Facebook Distribution from www.checkfacebook.com

It may be time for you to seriously consider advertising on Facebook. Now, I know many of you will say, “I don’t use Facebook,” or, “I don’t like Facebook.” You certainly have the right to feel that way. There are many things I don’t like about Facebook, but it is undeniable that many, many people do use and like it. Many of them are, or could be, your customers or prospects. According to CheckFacebook.com, as of April 16, 2011 there are 653,150,280 Facebook users globally. The number of users where it could impact most of our readers, here in the United States, is a healthy 154,869,960. Yes, you read it correctly. There are nearly 155 million Facebook users in the U.S. Now, not all of those users are active, but it is simply a market that should not be ignored.

Aside from the sheer number of people, what makes Facebook so attractive to advertisers? Facebook has a near plethora of statistics related to users, including demographics some marketers salivate over. They include age groups, birthdays, likes, interests, relationship, sex, education, occupation, connections (even friends of those connected with your page), and many more.

Ad targeting can be as simple or detailed as you want it. For example you could create an ad offering a 50% discount for anyone with a May birthday, and display that ad to any Facebook user that is female, between 18 – 35, and lives within 30 miles of your business. You may choose the days and times your ads display.

So, what does it cost? Well, that is entirely up to you. Facebook charges per click in a manner similar to Google AdWords and Microsoft adCenter. You may set a daily budget, and maximum cost per click. Our experience is that they noticeably try to get you to increase that budget, with increasingly higher suggested bids. Accordingly it takes some monitoring and tweaking to get the most clicks for your money. That seems to be especially true with small budgets. The bottom line on cost is that you can control it. You won’t spend more than you decide to budget.

I feel compelled to say, it is extremely important that you not only look at the reports Facebook Advertising provides, but you look closely at your website analytics. You will want to check the reports for “referring sites,” “bounce rate,” “navigation path,” and “time on site” results. If you are not seeing results there, or getting phone calls about your Facebook ad, you need to review why you are not reaching the goals you set for the ad campaign.

Creating the ads is relatively simple, but a bit challenging as you try to write an ad that conveys your message. You have some restrictions. The “Title” will be bold and blue, and can contain no more than 25 characters. Your ad must also include a working destination URL to a website (e.g.,www.examplewebsite.com) or a destination on Facebook like a Page or an Application. Your ad can have maximum size of 110 x 80 pixels. If you upload one larger, it will be automatically resized, but if it is not the same ratio as 110 x 80 it will be distorted. The body text may contain a maximum of 135 characters. You will find yourself rewriting several times to squeeze in what you want to convey. Facebook recommends you create multiple ads (that will not affect your cost) to find the one that works best.

So let’s recap to see if you should try Facebook Advertising.

• Do you want your advertising in front of large numbers of self-qualified, very targeted, visitors to a specific page on your website?
• Do you want to be able to control your monthly budget?
• Do you want to choose which days and hours your ads display?
• Do you want to quantify the amount you spend by seeing detailed reports?

My guess is the answer is yes to those questions.

The only caveat I’ll offer is that, as in all good things, it takes an investment of your time or that of a professional with experience. If you or your marketing professional, has experience, a proven track record using Google AdWords and other Pay-Per-Click platforms, and understand analytics, you will likely reach the goals you set for your Facebook advertising campaign. Of course, if you have time to learn, and put in the effort you may be successful as well.

Is Facebook Advertising a good fit for you?

Only you can make that decision.  Of course, we are always happy to help. Call us! 1-800-281-9993

Seems like I talk about Google AdWords frequently. There is a reason for that. Advertising using Google AdWords just plain works. Those of you using Google AdWords already know the benefits. This blog post is for those still not taking advantage of a very powerful, cost-effective advertising medium.

For the last few years, I have been writing (some may say, evangelizing) about using Google AdWords, and extolling its benefits. Since a significant number of our clients are not using AdWords, I obviously don’t convey the message well enough. Now, don’t get me wrong. We have many clients who enjoy the benefits of AdWords in increased, targeted traffic driven to their website for a budgeted amount that they control. They see quantifiable results. They know exactly how many people were delivered to specific pages on their websites, and the keywords their visitors used to get there. If they are also using Google Analytics and the the two accounts are linked, they know much more about their visitors. There are not many other ways to get self-qualified, quantifiable traffic to look at a specific product or service you offer, and at the advertising cost you choose.

Why use Google AdWords?

• Control Cost – You set your daily budget, set your maximum per click for single keywords, or by ad group
• Pay only for results – You’re charged only if someone clicks your ad, not when your ad is displayed.
• Local and regional targeting – Target by country, state, city, regions, or custom areas (set a radius of 10 or more miles from a point on the map)
• Local ads – Help potential customers find you by showing a business address with your AdWords text ads. You can show your location to people searching for local information on Google.com and Google Maps.

Enhance your adds with these Ad Extensions

• Site Links - your ad could look like this:

• Address – display your address to increase local traffic
• Phone – just list your phone number, or use phone extensions to enable “Click-to-Call“
• Products -  extend ads with relevant product details and photos from Google Merchant Center (a way for you to register your company and its list of products with Google).

I have just scratched the surface with this blog post of what Google AdWords and we at WebWise can do for you. If you are serious about driving self-qualified, targeted traffic to your website, please email adwords@webwisedesign.com or give us a call at 1-800-281-9993 or 608-822-3750.

If you are looking for more self-qualified local traffic to your website, and have claimed your Google Places page, you should consider using “Tags” to make you local listing stand out. If you have not claimed your Google Places page for your business, scoot on over to Don’t Lose Your Place – Claim Your Google Places Page!

What are tags?

Tags are yellow markers that allow business owners to promote important aspects of their businesses. Potential customers can scroll over tags on Google or click on the sponsored link to view offers, photos, or other select features.

You use tags to highlight information in you Google Places listing. Using tags does not affect your search results ranking, but they do help your listing stand out in the crowd.

What are the benefits?

• Easily highlight your listing on Google from Google Places.
• Potential customers in your local area will see what you think is most important or unique about your business.
• Track the effectiveness of your tag with your Google Places dashboard.
• No additional work or ongoing management is needed.

What does using tags cost?

Google charges a $25 flat monthly fee, with no bids and no keywords required.

What tags can you use?

The tag types available for your listing are based on information you’ve already included in your business listing. For example, if you want to highlight a video about your business with a tag, you’ll first need to add the video to your business listing. Once you’ve added the video, the video tag option will show up in the menu for your enhancement types. Types of info you may tag:

• Coupons for your listing
• Photos of your business
• Videos of your business
• Menu for your restaurant
• Reservations page for your business
• Posts for your business

Example Place page Posts

• Specials: “Free chips and salsa today from 4-6. We’ll even throw in free guacamole.”
  Posted 3 hours prior to the start of Afternoon Special
• Events: “Come to “Anything Goes – Poetry or Prose ” Today from 7:30 pm to 9:45 pm.”
  Posted 4 hours prior to the event, linking to the Facebook event page.
• New products: “Have you checked out our newest pastries? they are yummy!”

You can only pick one tag at a time, but you can change or remove the tag whenever you’d like.

The bottom line:

If you have a business that depends on local traffic, and it is the type of business your prospective customers search for, you should, as we have talked about before, use your free Google Places listing, and many of you should consider using “tags.”

This should be a no-brainer for many of you.

Read Google Help to learn more about using “tags” for Google Places.

Of course, we are always happy to talk about how we can help you with Google Places tags.