Tag Archives for " Ads Marketing "

Facebook Lead Ads: What They Are and How to Use Them

It has 2.89 billion monthly active users, a global presence, and a massive influence on consumer buying decisions.

What am I talking about? Facebook, of course!

Given its broad audience, marketers and businesses can’t afford to ignore Facebook if they want a fresh pool of prospects to target.

However, there’s another reason why you should use Facebook: they provide many innovative tools to help anyone drive more attention to their products and services by targeting specific audiences.

One of those tools is Facebook lead ads.

 

What Are Facebook Lead Ads?

Facebook lead ads allow marketers to generate leads on Facebook among users who might be looking to buy your product or services.

Rather than the traditional landing page, these ads keep users on social media while the prospect fills out a simple lead form with basic details such as their name, email address, and other contact information.

When a prospect completes an “Instant Form”, they get added to the company’s email list where they receive updates and offers (if you have an active mailing list).

Alternatively, you can customize Facebook Instant Forms—making it easier to target your audience (and filter out non-relevant customers).

With Facebook lead ads, you can choose from several campaign types, including:

• demos
• downloads, like PDFs
• discounts
• event advertising

Facebook users will then see lead ads in different site areas, including news feeds, Messenger, and even articles.

 

How Facebook Lead Ads Work

Facebook lead ads work in much the same way as other advertising. You can create your adverts by going to Facebook’s Ads Manager.

Once there, you establish your budget while adding your descriptions, images/videos, and other design elements for a successful ad. You can also customize your ad by using specified interests or demographics to target your ideal audience.

Ads then get shown in users’ feeds, where they can respond to your offer, helping your ability to generate more leads.

From a user’s perspective, Facebook Lead Ads don’t look different from other link ads. Once clicked, they take the Facebook user to a form rather than a website, like in the example below.

When creating the Facebook lead ad form, you get to decide what information you’d like to ask for. Aside from the pre-filled data, you can also select from a list of custom questions types such as:

• multiple choice
• short answer
• store locator
• conditional
• appointment request

 

Benefits of Facebook Lead Ads

The most obvious benefit of Facebook lead ads is that they give prospects an easy way to provide their information—especially if you choose the pre-fill option—allowing you to collect leads in a more efficient and straightforward way.

As for marketer and small business owner benefits, you can customize questions for your forms, have a better chance at increasing conversions, and access a mix of new lead generation campaigns.

Some other significant benefits of Facebook lead ads are:

• targeted audience segmentation
• easy data collection
• mobile responsiveness
• a better understanding of your customers

As you can see, you’ve got plenty of reasons to explore these ads and get to know how they may work for you in your business.

 

Why Should Marketers and Small Businesses Use Facebook Lead Ads?

The reality is marketers and small business owners are busy and can’t be everywhere at once, even if you might want to be.

That means you need to focus your marketing efforts on maximizing success.

That’s why it makes sense to use tools like form-driven ads to capture leads efficiently and dynamically (without too much effort and time commitment on your part).

You can use Facebook lead ads in any number of ways, including:

• finding prospects for your products/services
• gathering subscriber details for newsletters
• gaining insights into consumers behaviors
• encouraging people to sign up for courses and events

 

Facebook Lead Ads Best Practices

There are plenty of ways to make the most of your Facebook lead ads. Let’s start with the basics.

A few best practices include:

• ensure your ads are in line with your business goals
• make sure your ad messaging is consistent with your brand
• create a clear and effective call to action (CTA)
• use CTAs that speak to your specific audience
• keep the ads simple
• spell out the benefits

Facebook has a heap of helpful suggestions too. These include:

• Decide on the right budget and use ad scheduling.
• Create lookalike audiences to help find your ideal customers.
• Reach previous prospects with the Engagement Custom Audience feature.
• Run ads on both Facebook and Instagram.
• Add an engaging image/video.

Just a quick note: it’s definitely worth reading up on Facebook-published articles for a wealth of tips on increasing conversions from Instant Forms.

Before moving on, here are a few more things to consider:

• Find the right leads: By pairing Facebook lead ads with the platform’s audience selection and optimization tools, you can reach the right audience at the right time every time.
• Ask the right questions: Only you know what information you’re looking for from your audience. Ask the most important questions up top to ensure that you get the information you’re angling for.
• Integrate your CRM: Rather than losing your leads, you can integrate Facebook lead ads directly with your CRM, allowing your system to immediately reach out to interested parties.

Now you know what makes a great ad, let us look at some examples.

 

Examples of Great Facebook Lead Ads

Many brands in different niches are using Facebook lead ads to their advantage and, as you can see from the following examples, there’s a ton you can learn from them.

Let’s start with the Wealth Factory.

The Wealth Factory

Let’s face it. If someone is going to click on a link, they want to know what’s in it for them. When the benefits are clear, and they can see what they gain from clicking through, they are more likely to take that extra step.

