7 TIPS FOR MAXIMIZING FACEBOOK AD PERFORMANCE

TABLE OF CONTENTS

3 Facebook Pixel and Troubleshooting 4 Use the Power Editor

5 Different Images + Duplicate Copy = Multiple Ads

6 Structure Your Account According to Segment Type

7 Segment, Subsegment, Segment the Subsegments

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In the realm of social media marketing, Facebook ads is a real powerhouse for accelerating toward your PPC goals. Here are seven best practices you can use to maximize the

enormous potential this platform offers.

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Establishing conversion tracking via the Facebook pixel is not only important for the purpose of measuring your goals, but it also informs one of our favorite resources in Facebook Ads – Custom Audiences (more on that later).

The pixel also enhances the insights you gather from the ads manager interface, where you can now compare performance metrics against your objective and leverage this data to inform optimization and maximize results. Facebook has many comprehensive setup and implementation guides.

Here are the basics you should cover:Create the Facebook PixelInstall and Verify Your Pixel

If you’re comfortable editing and maintaining the code of your website, it’s feasible for you to accomplish these steps without the assistance of a developer. However, if web development is far from your expertise, never hesitate to enlist the help of a qualified developer. Apart from implementing the pixel on your landing page (or website), your developer can help tweak the Facebook pixel to suit your individual tracking needs.

TIP 1: THE IMPORTANCE OF THE FACEBOOK PIXEL

Whether you’re outsourcing pixel implementation or handling it yourself, we highly recommend using Facebook’s Pixel Helper – a chrome browser extension, which can be found here – to help with the troubleshooting process. The tool automatically browses your website for code that looks like the Facebook marketing pixel, and if it doesn’t load correctly, then it will recommend some likely causes and elucidate possible solutions.

TIP 2: TROUBLESHOOTING - USE FACEBOOK’S PIXEL HELPER

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https://www.facebook.com/business/help/336923339852238https://www.facebook.com/business/help/336923339852238

https://www.facebook.com/business/help/218844828315224https://www.facebook.com/business/help/218844828315224

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Just as important as proper conversion tracking is the Facebook Power Editor – an indispensable tool for managing and nourishing an account (or multiple accounts) as it grows in size and complexity. The Power Editor’s utility for timesaving on major tasks becomes clearer the more you use it. Use it to download the entirety of your account and view it from any of its foundational levels. Use it to upload bulk edits and make dozens of modifications to your account in a single click. Use it to enable Instagram Ads and further your initiatives’ reach.

TIP 3: USE THE POWER EDITOR

Tired of the time-consuming task of creating new campaigns from scratch? Duplicate an existing campaign (or ad set) instead. This will preserve the structure of all components within the duplicated branch. Keep in mind that while this saves time, you still will need to alter the names of its internal components (Campaign, Ad Set, Ads), as well as modify each new ad set’s target audience. If you’re using URL parameters (e.g. utm_source, utm_medium, utm_campaign), remember that ad URLs are likewise preserved during the duplication process and will also need to be modified.

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Another note regarding ad images: Facebook requires that all

text (including logos) must take up no more than 20% of the

total ad real estate. For this, we recommend using Facebook’s

Grid Tool to ensure your ads are not rejected because of this

particular rule.

A recent study conducted by Consumer Acquisition confirms

that images are responsible for 75-90% of ad performance.

In other words, when it comes to Facebook, don’t jump to

testing various copy syntaxes for improving user engagement –

images are where it really counts. Furthermore, testing

multiple images with a single audience, using identical

verbiage for each ad, is an effective strategy for discovering

which ads (and ad images) will deliver the best results for you.

It’s a good rule of thumb to run at least four ads simultaneously,

each with a unique image. The process of creating multiple

ads per audience is also a great opportunity to explore

the utility of the Power Editor.

TIP 4: DIFFERENT IMAGES + DUPLICATE COPY = MANY ADS

...“images are

responsible for 75-90%

of ad performance.”

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This feature relies on the Facebook pixel – so make sure the pixel is firing correctly before you try it out. Within the Ad Set level, under “Budget & Schedule,” you have the option to optimize ad delivery for your campaign objective. Facebook uses its internal algorithm to determine which users are more likely to complete the specific action outlined by your campaign’s objective (so be sure to set your campaign’s objective to “website conversions”) and then charges you by every 1k impressions. To test this strategy, simply duplicate the ad set (using the Power Editor) and alter this setting within the new ad set’s bidding section.

TIP 5: SPLIT-TEST CPC BIDDING VS. OPTIMIZING FOR YOUR CAMPAIGN OBJECTIVE (a.k.a. “oCPM”)

Establishing a universal structure, complete with naming conventions for the components of your campaigns, is a good way to streamline processes and tidy up your account. Before embarking on this task, be sure to outline a list of your prospective/current students’ characteristics according to these targeting options (demographics) available in the Facebook Ads interface: Fields of Study (which can be found under “Education”), Job Titles (under “Work”), Interests (listed by default under Ad Set > Targeting) and Groups/Associations (which can be actively searched through the “Interests” demographic).

TIP 6: ORGANIZATION IS KEY: STRUCTURE YOUR ACCOUNT ACCORDING TO SEGMENT TYPE

For example, if I’m marketing a master’s of science in health informatics, I’ll have a campaign labeled “MSHI – FOS” (Fields of Study), with individual ad sets for various graduates, whose area of study is a logical precedent to the MSHI degree (e.g. health informatics, nursing, pharmacy, public health, etc.). Keep in mind that each ad set should contain at least four ads with different images.

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TIP 7: SEGMENT, SUBSEGMENT, SEGMENT THE SUB-SEGMENTS

Whenever you’re faced with a particularly large audience in any of your ad sets, or just trying to improve the performance of an existing segment, it never hurts to find ways to break an audience down and test its various components against one another. Best practices indicate starting small before moving on to more advanced segmentation options, such as Facebook’s new AND/OR feature (whereby you can indicate that the target audience must satisfy multiple demographic options, rather than the default “any of the above” setting). Here’s a good place to begin your segmentation – by device/gender:

Copy any ad set with a large audience into Power Editor, so that there are now four duplicates. Add to the names of each duplicate ad set:

Desktop – Male

Desktop – Female

Mobile – Male

Mobile – Female

Change the targeting options in each of the ad sets to apply these targeting parameters to the foundational audience.

Measure results.Still not satisfied with your results? Segment further! Try segmenting by industry, geography or any of Facebook’s available demographics. What’s more, with Facebook’s new AND/OR targeting feature, you can segment the audience you’re already targeting without using any additional demographics.

Our team of marketing experts has assisted dozens of universities and businesses in building and maintaining highly productive campaigns.

Still have questions about what marketing channel is right for your degree program?

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About the Author:A graduate of the University of California, Andrew Glasser is an experienced paid search and analytics expert.

He is both Google Analytics and AdWords certified and, leveraging an ROI-focused and problem-solving approach, manages paid search campaigns for over a dozen well-known universities across the U.S. Connect with Andrew: @aglasser1201https://twitter.com/aglasser1201?lang=en

https://twitter.com/aglasser1201?lang=enhttps://twitter.com/aglasser1201?lang=en

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