Facebook Ads - anyone done this?

[hambo]

Hello, on a spur of the moment I bought some facebook ads...I wondered if anyone had done this already and if they had any words of wisdom? Have restricted my spending and am paying per click rather than per 1000 impression, however I am not sure that is the right thing....ho hum. Another waste of money? Trying to get my business 'out there' but it is pretty hard going!

I use mozilla with adblock - would not know what ads were on facebook
I am not alone
be warned

It can be a very sensible thing to do if you know your market well and target your ads properly - what are your campaign objectives?

Hello

TalkinPeace - didn't know that existed! Might use it for myself.

Escape - My objectives are to spead the word, get my company name out there - and sell! I make childrens art and when people see it they seem to buy it but I need a particular audience - it seems to be quite well off 100% women who are making the purchases. Women who have young children and who are going to kids parties and bored of buying the same old present and want something different!

Also, am keen to find out how many clicks I need to translate into a sale...eg if I get 1 sale per 100 clicks etc.

Have you used these ads? I was not sure whether they work or not (ie will translate into sales)

I went to a social media seminar recently where the speaker strongly advised against them for our particular group (all new/ pre start SMEs) due to the potential cost & low sales per click. She did ask could anyone raise their hand if they had ever clicked on one & no-one had. The speaker did quote some figures to support her (speaker was Karen @ Beacon for business) but of course that is just one opinion & the demographic of our seminar group may have influenced her to advise against them. She echoed what escape says about need for v careful targeting.

hambo seems like an ad on mumsnet may reach your target audience as there are more than a few wealthy yummy mummies floating around here

Good luck with the business

Hi Thorny

Very interesting indeed - sort of what I thought actuallu as I never click on the facebook ads either! I thought I'd have a go as an experimant but it seems a dud so far. This is the second dud - first was putting leaflets into bags at baby fairs. You may be right - keep your eyes peeled for an ad here soon! (hmm )

DH uses google adwords for his website.
They are useful to enhance visibility but we know from our web tracking data that very few of even the clicks turn into sales.
"content" ads like facebook, ebay, other websites are worse than useless - we have the price per click set so low that google rarely show the ads thank goodness

Thanks TalkinPeace2...can I ask what you find sends most real business to your (and DH's) site? Is it from real life meet, greet and here is my business card etc? Or adverts in the paper etc?

Off to read about how to market oneself on 2p a month....

For him its 70% word of mouth, 10% random web searches, 20% through specialist websites that have independent reviews.

Business cards - yup, we redesign it regularly and print out batches of 100.
Fliers - always handed to people - then they are less likely to go in the bin.
Paid advertising - minimal. Even when he gets an advert next to an article by/about him we rarely get leads from it.
Mailshots - never any more

The main thing is to KEEP ASKING anybody who does use you how, where and why and build upwards and outwards from there.

Thanks TalkinPeace2...I had a bit in the paper and as you say - nothing came of it! So strange (I thought)...

I just read about a lady who sent a 'celeb' some of her product, and said celeb mantioned it in her column and sales went through the roof...Do I have the courage though!

Do you do twitter hambo?

I finally set up an account on Fri night & have had 3 enquiries since then, OK no actual sales yet BUT it is free.

Also facebook business page? Good if you aren't ready for a website just yet.

I find that foot patrol works better for me than just sending letters & cold calling is a no no. Agree with talkingpeace about asking the people you already have.

If you don't want to send product to a celebrity can you demo your product locally? Maybe at mother & toddler groups etc or anywhere where affluent mums meet? Do you have a table at all the local school fairs or farmers market?

I do have atwitter account but I don't really know what is going on!

I have a facebook account which does give me the most business as it is freinds and friends of friends etc who see it. Often they have seen stuff in RL and been told about facebook...

I have done a few fairs but had a few duds - been trying to find ones which attract the markets I need! Someone recommended private school fairs !

I keep meaning to do the parent and toddler thing, but with two of my own I keep thinking - Id rather have a cup of tea!!!

Twitter is OK but very, very fastmoving if you follow more then 3 people
Linkedin has its uses for work
an FB work page separate from your personal one can be useful
and you can link the tweets to appear on all three!

the MAIN thing is to constantly be listening and loking and to have NO SHAME when it comes to self promotion.
DD LOATHES it when I hand leaflets to strangers at public events for DH!!
but it pays for her riding lessons so blaahh

Yes - just looked up Myleene Klass and she has had her second baby - so am going to send her some Baby Birth Prints......hee hee she will probably not receive it even! But you live in hope!!!!