That’s what The Wealth Factory does so well with its Facebook lead ads. The free PDF details the IRS’s tax benefits and lists 32 jobs that your child can do to help you in your business.

As you can see from the ad, the benefits include a sizable tax-free income for your child and a tax deduction for you as a business owner.

To find out more, Facebook users complete the super-short form and click send. It doesn’t get much easier than that.

This is an approach you can adapt for your campaigns.

Make the benefits clear and bullet point them, so people see at a glance what they’re set to gain, and you can encourage Facebook users to click through with a clear CTA.

 

Boux Avenue

Another proven technique guaranteed to inspire consumers to spring into action is offering a discount. After all, who doesn’t love a bargain?

That’s what Boux Avenue does with its Facebook lead ads form. Like the Wealth Factory, it’s very clear about the benefits of signing up (a 20 percent discount and a regular newsletter).

To make the decision even easier, Boux Avenue makes signing up a snap with pre-filled information and a CTA button.

Offering a discount is something most businesses can do, and by simplifying form completion, you’re increasing the chances of prospects clicking. Bear that in mind with your ads, and add a time limitation to discounts to create urgency.

 

How to Set Up Facebook Lead Ads

Creating Facebook lead ads involves some basic preparation.

First, Facebook advises businesses to familiarize themselves with the terms of service and its advertising policies. If you want to list some questions on your form, Facebook suggests you ask your legal team to look them over first.

Then there’s just one more bit of prep: you need the link for your privacy policy as it will appear on the form.

With all that done, you’re ready to start creating your first ad. It’s simple to do. Just follow these steps:

Creating a Successful Facebook Lead Ad

1. Log into your Facebook business account and click on “Publishing Tools.”
2. Go to the “Forms Library” on the left-hand side of the page and click.
3. Next, click “+Create”.
4. Select “New Form” or “Duplicate” if you already have a form.
5. Go to the “Create Form” window and fill out the “Form Name” box.
6. Now, go to the “Form Type” field and select which form you’d like. There are two choices: Selecting “More Volume” lets you make accessible fillable forms suitable for mobile users. While setting “Higher Intent” allows users to review and confirm their details first.
7. Next, go to the “Intro” section and create an introduction screen. Facebook has details on how to complete this stage. Here, you can add your images, headlines, and descriptions about your products/services.
8. Go to “Questions” and choose + “Add Question.” Facebook lets you list up to 15.
9. Next, move to the “Prefill Questions Section.” Fill out the description and explain how you intend to use or share the information people give you. Remember, you can’t use the info you gather for any other purpose other than the one you state.
10. Select any pre-filled information you want for your form. Select categories by clicking “+ Add Category.”
11. Go to “Privacy” and include your link text and the URL to the “Privacy Policy” box. You can also add a custom disclaimer by clicking “+Add Custom Disclaimer.”
12. Move to “Completion.” Put in your headline, descriptions, CTA button, and add a link. You can include up to 60 characters for Headlines and CTAs.
13. Click on the arrows on the top of “Form Preview.”
14. Select “Publish” or “Save Draft” if you want to edit later. Ensure all your details are as you want them because you cannot edit your Instant Form once you’ve published it.
15. Choose “Boost” to send out your form as an ad. Select your image/video, text, audience, length of publication, and budget.
16. Click “Promote.”
17. Congratulations! You’ve just created your first Facebook lead ad.

 

Frequently Asked Questions About Facebook Lead Ads

 

Conclusion: Facebook Lead Ads

Facebook has a massive reach, which is why it makes sense for marketers and business owners to explore the available tools to get your products and services in front of a considerable audience. One of those tools is Facebook lead ads.

With the ability to create custom leads, Facebook lead ads provide significant advantages to advertisers.

Marketers can customize form fields, capture more prospect information, and target more relevant audiences while making the experience as simple as possible for users.

Aside from customization, Facebook lead ads offer many other advantages including increased conversions and getting a better understanding of your customers—making them an important part of any lead generation strategy.

Do you use Facebook lead ads? How are they working for you?

Source: neilpatel.com

What Are Performance Max Campaigns?

Do you wish you could spend less time managing your paid ads campaign while driving the same, if not more, conversions? Then you’re in luck. Your Google Fairy Godmother is here to make that dream come true.

Enter Performance Max campaigns, which use AI and machine learning to improve your advertising strategy and offer a hands-off approach to winning with PPC.

Excited? Well, here’s everything you need to know about Performance Max campaigns, when to use them, and how to create your own.

 

Performance Max Campaigns: What Are They?

Google first introduced Performance Max campaigns at its Google Marketing Livestream event in May 2021.

Performance Max campaigns are the first fully automated ad campaign of their kind. Unlike traditional Google Ad campaigns, Google automates the targeting and delivery of Performance Max campaigns based on the information you provide.

All advertisers need to do is provide a series of ad creatives (a call to action, additional ad copy, and relevant images or videos), and Google takes care of the rest.

