Stop wasting money boosting posts on Facebook.
We’re all guilty of pressing the big blue button to “boost post” on Facebook. In this blog, we will show you how to stop wasting your money by learning how to boost your Facebook posts without the price tag.
What is boosting?
The best way I would describe Facebook boosting is an inexpensive way to get a larger audience reach on your Facebook post. In other words, a quick, cheap way to get more people to see your post. Now at this point, you may be thinking ‘cheap brand awareness, what’s wrong with that?’. Well, you’re right it can be looked at like that. However, I feel there are better ways to spend your advertising budget and get better results on Facebook.
Stop wasting your money
It’s so easy to boost a Facebook post. It’s done in a matter of clicks. Therefore it can be easy to boost without considering why you’re boosting the post. The immediate thought is to get more people to see your post. But why do you want that? Every minute of your work should have a purpose and be linked to an objective. When boosting posts, due to its ease it can be easy to forget to link that action to your objectives.
You can’t test creative
When boosting a post you are limited to only a single image or design this is an issue if you are looking to test creative. When you’re advertising on Facebook, Instagram or other social networks, you want to ensure that you’re putting your money behind the best possible ads in your arsenal. After all, why pay to push out creative and copy combinations that fail to convert, compel clicks or capture the attention of your target audience? That’s why social advertisers need to run creative tests — so they’re not blowing the budget on underperforming ads.
Creative testing is a way to compare ads to see which image and copy combinations are best at driving your desired results. It’s similar to how you would use A/B testing to compare the performance of different web page designs or email subject lines. With creative testing, you can optimize your ad campaigns so the bulk of your budget goes to the ads that bring in the most engagement and revenue. With automated advertising software, a creative test will also automatically pare down underperforming ads, so you won’t be wasting your ad spend on campaigns that don’t make the cut.
Poor targeting options
When creating a sponsored post on social media, you have the option to target certain people, demographics, interests, locations and so much more. This makes it excellent for narrowing down your exact target audience and ensuring your ads are only showed to the right people.
When promoting your posts there are a plethora of options available in the Facebook Ads Manager. However, when boosting posts you’re met with a much more limited scope when it comes to targeting your audience. This means you’re able to narrow down your boosted post’s audience a lot less than promoting a Facebook post (which I’ll come onto). Less accurate targeting results in your boosted post being shown to irrelevant people, or in other words, people that aren’t your ideal customers.
Little control over ad placements
Ad placements are where your advert will be seen on Facebook and other platforms. When boosting posts now, you have the option to show your ads on Facebook, Messenger, and Instagram. Although that might seem pretty extensive, when creating ads in the Facebook Ads Manager you have options on where exactly you’d like to show your Ads on each of these options. For example, you can choose Facebook Feeds/Instant Articles/In-stream Videos/Right Column (on desktop)/Stories. On Instagram, you can choose the Instagram Feed/Stories. Finally, on Messenger, you can choose Messenger Inboxes/Sponsored Messages. To put it simply, you have much more control over where your ads will be seen. This gives you more chance to target your perfect customers in the places they’re most likely to see your advert.
What should you be doing to boost your posts?
First things first, avoid the boost button at all costs, no matter how tempting it may seem. Get a Facebook Ads account set up and play around with the different targeting options, ad types and all of the features within the manager. Ensure that before you create any live adverts you seriously consider why you’re creating Facebook adverts and how they feed into your overall objectives. As I said, every part of your marketing should work towards your objectives, so if you’re unsure of those objectives when you start the ads, chances are you won’t see the returns you’re hoping for. Remember start off small. Put a few pounds here and there on different adverts and experiment with different settings to see what ads and settings yield the best results.
If you enjoyed this blog check out more just like it here. Learn more about Facebook ads here.
