Facebook Custom Audiences

If you are targeting the wrong people your marketing message you have no hope of success. You are done before you really start.

This is true no matter what marketing channel you are using. Google Adwords, Facebook ads  , radio or television ads or even Search Engine Optimisation they are all useless unless you get the targeting right.

You will often hear it said that sales is 80% list selection.

Start off targeting the wrong people and by that I mean people who either don’t want your product, can’t use your product or who cannot afford your product and everything you do after that will end in failure.

Facebook Custom Audiences offers some great options for targeting your Facebook Ads at the right people. You can create a custom audience that suits your needs based on a growing list of options from Facebook. You then use these custom audience as targets for your ads.

Some examples of the Facebook Custom Audiences  you may wish to create are

1. People who have already Liked your page
2. People who have bought from you.
3. People who have visited a specific page on your web site.
4. People on your email list.

People who have already liked your page.

You can create a custom audience of everybody who has liked your page.

Assuming the likes on your page are genuine, by that I mean are from people who genuinely found your page interesting and informative then this is a great option for you.  These people are already well disposed to what you say. They are not cold prospects. Any ads targeted at these people will benefit from the work you have already put into your Facebook Page.

Running an ad via an organic or free status update to this group will hit on average 17% of them. That means 4 out of every 5 will not see your Ad. Using paid Facebook Ads to target this group via a custom audience will boost that reach significantly.

BE WARNED. If the Likes on your page are not genuine. If you used one of the many tactics and services available that will boost your Like count by thousands in only a few days then stall the ball on this tactic.  All of these likes will be from countries and people you have no interest in. They will have no interest in you.

This problem for you will be compounded when you start getting real likes on your page. Now you may want to target your real audience, the people who liked your page because of its content but they are now mixed in with loads of rubbish.

This is one of many reasons I believe you should build a real list of Likes or followers on Facebook.  Worry less about the quantity of Likes you have and focus on the quality.

People who have bought from you.

As merchants we all love buyers.

Your existing buyers are  in many cases are your best chance of further sales and so they deserve special attention.

Much like with Google Pay Per Click Marketing Facebook Advertising allows you to re-market to people who have already been on your site.

Lets say you have a Thank You page on your web site. You can only get to it after a purchase.  One of the Facebook marketing options you have is to install what is called a tracking pixel on that page. This is just a piece of code from Facebook.

Once on that page every time it gets a visitor they are added to a Custom Audience List on Facebook.  This list will grow dynamically every time somebody buys from you and ends up on your thank you page.

When people on this list next visit facebook  you can use the Facebook Advertising Platform to target ads at them. You can keep people on a Facebook Custom Audience  list for up to 180 days.

People who have visited a specific page on your web site.

Marketing that is specific to a persons needs and interests always works best. If you know the problems people need help with then leverage that information.

You may have many offer many different products and services. You site will be structured to reflect the many products and services you offer.

If people go to specific pages pages on your site this tells you a lot about what currently interests them or what problems they need solving.

1. On a solicitor web site people may only visit the personal injury section,
2. On a e-commerce site people may visit the tv section
3. On a holiday accommodation site they may look at accommodation in specific areas.

Using the same tracking pixel already mentioned you can also use Facebook marketing platform to build lists of people who visited specific pages or sections of your site.  Armed with this list you can now target highly relevant ads at them when they next visit Facebook.

So instead of hitting his audience with general ads about his practice the solicitor will target Personal Injury Ads to his custom audience, the e-commerce site will target ads about the TVs’ they offer and the accommodation site will run ads specific to the area the visitor already looked in.

People on your email list.

Email lists of customers and leads do bring huge benefits to a business. If properly used to educate, entertain and inform  they can be a major source of money in the bank for you again and again.

Facebook adds another excellent way to reap benefit  from your lists , you can upload them into Facebook and Facebook will match the emails you have with the emails in its database and create a list for you.

I put together a blog video post on  email custom audiences , it reviews why you should do this and how to do this .