Facebook Ads vs YouTube Ads – Which One Should You Use with Andrea Vahl
Timestamps
00:30 – Episode & Guest Overview
02:19 – Advantages of Facebook Ads in Terms of Targeting
04:08 – Targeting Your Competitors’ Fan Pages
05:00 – Impact of the Recent iOS 14 Update with Targeting
08:08 – Best Targeting that Works on Facebook
11:00 – Keyword Targeting in YouTube
20:08 – Creatives: Facebook Ads vs YouTube Ads
21:47 – Image Ads vs. Video Ads
23:05 – Ideal Video Ad That Works
25:58 – Difference Between Facebook and YouTube Ads in Terms of Videos
30:15 – Thoughts on Dynamic Ads on Facebook
31:53 – Working Through Facebook’s Issue In Split Testing Dynamic Ads
33:31 – Long Copy vs. Short Copy in Facebook Ads
38:04 – Offers that Works in Facebook
41:25 – Running Ads on Live Webinars & Automatic Webinars
48:53 – Learn More About Andrea Vahl
Episode & Guest Overview
Ilana:
Whoo! Alrighty, so let’s get stuck in and let’s talk about what I’ve kind of prior to hitting record, I did think about, I’m a bit of a big picture person. And I really think that success with advertising, regardless of what platform regardless really of what you’re selling hinges on three really cool components.
And that is the first is targeting, like how you’re choosing to get in front of people. The second is the creative. So what ad you’re showing people, and the third is your offer. So I thought it might be interesting to break down our episode into those three core components, and go through, as I said, the pros and cons of each of those components for Facebook versus YouTube, and we can really battle it out. Yeah.
Andrea Vahl:
I’m ready!
Advantages of Facebook Ads in Terms of Targeting
Ilana:
Alright, so let’s start with targeting, you know, what would you say are some of the advantages that Facebook Ads with its targeting?
Andrea Vahl:
I think that one of the challenges with Facebook targeting is that I feel like there’s not as many keywords that you can pull from there’s, there’s some limitations there.
But you know, Facebook has a lot of data. And they can, you know, you can also use a lot of the data that you have available to you such as seed audiences for look-alikes. That can be really good targeting, they have lots of different options for kind of expanding your audience in different ways.
There are, you know, there are some cool targeting things that they have like job titles and interests, and you can target fan pages and you know, fans have certain pages, if that’s available.
So there are some great options within Facebook. I think that one thing Facebook does really well is you have that combination of optimizing around your goal with pixel data, combined with targeting and and really kind of learning how to get the best results for you.
Ilana:
You mentioned targeting fan pages. And I know one of the questions I personally get asked all the time is, can I target my competitors’ fanpage?
And or I’ve tried, for example, to target my competitors’ fan page, and I can’t seem to do it. Do you know, you know, what is that cutoff point that makes a fan page eligible to be targeted versus not?
Targeting Your Competitors’ Fan Pages
Yeah, that’s the biggest question. And no one really knows that. In fact, you know, I find in general, sometimes it seems to be around 50,000 fans, but sometimes I’ve seen fan pages that are, you know, 100,000 or larger, that don’t come up in that detailed targeting area.
And that’s where you need to put the keywords for your targeting in that detailed targeting section at the ad set level. And you start typing and if there’s a match if you know, you can target that. The fans of that other page.
I’ve but I’ve also found very small pages that are available sometimes fan pages that have just 5,000 or 10,000 people that come up in the targeting options, so there’s sometimes no rhyme or reason to it, but it’s yeah, you just have to type and hope.
Impact of the Recent iOS 14 Update with Targeting
Ilana:
Fair enough. And in light of the recent Apple iOS update, in terms of targeting, because you mentioned that Facebook has a huge amount of data at its disposal to use the targeting, yeah, do you have any sort of inclination as to the effect that will have on the targeting?
Andrea Vahl:
Well, the the effect from the iOS option, or the iOS change isn’t going to really come in the keyword targeting that you use, it’s really going to come with things like when they’re using look alike audiences of lead data that you have, because that lead data is in front of the pixel is going to start falling off as the iOS blocks that those pixels from tracking.
