Boosting is a Trap

Hey, and welcome back to another episode. We’re talking about more social media today and if you listen to our first episode, it was all about why social media isn’t producing for your business. You’re being consistent, you’re you’re posting, you’re doing all the things – or you think you are – and for some reason, social media is still not really producing any results for your business. So one of those points that I made in the last episode was that you’re not using the paid portion of Facebook. When I tell people that, many times people say “oh, what but I am, I’m actually boosting posts on Facebook.” The B-word is what trips me up and here’s why. I tell people that boosting is a trap – it honestly really is. While yes, you will get some positive results out of boosting. There’s just honestly so much more that you can do with social media ads and it’s such a shame to spend your money on that. It’s like you’re not really getting the full capabilities.

It’s tempting. I think – honestly – that’s why Facebook put that button there for the people who really don’t know Ads Manager. If anyone out there – if you’ve never been in Ads Manager – it can be kind of intimidating. When you first get inside of it, you’re like, “whoa, what? I’m just trying to make an ad.” There’s a lot going on in there and it’s intimidating. I think Facebook added this boost button on the bottom of every single one of your little posts and it’s literally like dangling a carrot in front of you of “oh, you want more people to see this, okay, then you better pay up.” It’s so easy to just hit the boost button; and now they’ve even made it where you can narrow it down by age, gender, demographics, things like that. Then you feel like you’re targeting people – and you are in a sense – but really, you’re missing out on so much. So it’s kind of a carrot for the people who don’t know Ads Manager. 

If you’re wondering what’s the difference between the two, between just boosting something for a post and when you actually set up ads and ads manager? Boosting really is only for likes, comments and shares – which is great. I mean, we all want our posts to get likes, comments and shares, because it gets more visibility that way. But at the end of the day, what is that actually doing for you? 

I’ll give you an example of when boosting actually isn’t a bad idea, necessarily. Let’s say you own a local boutique, and you are doing a grand reopening and you just want people in the area to know that you’re now open. So that maybe is an idea. I’d pop in a video of the new store or a photo of the new location. I probably would not do a graphic that just says now open. Graphics do not perform well, pretty much in any sense. A video is your best bet and if not, a photo of the new location so people can actually visually see your location, your storefront and recognize you. Then boosting that and put it within a certain mile radius of your location. If you’re a women’s boutique, maybe you’re targeting women between certain ages and that’s all that you need. You just simply need awareness that you’re now open. In that situation, boosting is actually not completely bad. Could you do more with Ads Manager? Yes. But you’ll still probably get some results with that. If you’re on your own, you don’t have an agency or anything and you’re kind of balling on a budget, in that type of situation, boosting really is not terrible. 

Here’s the difference though. When you set up an ad in Ads Manager, the first thing you do is you set an objective of what you want people to do. There are tons of different options. There are ads that optimize for getting clicks to a link. That’s if you’re trying to get somebody to go to your booking engine, or go buy something on your website, that can be a good objective. If you want more response to one of your events, you need more awareness, more people to click interested, you can make that your objective – but every ad only gets one objective. You only get one goal. The goal is to get people to click the link. The goal is to get people to click interested in the event. The goal is to convert. You can actually set up a conversion ad to follow people all the way through to the basket, to the checkout, to make sure that they buy. Every ad gets one objective and here’s why: when you’re asking users to do five different things – like this post, share this post, click this link – they’re not going to do it all. You’ve got to focus on one action item – that’s actually great advice for your posts in general too, not just your ads. 

When you go into Ads Manager, the first thing you’re going to do is set up an objective and then you can actually even build out the ad inside of what you want it to say, which platforms you want it to be on – Facebook and Instagram. If there are certain placements that you don’t think are a fit – maybe you don’t want it to go on Instagram stories – you can narrow it down to where it’s only being shown in the exact spots between Facebook and Instagram that you want it to go.

Here’s the coolest part about Ads Manager to me: you can set up a pixel. A pixel is a little code that you’re going to stick on your website. Let’s say you’re doing an ad that you’re trying to get people to click through to your website. You’re putting them on the page that tells about your new service of some sort, so you put that code on the backend of your website on that page specifically – the page that you’re leading people to. Somebody sees your ad, they click through to that page. Whether or not they do anything, when they go through to that page, that pixel captures them and puts them on a “list.”

I’m simplifying this here, but this is the only way to really make it easy to understand. If somebody clicks through, they’re reading that page about your new service, they go on an imaginary list. The pixel is collecting people onto a list, then after you run the ad for however long you want to, you’ve got this pixel list. Then Facebook creates an audience – or they can create an audience out of all those people who clicked on that. Then you’ll set up another ad that will only be served to the people on that pixel list. Now you’re serving ads to people that are warm leads – they already clicked through once, they obviously are interested enough that they read that much. That’s a really cool option that you have inside of Ads Manager that you can’t take advantage of when you’re boosting – always keep that in mind when you’re tempted to click that boost button. 

Really look at what you’re trying to get people to do. If you’re trying to get people to click through to your website, boosting is not going to do it. If you’re trying to get people to buy something, boosting is going to get you more visibility and that’s about it. If you’re doing a grand opening, if you’ve got a special, or a new location and you simply need awareness. Good idea, maybe. Do I always suggest that you work inside of Ads Manager? Of course, because I want you to reach your full potential, but it’s something to think about. 

People ask me all the time, why don’t you just use the boost button? That’s why. I feel like boosting is a trap for the entrepreneur that maybe doesn’t know Ads Manager or maybe just somebody who wants to get more visibility. Don’t take the carrot. Really hop inside of Ads Manager or reach out to somebody that actually knows about Facebook ads and Instagram ads, and they can actually help you work within Ads Manager to reach your full potential and actually make something happen. 

If you’re going to spend money on social media, it needs to produce something. You can’t just throw out hundreds of dollars – or you can – but if you really want to see results, you’ll definitely want to dig into Ads Manager. If you want to learn more about social media, we post stuff all the time on our Sociallee Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn. You can also follow me personally @TheWhitneyLee on Instagram. If you like this kind of content or you’re interested in it, screenshot this episode, share it with a friend. I hope you guys thought it was valuable and I’m really excited to hear what else you want to learn about. So until next time, we’ll see you on the next episode.