When your day-to-day is all about getting those numbers under targets, it’s easy to get mired in ongoing improvements and ignore quick wins. Your creative can be one such victory. Tweak your creative strategy in just the right way and follow a few Facebook ads best practices, and watch what happens to your monthly metrics.
1. Establish the Messaging
First off, determine the message. You know your brand and product better than anyone, but how do you effectively communicate these to a purchasing public?
A great first step is to clearly define your brand and product. Who are you? What does your product do? Why should people care? Communicate the importance of your brand through tone of voice and profile targeting, and apply this to your creatives. How does the image reflect brand and product values?
If you need inspiration, look to the industry. Your competitors are doing similar things, so take a peek at their ads. (You should be doing this anyway for competitive intelligence.)
Always remember to tell a story, make it interactive, and experiment.
2. Get the Specs Right
Next, make sure the images are the right format for your objective and ad type. It may sound like a no-brainer that you should avoid any image being squeezed or distorted, but make sure you’ve done your homework.
To this end, be sure to reference Facebook’s ad guide any time you’re communicating an image request to design team. This will go far in saving time before ad creation, and you avoid resizing an image or hounding your designers about format changes.
So, you have the right size and format for your ads. Now, how do you capture the attention of the more than one billion people visiting Facebook every day?
3. Hone Your Ad Creative and Copy
Consider this a checklist you can use to implement the above four-pronged strategy.
Think Brand
Identify your brand’s unique point of view. Use brand colors, relevant icons, and your logo to engage your audience. For ad copy, use your brand’s unique tone of voice, keeping things clear and concise.
Tell a Story
Introduce a character, preferably someone representing your customer. Feature the character in all imagery to build a story over time. Show that she’s enjoying the experience, so that others will, too. Create a storyline—a visual treatment that persists through all of the ad campaign’s content.
Align the ad copy with this story. You may want to include perks and comments on the user experience, or examples of customer wins.
Make it Interactive
Use cinemagraphs and different visual formats. Ask questions—create a dialogue with targeted audience. You can also include games, apps, and contests, inviting people to join your community and interact with your brand.
via GIPHY
Experiment
Some funky things you may want to try (remember to keep it simple):
- Patterns
- The character in different poses and formats, or in a poster
- Unique colors and lighting schemes
- A different perspective (high angle, low angle, etc.)
4. Experiment with Ad Types and Formats
Facebook has plenty of ad types you can use to drive attention and help you accomplish your goals. Here are further ideas for video and carousel formats.
Video Ads
Video ads are a great way to jumpstart your branding activity and boost your direct response campaigns.
TipHow to Nail ItConsider the Mobile Feed
- Design for a sound-off experience
- Start with something captivating
- Feature your brand in the first 4 seconds
Go deeper into the silence
(sound-off)
- Tell the story visually
- Use text and graphics
- Use captions (see Facebook’s caption tool)
Frame it
- Explore different thumbnail images
- Highlight key elements of the video
Experiment
- Make it quick and snappy
- Short as it can be, long as it needs to be
- Test, measure, and learn
Carousel Ads
Carousel ads allow you to show multiple images and links. You can use this ad type to drive demand and move leads down the funnel.
TipHow to Nail ItFeature different productsUse one image on each cardTell a storyDepict a process
Show a workflow in a series of stepsUse a panoramic imageUse one image, split into a few cards
Everything a Channel Has to Offer
Remember, Facebook is a channel that ultimately combats boredom. By personalizing every impression, you bring your brand, its story, and the interactive user experience fun. And, when you experiment and frequently try new things, you make it memorable.
[1] Note: about 95% of Facebook users view videos with no sound.