And so now your look alike, audiences might get a little, you know, become a little different because of that. I mean, it kind of remains to be seen if that’s going to really have a big effect or not in look-alike audiences.
The big thing is really going to be in the tracking piece of it, whether or not you’re tracking that you’re getting leads or purchases or things like that. But in the targeting piece, it’s not going to come into play as much, I think.
Ilana:
But what about a situation where somebody might opt out of being tracked? And then as you say, obviously, the tracking is affected. But as a result of that they are no longer being tracked in terms of what they click on, what they like and what they don’t like, a byproduct of that could be in terms of your targeting even for cold traffic, right?
Andrea Vahl:
Yeah, yeah, that’s true. That is true. And like, right, and, you know, it’ll definitely affect your retargeting because that’s using that pixel data. But if they’re opting out of that tracking with the pixel data, then you know, you’re not going to that is very possible.
Ilana:
So yeah, I guess it’s a big unknown. Yeah. What would you say in your experience…..
Andrea Vahl:
Let’s also bring back, let’s just bring back is going head to head here.
Ilana:
Sure!
Andrea Vahl:
You know, I want to bring up that YouTube is also going to have the issue with tracking and there’s been a lot of attention around the Facebook tracking with the iOS update, but that’s really affecting all platforms 100%.
Ilana:
Yes, Facebook is definitely getting a lot of attention with this. But I think this is just going to affect multiple platforms. And yeah, and yeah, the abilities there across all platforms, really.
Andrea Vahl:
Right. There’s a lot of people thinking that, oh, if I just switch to YouTube ads, I won’t have the iOS problem. But it’s going to happen. If people are, you know, in several ways. So…
Ilana:
Yeah, look, I mean, as an advertiser, like yourself, we’re still very much discovering the true impact of this. And it’s still, you know, we’re waiting for the dust to settle to real Yeah, we’ll look at the data and see where, where it ends up.
Best Targeting that Works on Facebook
I wanted to ask you in terms of targeting, and then I’ll sort of go into the differences of targeting and success that I have with YouTube, but what some of the best targeting that you find works really well for either your clients or your students on Facebook.
Andrea Vahl:
Yeah, so it really does depend on the industry. So some of the clients that I work with in the b2b space can have really good luck with targeting by job titles.
So if you are in b2b, and you know that you are trying to target the owners or the executives or directors, if you know the specific job titles of the people who buy your product service or software, whatever it is, as a business to business product, then you can target by job titles and and you know, optimize around that.
If it’s more of a consumer product, you might target things that look like audiences of people who have added something to the cart or purchased your product in the past. And you can do different ranges of lookalike audiences of Add To Cart in the past 15 days or look alike of purchase in the past seven days.
So you can kind of create all these different audiences where Facebook is really very dynamic in how it’s finding those people for you.
So that can be those can be great audiences and then you can broaden the range and say, let’s find a wider look alike audience of 2% or 5%, or something like that of this small seed audience that’s super valuable.
Another valuable audience in b2b or b2c can be a lookalike audience or have a particular seed audience that’s valuable to you. So for example, if you have multiple buyers, maybe people have purchased multiple times from you, you create a look alike of that smaller audience. And you can really have some good value there.
But sometimes I’ve had good, I’ve had better out value with just, or better results with just targeting by General keywords like copywriting or people who are interested in blogging or something like that.
So it’s important to test all those and see what works.
Ilana:
Yeah. In my experience, actually, I find larger audiences seem to be working better these days than smaller ones. I think the algorithm kind of really lends itself to you finding the same thing.
Andrea Vahl:
Yeah, for sure. For sure, I found some, I used to never do a lookalike, like a 5%. Lookalike, that’s a wider audience. But now I’m finding some good results with that, because Facebook is able to learn the types of people who are opting into your ad or buying your products to feel like,
Ilana:
Alright, I might just talk a little bit about on the YouTube side, yeah, targeting.
