Apr30

A couple of weeks back I decided to have a go at Facebook advertising. If you have a look online you can find lots of information and success stories to confirm that Facebook advertising can be a really powerful tool. I was curious to find out if these types of adverts could work in our industry.

A bit about how it works

Facebook adverts are similar to Google Adwords in some ways but also very different in other ways. Both advertising formats work on a pay per click basis, meaning when the advert is clicked you are automatically charged for the click. The big difference though is that Google advertising works by “search” ie somebody is Looking for a locksmith In Leeds, so they type locksmiths Leeds into Google, Then Google will display adverts relevant to the search terms, when somebody clicks your advert they are directed to your website and Google then calculates the cost per click based on your maximum bid.  Facebook adverts are not targeted to a specific search term, they are designed to show in peoples news feeds regardless of whether they want to see your product or business, when your ad is clicked you are charged for the click (CPC) or you can choose to pay per impression (CPM)

How much does it cost?

The cost of a Facebook advert is completely up to each individual person and can cost as little or as much as you want. The higher the budget you set the more people will see your advert as it will take longer to use up your daily budget. When your budget for the day has run out your advert will stop displaying.

Is it easy to do?

Yes it’s very easy to set up an ad campaign on Facebook. First of all you need to design the advert, in the design process you will be able to add a picture and the url of the website you want to drive Facebook users to. Next you need to choose the goal for your advert ie do you want the advert so your page can get more likes? or do you want to get clicks through to your website?  Then you need to think about the audience you would like the advert to reach. There are a number of different options for targeting adverts to a specific audience. You can set the age range you would like to target and the geographical areas, also you can target an advert based on the types of products and services a user has liked in the past. Next you will be able to select whether you want to pay per click or per impression, if you pay per impression you will be charged when people see the advert as opposed to when people actually click your advert. Also you will need to set your daily budget and the start and end dates for your campaign. Facebook will calculate roughly how many people will see your advert based on the daily budget and the length of time the advert is running for. The last thing to do is check through your advert carefully and make sure everything is spelled correctly and your budgets are set correctly obviously this is very Important! Once you have checked and double checked its time to place the order with Facebook who will then review your advert and approve it. Once its been approved that’s it your advert is complete. I managed to talk an Enfield locksmith through it over the phone so its pretty straight forward.

So Does it work?

Kind of! Let me explain. I set my adverts up for the supplying and fitting of anti snap locks targeting Leeds, Wakefield, Castleford and Bradford. The reason I chose to do this instead of a general advert for my locksmith services is because I don’t believe that anybody who needed a locksmith in an emergency would really look at their news feed on Facebook in the hope a local locksmith company might pop up! I thought the anti snap lock advert might spark some interest as it’s a security upgrade which is not a desperate emergency meaning people would see it and think, I wonder what that’s all about and click the advert to get more info and maybe book a lock upgrade in the future. I did two different adverts over a two week period, the first one was for Avocet Abs locks supplied and fitted and the second one was a special offer for 2 x Brisant E locks supplied and fitted. Both ads were run Mondays to Fridays and had a maximum budget of £5 a day meaning a £25 spend on each advert. The reach of the adverts was quite impressive the Avocet Abs advert had around 20,000 views and the Brisant E advert had around 28,000 views. The big difference came with the clicks through to my website, the Abs advert received 32 clicks but the Brisant E advert was clicked 83 times. To me this would suggest that a special offer type advert seems to draw in a lot more people than a general advert. So with these two adverts combined I managed to them seen 48,000 times! So did I get 48,000 jobs from it? Not exactly but I did get one job from it which paid for both adverts and a little bit extra on top. For me though the most positive thing is that 48,000 have seen my company name who would probably have not seen it if it wasn’t for Facebook, so surely at least one of them might just remember the name if they ever need a locksmith in future!

 

 

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