If yes, Can you give some tips/examples on what you did to make it work?
Poll: Does Facebook advertising work for you?
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Re: Poll: Does Facebook advertising work for you?
#2It helped me reduce carbon emissions when setting money on fire for three different people now. (n.b. All were trying to get direct sales, which many people would say FB is contraindicated for.)
Re: Poll: Does Facebook advertising work for you?
#3Most of the time I have received poor results when measuring on a CPA basis, compared to conversion through other channels (cost per registration in my situation). I have had a few great successes of bringing CPA under $2 for a very targeted key words. For example a recent advertisement for a campaign we were running on the artist "Ray LaMontagne" worked superbly, probably because the keywords weren't extremely popular and we happened to be giving away VIP tickets to his show the same weekend. So it was very low friction.
As with any advertising channel, your mileage will greatly vary depending on what you're marketing, what you expect in return (branding, sales, site registrations?).
Re: Poll: Does Facebook advertising work for you?
#4It can. It's not as good a DR channel as paid search, simply because you're buying demographics and interests rather than intent.
However, for list building and 'softer' DR actions like a whitepaper download or a lead form fill, it can work very well.
There's also a lot of off-the-wall targeting things you can do, like advertising your blogger program to mommy bloggers, targeting reporters at techcrunch and mashable with your app launch, and other things that fall outside of the scope of traditional display advertising.
Re: Poll: Does Facebook advertising work for you?
#5There should be a 3rd option: Ads on Facebook? Really?? (Adblock-effect)
Re: Poll: Does Facebook advertising work for you?
#6There should be a 3rd option: Ads on Facebook? Really?? (Adblock-effect)
This is about companies buying ads to market their product or service on Facebook, not about users' view on ads.
Re: Poll: Does Facebook advertising work for you?
#7It can. It's not as good a DR channel as paid search, simply because you're buying demographics and interests rather than intent. However, for list building and 'softer' DR actions like a whitepaper download or a lead form fill, it can work very well. There's also a lot of off-the-wall targeting things you can do, like advertising your blogger program to mommy bloggers, targeting reporters at techcrunch and mashable…
I used this trick when I launched http://anynewbooks.com. I used existing credits (if I remember correctly) I had on both LinkedIn and Facebook to target publishers, book bloggers, and journalists. It worked, to a certain extent.
Re: Poll: Does Facebook advertising work for you?
#8I work at a place that runs an ad network for facebook apps (so it is ads in Facebook, but not run by Facebook). It definitely works well in some particular areas, like in driving app installs or reengagement. For example, if you've got an app that has a high ARPU but low virality, then fb ads might be an attractive arbitrage opportunity.
Generally, I think the ads are good if you aren't seeking a commercial exchange right away, but rather are trying to build some type of relationship that can be capitalized later on.
Re: Poll: Does Facebook advertising work for you?
#9Yes and No (it's a bit of an art):
The trick with Facebook ads is create that magic combo of the right keywords, demographic profile and creative approach to making your ad stick out within the limitations of their format. It also depends on who you're going after: I ran one campaign for a content focused website and that did well -- did another campaign aimed at a professional audience and had mixed results at best (maybe my product was too specialized).
You also have to design your strategy to work with the ecosystem of facebook and play their "game". Their game is that they want you set up a page on their service and for you to feed it with content which they'll do you the favor of maybe getting through to your audience (and yes that content needs to be crafted just as much as an ad).
My suggestion is to look at other ads that appear on the system and then play with your creative and then measure your results.
Re: Poll: Does Facebook advertising work for you?
#10For me, it has always resulted in a significantly lower CTR and conversion rate than AdWords–and that's even after accounting for the higher CPC at AdWords. So I gave it up. Also, the number of clicks I paid for was always higher than the number of visitors GA told me I was getting from FB–and that kinda ticked me off.
The only time I've seen it work is for some wedding photographers I've worked with–and this is mainly because you can show ads to "women who are engaged".
So, it can work for some service providers whose target market can be sliced out of FB's demographics. But for most software-type businesses, there's dozens of better ways to put marketing money to work.