So most people, I mean, I’ve heard the statistic that YouTube is the world’s second largest search engine. But what people don’t then make the realization of and the extension is that there’s a huge amount of intent that comes with it being a search engine, people actively go to YouTube, and type in something that they’re actively looking for.
And, you know, YouTube, or Google really have, they’re essentially a data company. And they’ve done a huge amount of research on YouTube and how people are using YouTube.
And there’s some crazy statistic that, I mean, we can only take it for face value and assume it’s true. But Google has said that 68% of people use YouTube to help make a purchase decision, like an e-commerce purchase decision, which is a pretty insane statistic I mean, maybe it’s not 68%. But even if it was 58%, or 40, that’s half the people.
So people go to YouTube to look at reviews, they want to see how to use the product. And so if you’re in e-commerce, and obvious, kind of, you know, it might be obvious for you to advertise for those types of queries and search terms.
Keyword Targeting in YouTube
Yeah, so actually, one of my favorite types of targeting on YouTube is the keyword targeting. And so targeting people who do actively go to YouTube and type in a search query.
Now, I do want to mention, though, it is very different to doing keyword targeting on the Search Network, which is on Google.com, where the text ads come up, it is very, very different.
And so it’s not an exact science with the keywords that you choose on YouTube, where you will kind of Google have kind of come out and said, like, let’s say for example, you know, so for example, I teach Google, I teach Google Ad training, right? So I do keyword targeting of YouTube for the people who type in Google Ad training, right?
That would be an obvious keyword for me. But the way it works is that if somebody types in Google Ad training, let’s say it, my ad might show up at some point in that session.
So they’re not necessarily going to show up at that moment. But if let’s say, you know, they start watching, they don’t, they don’t see my ad, and they click on organic results for you, YouTube. It’s a Google Ad training.
And then of course, they get distracted and start watching cat videos. My ad for my Google Ad training will still show up, because in that session, they have typed into YouTube, Google that training, because apparently, the average session duration for someone on YouTube is about 40 minutes.
Andrea Vahl:
Oh, my gosh!
Ilana:
So these are massively engaged people. And as we all can, I’m sure attest to, you know, you start watching one video and you know, 40 minutes later, you’re watching cat videos, you think, How did I end up here, right?
Andrea Vahl:
I know, I know!
Ilana:
So yeah, keyword targeting on YouTube is actually one of my favorite targeting options. And the other favorite way I also like to target is I like to target specific videos on YouTube, provided that that particular channel allows our Google ads. So that’s the big caveat.
So I might go to YouTube and type in the keyword myself “Google Ads training”, click on the first organic result. And if that video allows YouTube ads on there, I can just swipe in front of that audience and it’s a way of kind of me getting straight to the top of the YouTube search. And actually, we get really, really good good results with that strategy.
So keyword targeting and placement targeting on YouTube is killer. Yeah, but of course, like Facebook, you can very much target. Also the type of person somebody is in, which is what sort of, I guess called behavioral targeting, which is what Facebook is.
So it has both of those components. It’s got that intent based targeting, but it’s also got the identity based targeting of people who are, you know, interested in certain topics. Or in the market for certain types of things or some kind of person.
Andrea Vahl:
Yeah. Now YouTube doesn’t have the lookalikes do they?
Ilana:
They do, so they have called it a similar audience.
Andrea Vahl:
Oh, yeah. I am so deep into Facebook ads. And I just….
Ilana:
Hopefully, I’m going to introduce you in the world of Google. And I would say, though, that they’re similar audiences are not nearly as good as Facebook’s lookalike audiences.
And if you’re, you know, after watching this, head to head that we’re having you kind of are inspired and decide to test YouTube ads, I would start with either that keyword targeting or placement targeting as a real starting point, merely just to test if your creative and your offer works, which we’re going to get to next.
But it’s a really good way because let’s say you launch a campaign and it doesn’t work, which you and I know, happens all the time. Right?
The variable you’re going to have in your head is is this a problem with my targeting? Because it’s either one of three problems targeting creative, right?
