there like you would with an organic post.
B: Right.
J: So, we’re kind of seeing, more and more, that you kind of have to pay if you want to get some good results. So, we’re just going to talk about, kind of, some best practices of doing paid advertising. Because, you know, whenever you’re doing this you’re not just investing your time; you’re investing money, too. So, you want to make sure you do it the right way.
So, the first thing you want to do whenever you set up a paid advertising account, or a campaign, is you want to make sure you have a specific goal in mind. And, obviously, you want to make sure that coincides with your overall social media goal.
And so, there’s four things you want to consider when you set up this goal. You want to figure out what you want to say. Who you want to say it to. What the call to action is. And then, you want to figure out a way to measure it as well.
And so, kind of going on number three, on the call to action, you want to make sure that’s very specific. You don’t want to just say, “Oh, we want to get, like, get branding.” You know? It’s like, that’s really hard to measure. Now, so, some ideas on that, is like, do you want people to attend an event? Sign up for an email? Buy something? Or just visit your website?
B: Okay.
J: So, you want to make sure that you have that in mind. So, that way, you know if it’s effective or not.
B: And that helps with what link you put in there? Or image?
J: Yeah, exactly. I mean, just overall, helps on crafting. And, sort of, after the fact, you want to make sure you can tell if you’ve hit your goal or not.
B: Okay.
J: And so, the next thing you want to do is you want to make sure you pick the appropriate network. And that kind of just goes with industry. You know? If you’ve got like a very business to business industry that you’re trying to sell to, then you’re probably going to want to stick with LinkedIn. Whereas, if you have more of, like, kind of, a local shop that’s, kind of, more fun, more consumer based, then, you know, you can get away with doing virtually else you would. Whether it be Facebook, or Twitter, or even Snapchat – if you want too. So, make sure that you’re on the appropriate spot. Otherwise, you’re just going to be wasted.
So, whenever you start setting up your campaign, you want to match your platform to your message. So, one thing to consider, a little tip is like, on LinkedIn, the overall layout is pretty bland. There’s a lot of white space, and maybe some blue. So, like a colorful ad is going to do really well there. It’s going to be very eye-catching if you have, like, a lot of reds and orange.
B: Okay.
J: And so, you just want to consider, like, what the background is going to be. And, like, what is going to be set up next against. So, that way you know if it’s just going to blend in, or if it’s going to stand out.
B: Okay.
J: And so, you kind of want to see where your visitors are. Where your consumers are. And make sure you’re not just “making noise”.
B: Okay.
J: The next thing you want to do whenever you’re writing that ad, or creating it, is you want to have a hook to get people to click on it. But, you want to be specific, too. Otherwise, your bounce rate is just going to be terrible.
B: The hook is kind of the call to action?
J: Yeah. You want to make sure you leave something to the imagination, so to speak. So, that way they don’t rush, click on it, and not just read the ad and get all the information they need. But, at the same time, if they click on it thinking they’re going to sign up for a newsletter, and then that page takes them to buying something, they’re just going to leave.
B: Right.
J: So, then your bounce rate’s just going to be terrible, and it’s not going to be an effective ad. And your click-through rate will be great, probably, but it’s not going to do anything.
B: Right.
J: Your conversions aren’t there. So, you want to make sure that it’s good. You want to make sure it’s vey specific, but still has some kind of a hook to it as well.
And on that, talking about conversions, it’s important to, whenever you’re setting your budget, just to know what the value of that conversion is. So, if you know that for everyone that signs up for that newsletter, or clicks on the website, or attends this event, your company will profit X amount. Then that will help you set your budget.
B: Okay.
J: Because, obviously, I mean you are paying for this. So, you want to make sure you can set an appropriate budget to consider your audience, and just get the job done, as well. So, once you have everything in motion, it’s a good idea to do some testing, to figure out, especially if you’ve never done this before, if you’re kind of new to it. So, some tests that you can do, kind of some simple A/B testing. And so, one, you can set up, like, the same message, but then just send it to different audiences.
B: Okay.
J: And that will kind of help you refine your audience. So, if you find that, you know, that one does a lot better than the other one, then you stick with that. So, you can kind of all most set this up like March Madness, like tournaments, bracket style if you want to.
B: Okay.
J: Kind of like: knock it down and see which one wins.
B: Right.
J: You know your audience, you know your consumers, and so, especially like Facebook ads, it’s really easy, to just like, pick what their interests are, what kind of music they listen to, what the age groups are. And you can kind of just like, and it sounds bad, but you can basically stereotype your audience. And just kind of trust that they post enough information on their Facebook page to get away with this ad.
And so, another test you can do is just kind of swap out images and copy. And so, just put the same copy with the different image, and vice versa. And just kind of compare click-through rates. And compare conversions. And see which one does better.
B: Okay. So, A/B testing, kind of what they call split testing, too, I think.
J: Yeah.
B: So, one way is to look at the audience – same message, two different audiences. Or more than two.
J: Yup, exactly.
B: And then the other one is two different messages to the same audience?
J: Yeah, yeah. Once you kind of get your audience, then you kind of figure out what verbiage works, what doesn’t. And a good thing, before you even start, is to look at, like, your best-performing organic post. And kind of see what kind of tone you took, see if it was sharing a blog that you wrote – then you should write more blogs. If it was, you know, sharing a news article that your company was mentioned in, then that’s great. Or, if it was just like a funny little snippet that you wrote, then you should stick with that. You know, if you use an image or not, just kind of look at your top five organic posts, and see what common themes present themselves.
B: Okay.
J: And that way, you can know if you can apply that same, those same themes to your paid ads.
B: Okay.
J: And the idea is that it will carry over.
B: Right.
J: And so, once you kind of have all that in place, you’re going to want to really set a time in the next couple of months, or however long the campaign is, plan to manage all the traffic. Especially if you’re spending a fair amount of money, you’re going to get traffic. And so, you want to make sure that you are prepared to interact with these consumers online. So, that way it’s not just dead space. And there just kind of left just kind of wondering, “What do I do now?” If they have questions you need to respond to those. If they have comments, you know, encourage that. And just really be ready to interact. Because it’s going to take a lot more than it would just on an organic post.
B: It’s not just on autopilot.
J: Yeah, exactly. It’s very much social media management.
B: Right.
J: Versus, just like, social media posting.
B: Okay.
J: And so, that’s kind of like a general overview of paid ads. And so, I think next week we might get into some more specific platforms and how to manage those.
B: Perfect. So, I’ve had a lot of people too, where they’ll just try it out for a week, or two, and, “Ah, it didn’t work.” You recommend doing it for a couple of months.
J: I would say at least, this is just a general rule of thumb in all marketing, but plan to budget for three months.
B: Three months, right?
J: Yeah. And that’s going to be a good test of what works, and what doesn’t. If you can only afford to do something for one week, then you can’t afford to do that.
B: Right. Don’t do it?
J: Yeah. Absolutely. I would apply that to all of marketing in general.
