What is Facebook Ads & How to Use Them?
Whenever you scroll on your Facebook timeline, you will definitely see an ad or two popping up in the middle of your scrolling. Often times you will see different types of Facebook Ads by various businesses and brands. What are the different types of Facebook Ad Formats available?
There are a few Facebook ad formats that you can choose from depending on your goal and focus.
Photo
Photo ads are the most basic and simple ones you can use to portray your brand’s product and give out quick and strong impressions of what you do. Although we say it’s the most basic and simple ad out of all the other Facebook ad formats, a study shows that Photo Ads outperformed other ad formats in driving traffic. What’s great about Photo Ads is that you can easily create an ad in a matter of minutes or seconds by publishing a high-quality photo to your Facebook Page, and boosting the post with the photo. It’s that simple and fast. Photo ads are ideal if your company or brand has a tangible product and you want to specifically promote this product. It helps create awareness, engagement and reach to your product and brand.
How to create a great photo ad on Facebook
- Less text: Less is more. This phrase fits like a jigsaw when it comes to creating an effective photo ad. When there is too much text on your image, it is distracting and can result to your ad being shown to far lesser people. If you must add a text to your image, make sure that it is only 20% of the entire image.
- Focus point: When we mention that too much is feeble, we don’t just say it because we think so. It is proven by Facebook itself that when your ad only focuses on one thing, it does not distract the entire point of your image. Hence, you have to make sure that your photo is powerful and meaningful enough to tell a story of its own. Draw the attention to a focus of the photo. A simple photo of your product being placed and captured properly is enough to catch the attention of your potential customers.
- High-quality images: That goes without saying, your photo has to be high in resolution. This doesn’t mean you have to splurge on an expensive camera to take good quality images. Just make sure the size and the quality of your photos are within your preference and especially meeting the Facebook Ads criteria. Nobody likes to look at distorted and low-quality photos that are blurry and pixelated, so just make sure you pick the best one out of the many shots attempted.
“I think a simple rule of business is, if you do the things that are easier first, then you can actually make a lot of progress.”
– Mark Zuckerberg
Video
If you’ve never thought of using videos as part of your ads, it is time to consider and start practicing. A video ad tells so much more story of your product or brand with added features of sight, sounds, and motion. Ever caught yourself actually watching through an entire video of an ad on Facebook? Video ads can be as short as a few seconds or even up to minutes long.
Shorter videos have higher completion, which means the audience is more likely to watch the entire video from the start to the end. However, longer videos allow you to share more messages and information. If you think that videos are an extra bonus, it’s time to change your conception on them. Video ads are no longer an option to advertise your brand or product, in fact, it is becoming more crucial and fundamental. Consumers are more likely to pay extra attention towards video content than text content.
Why? Because people like to see visuals, things that move and make sounds. It doesn’t necessarily have to be a long video to get their attention, a simple GIF can actually work wonders too. GIF or short video ads are more likely to capture short bursts of attention in feed, which means the audience would stop their scrolling to look at the short video or GIF for a good few seconds. This is enough to leave an impression in their heads, or even better, catch their interest.
It’s very important for a video to be able to capture the attention of an audience within the first three seconds. So, make sure that all your message is conveyed in your 15-second video. Include important messages that you want your audience to pay attention to that will leave an impact.
Video ads need to be designed for sound off but still enchant with sound on. Most of the time people scroll through their Facebook feed expecting no sudden sound popping out because it can be distracting and inconsiderate to their surroundings. Make sure your video still delivers important key points without sound on, or better, include captions in your videos so audience still knows what story your video tells without having to turn their sound on.
Carousel
This is similar to the Photo Ads, but even more to offer. Carousel ads allow you to post up to 10 photos or videos in one single ad. This favors you to display different products that you would like to highlight simultaneously. With this, it increases the chances of the audience to click on the link as the swipe through the carousel images.
Other than that, you can actually tell a story with carousel ads. With the swiping, it’s almost as though the audience is reading a comic strip, which will keep them engaged to your ad.
Slideshow
Slideshow ads are like a combination of photo and video ads. Photos are displayed with motion, sound and text together to develop a story. The good thing about Slideshow ads is they load really quickly even with a poor connection. Slideshow ads are so easy to create as you can just use stock images in the ad creation process or an existing video.
Slideshow ads can be done quickly and easily with low production cost. It’s easy because ready stock images can be used on your ad according to your preference. You can also choose from a variety of free music available to make your slideshow ad more appealing.
As mentioned, slideshow ads use five times lesser data than videos. This means that an audience with a low or poor internet connection can still view your ads without any disruption.
“Many a small thing been made large by the right kind of advertising.”
– Mark Twain
These are the few Facebook ad formats that you can use to create awareness for your business and brand. It can be overwhelming and indecisive to pick which ad format that suits your business. It doesn’t take one attempt to identify which one is the best, although it could be a few formats too! As you constantly start using ads, you will get a gist of it and identify which format best helps your brand promotion. It is essential for you to find the best format to help with your marketing goals and strategy.
What do you think of Facebook ads? Do they work? Which format gives you the best reach?
Contact us if you need more help for your Facebook Marketing!