By doing keyword targeting and placement targeting, you’ve eliminated the variable of is this a problem with my targeting because you know, because of the intent factor, you’ve gone to anyone who’s watching one of the organic videos on Google Ad training, I know that they want to learn that they’re watching that video now.
And so therefore, if my ad doesn’t convert with that type of targeting, I know it’s not a problem with my targeting, I know, I’m going to change what I created, or I’ve got to change my offer.
And that really, really helps in diagnosing issues of why is your campaign not performing.
Andrea Vahl:
Yeah. And that is one of the problems with Facebook is it’s very, you don’t have that intent based search there. So you could be targeting someone who is interested in Google Ads training as a keyword, but they aren’t searching for that right at the moment.
They may be are, they’re really, they are really well versed, perhaps in Google Ads training. So you could know, that is a challenge.
Ilana:
Yeah, exactly. But I would say that the pixel on Facebook, where you where you do, as I said, you know, the lookalike audiences, which is where you would be leaning very heavily on the pixel, I do think is actually superior than Google?
Andrea Vahl:
Yeah, it’s definitely I feel like Facebook does a great job of finding the people. And that’s why targeting is working well on Facebook, because Facebook has data on the types of people who are opting into leads, we’re making purchases, who are who are doing these things that the pixel is tracking. And you know, sorting through that and serving the ads to those people.
Ilana:
Yeah. And that’s actually why I’m so interested in seeing the impact of this iOS update, because that pixel is so good. And I think actually, that is why Facebook is jumping up and down and making a big fuss about this.
And they are not happy about this change. And because they’re really worried actually, that it’s going to affect their targeting that advertisers will have and as we mentioned, the tracking and the retargeting audiences and they’re worried that they’re going to use lose advertisers in droves, which, I mean remains to be seen, but may or may not happen. This just might be the new normal to use that catchphrase.
Alrighty, so hopefully, that explained but i think you know, for the listeners who are possibly starting out, I am a big fan of at least doing retargeting on both Facebook and YouTube and I think that’s a really really good starting point.
Because it’s obviously low hanging fruit someone’s come to your website they’ve left doesn’t necessarily mean they’re not interested it means that you know, life possibly got in the way. Yeah, so retargeting on multiple platforms. It is really successful.
All right, I think we’ve talked at length about the targeting on Facebook and YouTube and the differences.
Creatives: Facebook Ads vs YouTube Ads
Let’s go to the next pillar, which is about the creative, which I don’t know if you agree with me, Andrea, but I find people just do not spend enough time on nailing their creative, it’s just a side thing that they are whatever, I’ll just throw up this ad. And that’ll do it, you know, they think it’s all about the targeting, but it hinges on the creative.
Andrea Vahl:
It’s so true, it’s so true. And if you need to have a lot of creative people think that I’m going to test one image or two images, or one video. And if it doesn’t work, they’re like, Facebook ads don’t work or whatever.
But I’ve seen huge differences in the cost per conversion, and cost per sale. With different creatives, even within the same audience, you can, you know, you’ve got to be rotating them.
That being said, I do have creative that performs well for, you know, a long period of time, you don’t have to rotate it every three days, like some people say, you can keep creative that is still continuing to perform. But you’ve got to watch it. And you’ve got to bring new things into the mix.
Because you just don’t know, you think that your baseline is up here, you bring in some new creative and you’ve cut your costs in half. It happens all the time.
And some people think, oh, they have a rule in their head that no text on Creative or always have text on creative. And I see both of those things change as well. And you’ve got to test.
Image Ads vs. Video Ads
Ilana:
Yep. So what is your opinion on image versus video ads? Or I guess, you know, I just would love to hear your thoughts on that.
Andrea Vahl:
I’m seeing a shift in Facebook, I used to always see images performing better with opt-ins and purchases, although purchases sometimes have video performing better. And again, it depends a little bit on the industry.
If you’re in the consumer space, b2c, where you might be demoing a product, then a video can do really well and help someone see that product in action.