It also stands apart from anything else currently on offer by allowing you to access all of Google’s ad inventory from one lone campaign. YouTube, Search, Display, Gmail, Google will run and test creatives on every channel to meet your goals.

In short, you get access to Google’s entire inventory of ad space and a fully automated ad campaign with as little effort as possible.

 

Who and When Should You Use Performance Max Campaigns?

The great thing about Performance Max campaigns is that they use all of Google’s ad inventory, you can use them for pretty much any kind of campaign.

That doesn’t mean Performance Max campaigns will be everyone’s cup of tea, however. PPC experts who can eke out a lot more revenue by optimizing every facet of a campaign probably won’t enjoy the set-and-forget nature of Performance Max campaigns.

However, it makes the campaigns perfect for small and medium-sized business owners who don’t have much time or a dedicated team to run campaigns.

Performance Max campaigns are also perfect if you:

• don’t have the time or knowledge to optimize your own campaigns
• want good ad performance but don’t want to pay for a PPC agency
• don’t have the necessary budget to target all of Google’s ad inventory individually
• have a large budget and want to discover new angles that result from these campaigns
• want to optimize the performance of your campaigns but don’t care which channels your ads appear on
• want to simplify your PPC advertising with a single campaign

As for which industries are best served by these ads, it’s a little difficult to tell given how new they are. Whether you’re an e-commerce store, a physical retailer, a SaaS brand, or a B2B company, I’d recommend trying them out.

Pretty much any industry can have success with Performance Max campaigns. Just make sure to set specific goals when launching your campaign.

By that, I mean focus ads on a specific product or offer, rather than your brand as a whole. Awareness campaigns aren’t as likely to see results with Performance Max advertising.

 

What Are the Main Advantages of a Performance Max Campaign?

Not sure if these new ads are the right choice for your brand? Let’s take a look at the advantages.

Focus on Goals

The major benefit of Performance Max is the goal-focused nature of campaigns. The primary target for Google’s campaign optimizations is to meet the goal you set at the start of the campaign.

If you have a very specific goal, like acquiring trial customers for your new product, Performance Max campaigns are a great way to drive conversion.

 

Hands-Off Ad Optimization and Creation

Another of the biggest advantages of Performance Max campaigns is the hands-off approach that advertisers can take with their PPC campaigns. Once you’ve set the campaign up (which is incredibly quick and easy, as you’ll see below), there’s not a lot more to do.

Setting up and managing the campaign is much faster, too. There’s no need to design your creatives with Performance Max campaigns, just provide Google with all of the individual assets, and it creates ads on your behalf.

You don’t need to spend time selecting which networks to run, and there’s no need to tweak the campaign while it’s life, either. Google does it all for you.

How you spend the time you save is up to you. Some business owners will focus on optimizing their business as a whole, but you could also choose to spend time optimizing your ad creatives (the one element of Performance Max campaigns you do control) to boost the campaign performance even more.

 

Access to More Ad Inventory

Getting access to all of Google’s inventory in one campaign is another major benefit. Before Performance Max campaigns, the barrier to entry for creating a campaign that leverages all of Google’s ad inventory would have been incredibly high. Only the biggest spending marketers would have been able to do it.

Performance Max campaigns democratize access to Google’s ad inventory in a way that we’ve never seen before and give everyone the chance to advertise across Google’s entire ad ecosystem.

Not only is this a great way to quickly reach new customer segments, but it’s also a great way to generate more PPC data you can use to inform new campaigns in the future. Who knows, you may discover an audience segment and ad inventory combination that converts like a dream.

 

Save Money On Marketing Costs

You don’t need to be a PPC expert to run these campaigns, either. There’s no need to guess manual testing, bidding strategies, or which ad inventory will deliver the best results.

Of course, some business owners who have experience with PPC advertising may not relish relinquishing control in this manner, but it may still be profitable to experiment with Max Performance campaigns to see the kind of results it can deliver.

If it does work, you won’t need to worry about spending time managing their own campaigns, no matter how experienced they are with PPC campaigns.

 

Drawbacks of Performance Max Campaigns

If there’s one drawback of using Performance Max campaigns it’s reporting—an issue raised during the Google Marketing Livestream conference.

Google announced advertisers had raised issues with reporting transparency, but the search giant is taking steps to improve this feature. Reports are still limited as of writing, but this may improve in the future.

 

A Google Performance Max Campaign Case Study

Naturally, Google has been quick to share the positive results companies have seen from its new campaign format. This has primarily been through a case study. It was published with consumer loan provider MoneyMe.

The company, which was looking to rapidly increase its customer base, worked with Australian agency Sparro to launch Performance Max campaigns. The goal of the campaign was to drive newly funded loans for the company’s feature product, personal loans.

They started by maximizing conversions to find a baseline CPA target before switching to a target CPA strategy to boost the profitability of campaigns.