Sorry - the yes was in reply to self promotion!

Just thought; have you linked yourself with any likeminded people who you can promote with? Maybe party planners, bouncy castle hire, cake makers would be good to network with as they might be happy for you to promote their services to your customers too?

I do this with beauticians & am trying to get personal trainers to link up with too, basically anyone who isn't a competitor but shares my target market.

I would agree that Twitter could be a good place to pick up enquires etc. There are lots of articles out there on google as how to use it and good tools like tweetdeck. I help orgs with setting up Twitter accounts & as long as put the time in, it does pay off.

Are you maximising your recommendations, offering incentives for friends to recommend a friend etc?

Have you also thought about www.notonthehighstreet.com/join/why - they seem to be targetting the same sort of customer as you. Not sure about the ins and outs of selling on there, but I do know that NOTHS seem to do lots of great PR themselves (I have seen them everywhere!), which in turn drives customers to their site.

Finally, have you looked at your local NCT branch? I used to volunteer for our local one managing the advertising for the newsletter. We offered quarter page adverts from £9 for each quarterly edition. Our branch reached 500 people - most of which were fairly well to do mummies- but some larger branches could have 1000 or more. You could also get involved in their events. Typically we used to charge £20 for a stand space at a baby fair or toddlers party.

Or as you said get involved with school events, particulary private schools, our local private school charged £8 per person to enter their schools fete - good lord!!!

www.no-waffle.co.uk/communicate/ Scroll down to Sliced bread by Seth Godwin.

What he says makes perfect sense - though I am still struggling on how to apply it to me! But insightful and entertaining anywhoo!

ThornyKate; Watersign and TracyK - Thank you for taking the time to reply. I am going to do all that you suggest...I will write them down first as I forget easily! Annoyingly most of my work time is at night when my brain has given up! However it is all good and I am keen to organise myself! Cheers for all your great ideas!!

PS will let you know about Myleen ha ha

Hi Hambo, I sell through Not On The High Street and it does very well for me. But the initial outlay is significant, and then they take their 25%. However it's well deserved in my book as it would cost me a fortune to drive that volume of traffic to my own website. I think they recently pumped 7 million venture capital into PR.

What about Etsy and Folksy? They only take 5% of your sale price and it's buttons to get a store up and running.

Thanks Novascotia - lucky you! I think I need to hone my 'story' before I approach them...I know they have some designers who do prints already but when I have a better range I will approach them...It's hard to get in I think? You must be very pleased! (Have you seen all the funny threads on mumsnet about NOTH?)

I've seen one, that's funny if there are a few, wall to wall bunting, gotta be the way forward, ha. It's the same with Etsy, now there's a site called RegrEtsy, which is very amusing.

I'm not sure how tough it is to get accepted on to NOTHS because they really seem to advertise for new sellers, including on their home page, which would suggest to me, that it's not that hard at all. Or they wouldn't need to kinda thing.

Wish you well with what you're doing, if you're not on Etsy you should deffo have a look at that. For me Etsy is the greater share of my sales, about 20% more than Noths, I guess it's just a different market.

We use facebook ads at work (we are a sailing holiday company) expensive and haven't had much response yet however they do help us get to our very specific Market. Just trialling them at the moment to see how it goes playing with who we are aiming at and how many etc. Setting up a facebook fan page which is free however has been very successful.

Thanks VovaScotia - I will try to get an Etsy up and running - I seem to spend all my time on the web updating and trying to be seen but no time for designing making anymore! (after summer smallest will go to playgroup so might improve)!

Thanks Florin - good luck with your sailing holiday company. Sounds like bliss..

I think the problems of advertising exist for new and established businesses. I spent a fortune last year on BT books and yellow pages and really nothing at all. The year before I Yell.com too.

I made a mistake of also signing up for BT webclicks - another rip off. I was told by an expert that your eye doesnt read the RHS and also reverts to the left and if I want to locate something I always look for it on google search. No matter what pops up on adwords I ignore.

I spent the last few weeks spare time adding my details to all the free directories on the web and am sure there are loads that suit yr type of business.

Be warned that advertising budget can eat up any profit.

Contact yr local business advisors which are free they may be able to point you in the right direction with groups, women in business, local chamber of commerce, networking, schools etc.

Also, try netmums.com there are "local boards" where you can add your business and get on forums.

Also clicks dont mean sales, most of mine are men looking for work within our construction business.

Website, facebook also a winner!