The results are impressive. Performance Max campaigns helped MoneyMe increase conversions by 22 percent and drive more than $800,000 in revenue from new loans. They also managed to reduce their CPA by 20 percent, too.

How to Create a Performance Max Campaign

Google is currently beta testing Performance Max Campaigns. You’ll need to enquire using this form to launch a campaign as soon as possible. You’ll also need to have Google Ads Conversion Tracking implemented on your site.

Once you’ve done both, follow the instructions below.

 

Step 1: Set a Goal

The first step in creating a Performance Max campaign is to set a goal. This could be online sales, lead generation, or offline sales.

 

Step 2: Set a Budget and Bidding Strategy

Next, set a budget and a bidding strategy. You can choose to maximize conversion or spend, set a maximum CPA, or set a target cost or conversion.

 

Step 3: Create an Asset Group

As we have discussed above, this is not an ad. It’s a collection of assets Google will use to create static and dynamic ads depending on the ad placement.

In total, you’ll need to provide Google:

• 3 headline versions
• 2 ad description
• sone longer headline
• a 600×316 landscape image
• a 300×300 square image
• a 314×314 square image
• a 128×128 logo
• a 10-second-plus video for video ads

 

Step 4: Select a Target Audience (Optional)

If you want to give Google a little help getting started, you can select a target audience. Google will automatically show your ads to the users who are most likely to convert, but you can provide signals to help Google quickly find your ideal customers.

Of course, by doing this, you may miss out on finding a yet undiscovered audience segment.

 

Step 5: Add Extensions

These can either be existing site-level extensions or you can create your own site links for your Performance Max campaign. Helpfully, Google suggests creating specific formats depending on your campaign objectives, like adding a form extension if you want to acquire leads.

 

Performance Max Campaigns Frequently Asked Questions

 

Performance Max Campaigns Conclusion

You don’t have to be a PPC expert or hire a PPC marketing agency to drive leads and sales for your business. Google’s Performance Max campaigns take all the hard work out of creating an effective PPC campaign, so you can focus on your business while your ads drive conversions and, most importantly, positive ROI.

These campaigns may not be profitable straight away—just like any other PPC campaign strategy—but they may deliver solid results over time. They’re definitely worth testing.

Have you launched a Performance Max campaign yet? What were your results?

Source: neilpatel.com

How to Do Quarterly Ad Planning

Perhaps you have a yearly marketing plan that provides an overview of the year. This can be helpful in understanding your overall goals but is too vague to implement. That’s why a campaign plan with a narrower window—such as a quarter—is essential to marketing success.

A quarterly ad campaign plan provides a more granular view of your objectives, goals, and success. This will enable you to keep your priorities in line and respond accordingly to KPIs and metrics as results become available.

This in-depth guide provides actionable tips for successfully planning your quarterly ad campaign. By the end of this article, you will feel confident in your ability to create a thorough campaign plan you and your team can execute.

 

Review Last Quarter’s KPI and Metrics

The first step to future campaign planning is to look at the previous quarter’s performance. Using Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and metrics, you can gain a deeper understanding of the success of previous campaigns.

The KPIs can vary depending on the marketing campaign and its ultimate purpose, but a few KPIs to consider closely are:

• customer acquisition cost (CAC)
• customer lifetime value (LTV)
• return on investment (ROI)
• marketing qualified lead (MQL)
• traffic-to-lead ratio (new contact rate)
• lead-to-customer ratio
• return on ad spend (ROAS)
• conversion rate
• website traffic
• customer retention

This list is a healthy mix of short-term and long-term KPIs, which is crucial to agile marketing. You don’t need to include all of them in your quarterly business review. Instead, you should focus on one or two that most closely align with each of your objectives.

When choosing KPIs to track, ask yourself whether it is easily quantifiable and something you can influence. The more control you have over a KPI, the more valuable its inclusion in your performance tracking.

With the information above, you can make new quarterly campaign decisions based on what worked, what didn’t, and what ideas could have been better executed.

 

Set Campaign Goals and Metrics to Track

It’s not enough to create a plan. You should do so with specific goals in mind. However, setting marketing goals you can achieve requires an in-depth approach. I recommend the SMART method for goal setting. This stands for:

• specific
• measurable
• achievable
• relevant
• timebound

What does this look like for a marketing campaign?

Let’s say you’re running a campaign with the overall goal of bringing more qualified leads into your funnel. A SMART goal might look like this:

“Increase the number of MQL’s in our funnel by 8 percent by the end of Q3 via a targeted social media campaign.”

This goal hits all of the marks of a SMART goal by being specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and timebound. By the end of the campaign, you can easily answer yes or no on whether the goal was achieved. If not, you can reevaluate for the next quarter.

 

Evaluate Campaign Targeting

Your ad campaigns will only be as effective as the audience they reach. Identifying your target market is a crucial step in ensuring a successful quarterly campaign season.

You should first take a closer look at the data from your existing audience. This means digging in to further determine geography, age ranges, and lifestyle. How did your audience respond to the previous campaigns, and what can you do to improve those responses?

For example, did one segment of your audience interact with the campaign media but not convert? This indicates a surface-level interest. You should not abandon your efforts with this segment entirely but instead shift your objective to a higher level of the marketing funnel (e.g., attention or interest).

You may want to consider target audience expansion, too. Based on the previous quarter’s data, perhaps you found you were reaching demographics not previously on your radar. This would be a good time to reconsider the various segments of your target audience and add new ones if needed.

Fortunately, there are free tools like Google Analytics to help you further evaluate and segment your audience.

 

Decide Which Platforms to Use

The list of platforms is long and growing longer. The most popular platforms include Google, Facebook, Instagram, Bing, Amazon, and YouTube.

Before you choose which platforms to advertise with, though, you should first determine how many you will use.

With just one or two platforms, you can focus more intently on a more segmented part of your audience. This may result in a higher ROI. If your interest is more in testing various ad types and audience segments, though, then three, four, or even five platforms may be a good idea.

You should focus on quality as well as quantity. Each platform offers its own ad types, and using the right one for your audience is important. Google, for example, has eight different campaign types to choose from:

With so many platforms, you may feel compelled to spread your campaign budget across the spectrum. After all, doesn’t more platforms mean an increased reach? While true in theory, it’s more important to target the right audience.

 

Review Campaign Budget

You can make your ad campaigns effective, whether on a small or large budget. However, it’s essential to set the budget from the start so you can plan accordingly.

The different platforms will have different tips and tricks for budget optimization. Before you consider the specifics of your budget for each platform, though, you need to determine all-in advertising costs.

It helps to use a top-down approach. This means setting a maximum budget for the quarter that includes all advertising costs. You can then split the budget for each platform based on a few different factors, such as:

• previous platform success
• target market share
• ad type and opportunity

Even further, you can split the platform budget into per-advertisement costs. For example, spending more per day on a sale campaign can make more sense if the ROI is expected to be higher.

 

Outline Campaign Messages and Offers

While you don’t need to have all of the copy and digital assets completed before the quarter, you should have a solid idea of the campaign messages and offers. This outline will act as your framework for the work to come.

The outline can be a simple list of dates with corresponding messages and offers, or it can be baked into your workflow. The most important thing is to answer these three questions:

• Who is the target audience?
• What is the purpose of the advertisement?
• On what platform will this advertisement be displayed?

The more detailed your campaign messages and offers are at the outset, the easier it will be to plan your workflow. It also takes a lot of guesswork out of the process so the campaign goal is clear for all members of the marketing team.

The drawback of being too detailed is the plan can feel a bit rigid. You should discuss internally just how detailed you want to get at the beginning of the quarter. Your team may prefer to flow a bit more freely, or they may prefer to have the campaigns locked in place 90 days in advance.

You can easily enter campaign details into a spreadsheet or word document. There are also more detailed campaign offer templates for those who prefer them.

 

Create Asset Production Workflow

At the beginning of the quarter, the list of work to be done can be long and overwhelming. It’s at this point that establishing an effective workflow is crucial to future campaign success.

An asset production workflow ensures campaign assets (including copy, images, videos, and other digital elements) are completed on time. A good workflow ensures team collaboration and clear communication.

The workflow will vary depending on the type of asset and the number of collaborators. The basic steps of creative production include ideation, creation, review, approval, and launch.

You can manage these steps in a spreadsheet, though many project management platforms exist. These platforms often offer templates to spark your creativity.

Platforms like Trello and Asana enable you to create a seamless workflow. You can add multiple collaborators to each board, as well as use deadlines, checklists, and triggers to keep on task. These platforms help you focus more thoroughly on the process and less so on process management.

 

Create a Campaign Testing Plan

Testing your campaigns on an ongoing basis is important to future marketing optimization. The results of campaign testing provide insight into your target audience so you can better refine your marketing campaigns.

With this in mind, it’s important to include campaign testing within your overall campaign planning. This ensures assets are created early in the process and properly vetted.

A few examples of campaign tests include:

• target audience
• budget
• time of week and day
• calls to action (CTAs)
• word order
• power words in headlines

It can be tempting to perform campaign testing off-the-cuff. However, it’s best to plan for these tests at the outset and include them in your asset workflow. You can use the results of these tests going forward.

 

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) About Ad Campaign Planning

If you still have questions about ad campaign planning, take a look at the answers to these frequently asked questions on the topic.

 

Quarterly Ad Campaign Planning Conclusion

When you transition to quarterly ad campaign planning, you will feel more confident in your ability to carry out and evaluate your marketing goals.

This is true whether you are transitioning from an annual campaign plan, which can be too vague, or a weekly campaign plan, which can be too granular.

A quarterly campaign plan enables you to break down your goals, objectives, and budget into bite-sized chunks. This cuts down on the overwhelm while also providing flexibility.

More importantly, the 90-day window a quarterly campaign plan includes is just enough time to flawlessly execute while also evaluating your success along the way.

This agile framework enables you to respond accordingly to the results of your campaign so you can become proactive.

What objectives do you want to highlight with your next quarterly ad campaign plan?

Source: feedproxy.google.com

Ad Secrets From Big Brands That You Can Copy to Sell More [Free Webinar]

 

Are you struggling to scale up your paid ads?

Or even worse, are you struggling to get them working?

You see all these big companies running tons of ads, some even are spending millions of dollars… if they can make it work, you can too, right?

Well, today at 9 am PST I am hosting a webinar that breaks down the ad secrets from the big brands that you can copy to sell more.

So, make sure you register, it’s free.

What will you learn?

At our agency, NP Digital we’ve worked with companies of all sizes… large and small.

And we’ve learned a lot of cool, unique strategies that are typically only used by the bigger companies.

But what’s interesting is these strategies also work well for smaller brands that have smaller budgets… but they just tend not to use them.

Here are some of the specific things we will teach you:

• There are certain times of the year people will spend more, and it is easier to make more money from your ads during those times. (We will break down exactly when those times are.)
• How to combine ads with other marketing efforts to generate a better ROI. (We will show you those other efforts and how to implement them step-by-step.)
• How to leverage trends and benchmarks so you can make better decisions with your ads.
• Different mobile strategies you can use that work well. This is important because the majority of Internet users are coming from mobile devices.
• Tests you can run that has been effective in the past.

And the points I mentioned above are just scratching the surface. So make sure you register for the free webinar.

Conclusion

I hope to see you at the webinar.

I know I mainly discuss SEO, which is a great marketing channel, but you should also consider leveraging paid ads.

With paid ads, you can scale faster and see results quicker.

It takes some time to get paid ads going correctly, but hey that’s what today’s webinar is all about.

And whether you are spending little to no money on ads or millions, there will be strategies and tactics that will benefit you.

So, make sure you register.

I look forward to seeing you today.

PS: If you just want my team to implement these hacks and manage your ads, go here.

Source: neilpatel.com

How to Use Google Discovery Ads

 

Google discovery ads are changing the game by implementing a more powerful AI to take a lot of the guesswork out of paid advertising on Google.

Instead of manually optimizing your ads over time, Google AI will take care of it for you using its massive amounts of data.

How?

That’s what we’re going to cover in this article.

If you’ve never tried Google discovery ads, now is the time to dive in with both feet and take them for a spin.

 

What Are Google Discovery Ads?

Discovery ads allow you to take advantage of the AI that Google has created to deliver the most accurate and interesting ads to the people who want them the most.

It’s essentially a newsfeed on the Google app that is catered directly to the user’s search intent.

In addition to being a standard “Google ad,” there’s also a visual aspect now.

Instead of a title tag, meta description, and slug, you’re also getting a vibrant image at the top of the display to help draw the attention of the user.

There’s one major difference here.

Instead of the ads being driven by a query, they’re driven by Google AI.

This means that the goal of the discovery ads page is to solve the user’s problem or answer their question before they even have to type anything into the search bar.

As the user engages more with the Google discovery page, the AI will pick up on their interests and provide a more accurate representation of what they want to know and what they’re looking for.

In the event that the discovery page isn’t accurate, you can toggle based on what you want or don’t want to see.

You can even break it down to exact keywords that you want to see less of.

Using the show “The Office” as an example, you can tell Google that you’re not interested in the specific story.

You can also say you’re not interested in anything to do with the keyword “The Office,” or you can ask Google to stop displaying content from the media source “NME.”

Either way, it puts you in the driver’s seat so you can gradually optimize the newsfeed to see more and more of what you want.

 

Benefits of Google Discovery Ads

Let’s shift gears now to an advertiser standpoint. You understand the benefits to the user, but what about advertisers on Google?

The process of creating these ads is simple and effective.

Plus, just like for the user, the advertiser can take advantage of Google AI as well.

Running this ad to test out a new product or spread awareness of something makes the most sense.

The goal is for people to “discover” things they might not have known or seen before.

Since Google AI is deciding who to display the ad to, this is also great for retargeting.

As users see more and more of your ads, they’ll become more familiar with your brand, and that will build trust.

Here are some of the benefits of this ad type:

Farther reach with one campaign:

With one single campaign, you can reach up to three billion people per month.

This is because Google discovery ads don’t stop at the Google app.

You also advertise on the YouTube homepage, Watch Next, and the Gmail promotions and social tab.

Utilize more relevant advertising:

Google is taking the need for user intent out of your hands and putting it into its own.

The goal is to deliver the most meaningful and powerful content to the exact people who want it.

You don’t need to do your own research anymore to determine what is most relevant because Google AI can take care of it for you.

Drive engagement with visually rich ads:

The goal of Google discovery ads is for you to “discover” new things and take an interest in the information and content you find on Google.

One great way to do this is with visuals to spark interest and create action.

According to Google, 76 percent of people enjoy making unexpected discoveries while shopping.

That sounds about right!

Use automated bidding:

Choosing your bid is one of the most challenging aspects of managing your ad budget.

Google takes this out of your hands with maximized conversion bidding and target CPA to help optimize your campaign.

Many of us are putting a lot of trust in Google with this advertising, but what better person than Big G to handle it for us?

Advertise consistently:

One of the greatest features of Google discovery campaigns is the fact that your ad will almost always align with the people you reach. There’s no more testing or guessing.

Since 85 percent of people take action in 24 hours after discovering something, you’ll stay fresh in their mind if your ad continues to display.

 

3 Tips for Creating Great Google Discovery Ads

As with any type of digital marketing, be it SEO or paid ads, the right way and wrong way to do it aren’t so clear cut.

However, here are some helpful tips to get you closer to the right side of the scale:

Use your best images:

These are visual ads that demand high-quality photos and images.

You can’t expect anyone to want to click on a low-quality image or an obvious stock photo.

The image needs to also create interest and intrigue.

Limit text in images:

The goal of these images is not to give it all away so the user never clicks through.

By limiting text in the images and reserving all that space for imagery, you’re telling a story that will make them wonder what is happening on the other side.

Build trust right away:

Remember that most of the people that see these ads have no idea who you are or what your business is.

You’re meeting them for the first time, and like any other newsfeed, they can keep on scrolling pretty quickly.

You need to build trust, so use the text space to qualify yourself and tell them why they should click through.

 

Examples of Google Discovery Ads

Take a look at the Google discovery ad example below.

You’ll see a really interesting headline paired with an interesting image as well.

The image is of two men eating pizza while they both look at their laptops.

Plus, the headline and body text are both very interesting.

If I were applying for jobs or trying to get the career of my dreams, I might want to know what makes me look like a narcissist in my resume.

That said, I’m not looking for a job, so this is actually a situation where the ad doesn’t apply to me.

One great thing about Google discovery is that you can optimize it.

Right above the image, it asks you if the card is useful.

In this case, it’s not, so I would want to get rid of that ad and not see ones that are similar, even though it’s an interesting topic.

The next example is one from the YouTube homepage, advertising health supplements.

My favorite thing about this ad is how direct and clear it is.

There’s nothing hiding behind this image.

It’s transparent, clear, and straight to the point, which is something that Google looks for in advertisers.

Once you tap through, you can shop for some of the new nootropics mentioned and enter the promo code.

They even provide a bit of scarcity in the body text by telling you that the promotion runs out on Saturday.

 

How to Create Google Discovery Ads

Before we dive into the actual steps you’ll take, there are some things you’ll need to get together first.

Make sure you have many different headlines, descriptions, images, and logos because Google AI will play around with these for you to determine what converts the best.

Be sure that the images are extremely high-quality and optimized properly for mobile use.

You’ll also want to test out a variety of messaging based on whatever it is you’re selling.

Enabling sitewide tagging and conversion tracking are the final pieces.

These make sure your ads are eligible for conversions and help you keep track of every hit you get.

 

1. Set Up the Campaign

To get started, sign in to your Google Ads account and click the Campaigns tab on the left.

Click the Plus button and select a new campaign.

You’ll need to choose an objective such as website traffic, leads, or sales.

You can also select “no goal,” but I recommend choosing one because it will give Google a better idea of what you want to accomplish.

Select the discovery campaign type of either a single image ad, carousel, or both, and then click continue.

From there, you’ll choose your demographic and target language, as well as a variety of other audience information.

Once you’ve done that, you’ll set up your daily budget and bidding strategy. Save and continue.

 

2. Set Up Single-Image Ad

If you’re using a single-image ad like many of the examples featured above, you’ll want to go to your discovery ad and click “Ads and Extensions” from the left panel.

Click the Plus button, choose the discovery ad, and then enter all the variable information.

Some of these include:

• headline
• description
• images
• business name
• logos
• URL
• call-to-action text 

None of this is out of the ordinary, but I have plenty of resources available to help you write the best headlines and descriptions.

 

3. Set Up Carousel Ad

If you’re using a carousel ad, you’ll follow a lot of the same steps by going to ads and extensions, but you’ll choose “discovery carousel ad” this time.

For this one, you’ll need to choose somewhere between two and ten different card images.

They each have their own unique shape and size requirements, so you’ll want to pay attention when doing this.

With carousel ads, you can also choose two different URLs: one for mobile and one for desktop.

 

4. Allow Ramp-Up Time

When you have all your assets and messaging together, you need to give the campaigns a little time.

Set the budget for high volume but realize no matter what your budget is, it will take some time for Google to identify your ideal user.

Be sure you have enough budget for at least two weeks and wait to see at least 40 conversions before making any adjustments.

The good news is, Google AI handles a lot of that for you here, and you shouldn’t often have to make adjustments unless you entirely missed the mark with your advertising copy and images.

 

5. Use Automatic Targeting

By choosing automatic targeting, you’re letting Google discovery decide for you how you want to display the ads and who you want them to go to.

To do this, you need to go into your discovery ads panel and choose audiences from the navigation menu.

Click the pencil and choose Edit Ad Group Targeting.

Here you can choose how far you want Google to expand your audience.

When you’re satisfied, click Save.

 

Google Discovery Ads FAQs

I’ve answered the question, “What is Google Discovery?”

Now, let’s take a look at some of the other most frequently asked questions.

 

How Much Do Google Discovery Ads Cost?

Google Discovery works with cost per view (CPV), so that’s how you’ll pay for your ads.

A view is counted when someone interacts with your ad.

In the case of a video ad, the view is counted when someone watches at least 30 seconds of your ad.

The average CPA for Google Ads discovery campaigns is about $12, so it’s a great way for businesses and marketers with small budgets to get started in paid advertising.

Where Do Google Discovery Ads Appear?

Google discovery ads appear on the Google app homepage, YouTube homepage, Watch Next feed, and Gmail promotions and social tabs.

What Does a Google Discovery Ad Look Like?

A Google discovery ad looks different based on its location. The example below is from the Google discovery newsfeed in the app.

 

How Are Google Discovery Ads Different From Google’s Other Ad Types?

There are two main differences.

First, Google AI takes control of a lot of things for you.

The AI plays around with your headlines, images, and messaging to determine what converts the best.

You don’t have to manually do it if you don’t want to.

 Second, these ads are more visual than most Google ads.

Instead of just having text, you can display a high-quality image to go along with it.

 

Google Discovery Conclusion: Discover Your Potential

Google discovery ads are a great way to take advantage of everything Google has to offer.

It’s offered a way to make advertising even easier with the implementation of AI.

I expect to see more of this happening with search ads as well as display ads.

Have you tested out Google discovery ads yet?

What has your experience been?

Source: neilpatel.com

The First Step in Creating Video Ads That Sell

If you’ve been spending a little extra time on YouTube lately (we’re just as guilty as you are), you may have noticed a few really good video ads that made you think, “I kinda want to buy that.”

As business owners and marketers, we’re a hard sell.

If one of Superman’s superpowers is X-ray vision—ours is seeing right through lead magnets and funnels.

We’ll happily buy products and services that make our life easier…but you’re going to have to really sell it right.

That’s why these video ads that stop us in our tracks (even when all we wanted to do was watch our chosen video) make us extraaa impressed.

What did they do that was so good?

When a video ad can show us what our lives are like before and after we use the product or service, that’s when our ears perk up.

It all comes back to take us from our Before State (pre-product) to our After State, (post-product).

 

How to Figure Out Your Audience’s Before State

At DigitalMarketer, we call the state that somebody was in prior to buying your product/service the Before State.

This is the state where somebody wants a solution so much that they’re daydreaming all day about it.

This Before State describes the problem that somebody is facing, so you can figure out the solution they’re looking for.

When you see a video ad that makes you think—” That’s exactly the problem that I’m having!

And wait… that’s also the solution I’m looking for!” This is what the video ad did.

It described your problem and showed you the solution.

And that’s how Billy Gene is creating video ads that sell.

In his The Pain Process Worksheet, he figures out who he’s targeting, their 3 greatest paints, and the solution to each of these pain points.

Here’s Billy Gene’s Pain Process Worksheet:

(NOTE: Download the worksheet for FREE here!)

To figure out your audience’s Before State and the problems that they’re facing, you want to ask questions like:

• What problem do they have?
• How does it make them feel?
• What’s their average day look like with this problem?

Once you’ve figured out the problem, then you can figure out the solution to that problem.

 

How to Figure Out Their After State

Now that we know the problem that our customer avatar is facing without our product or service, we can build the bridge between the problem and the solution.

When this problem goes away—how does their life improve?

For each of the 3 problems that you listed in the left-hand column of Billy Gene’s Pain Process Worksheet, you’ll write the correlating solution in the right-hand column.

This solution is going to be the change this customer wants in their life from buying a product or service.

To figure out what this solution looks like, ask yourself questions like:

• What does my customer have now that they’re using my product or service?
• How do they feel now that they don’t have this pain anymore?
• What does their average day look like without this pain point?

And now, we can bring it all together.

When you’re making your video ad, this is the starting point to making sure that your ad relates to and interests your customer avatar.

By speaking to their pain points you show how well you know the struggle they’re going through.

By finding what it would be like to have that pain point relief, you show them why they should take you up on your offer.

For every customer that you have, fill out The Pain Process Worksheet so you know that your video ads are going to sell. Remember, define their problem and connect it to the solution.

That way you can create video ads that impress even expert marketers.

The post The First Step in Creating Video Ads That Sell appeared first on DigitalMarketer.

Source: digitalmarketer.com