But in terms of if you’re doing a lead, you’re trying to get people as a lead magnet, you know, over to a lead magnet, oftentimes, the image is going to catch someone’s eye. And you’ve got to just get that click over to that landing page, which we’ll talk about next.
Right that or will they offer and that also includes landing pages that’s going to convert them. So, you know, I’ve found that in the past, images have done better for converting people into leads.
But I am finding a little bit that videos are really starting to perform well and do a little bit better on Facebook than I’ve seen before.
Ilana:
Interesting. And on that topic of video. You mentioned an explainer type video. Do you want to expand on that a little bit? Like what? And I guess I also like, ideal length of video?
Ideal Video Ad That Works
Andrea Vahl:
Yeah, people have people always ask about length. And I think you know, there is no perfect length.
You know, in the speaking world, we say you can never, you can never be too long, you can know you could just be too boring. So you’ve got to have it be interesting and engaging.
I mean, shorter is typically better, if you can make it pretty quick, so that you get right into the heart of the matter quickly. Because you got to, you’ve only got about three seconds to hook them with your, with your videos.
So the first three seconds have to be super interesting and eye catching.
Or maybe have some text that’s really intriguing on there.
So with an explainer video, you’re doing more of a like, like, it could be like a product demo, or you’re kind of showing what your product or service can do for somebody.
And, and so that that’s where you’re showing that transformation of what that person wants. So that person might be sick of cooking eggs in their pan, and it’s always sticking so your video shows them the eggs just slide right off and shooting red, or whatever, you know.
And that’s the transformation that clients are looking for.
But like, you know, in the b2b space, it could be more about explaining the problem that your client is potentially having in their business where your product or service is going to help get them to the other side and change their life.
So that could also be kind of an explainer video in that way.
Ilana:
And I’m assuming you’re a believer in that your videos or the videos need to have captions. I know I personally, when I’m on Facebook, I watch videos silently.
Andrea Vahl:
So yeah, yeah, me too, all the time. And I’m like, I just I’m like, “why am I just sitting here reading this video?”
But yeah, for sure you got to have I mean, it’s almost either full of captions, or like bullet points to illustrate what’s happening, you know, to kind of give the overview in a shorter time frame.
Ilana:
Yeah, I think you know, you have to assume that the consumer of that video is going to be watching that video on silent.
Andrea Vahl:
And so now is that the same for YouTube is YouTube Do you have to have captions on YouTube?
Ilana:
Not at all. In fact, in my experience, people are on there, because they are wanting to watch a video as opposed to scrolling through their newsfeed and have stumbled on a video.
Difference Between Facebook and YouTube Ads in Terms of Videos
The big difference that I see in terms of creative on YouTube versus Facebook, is that on YouTube, your video is doing 100% of the heavy lifting of that creative, you have to have a compelling video, it doesn’t have to be high production, although that’s you know, often nice, but it by no means does has to be high production value, but it has to hook people in because the difference on Facebook is you could have a video ad but above the video ad, you can have all this text, right? And explains it. And you cannot have that on YouTube.
So your video has to do all of the heavy lifting of getting your message across. And you know, you know, selling whatever it is that you’re selling. And so it needs to be a very, very successful video.
The difference was also on YouTube is that the first and I’m just going to assume that people are doing what’s called the in-stream ads, which are the video ads that come up before the video you’re about to watch.
And so those first five seconds of that video is unskippable, someone who was about to watch a video, as I said, on Google Ad training, right? My video comes up in front of them that the first five seconds are unskippable.
So I have five very, very critical seconds to capture people’s attention and hook them into just continue watching my ad. So you can imagine how critical those first five seconds are.
I certainly wouldn’t waste those five seconds and stop talking about myself. It’s not about me. It’s about the end viewer and the problem that they’re having that I can help them solve.
So on YouTube, I would call out my target audience, I would you know, say your business owner who is struggling to get Google ads to work for your business.
And ideally, what I’m wanting them to do is I’m trying to qualify people, and equally important, I’m trying to disqualify people.
So if someone says no, well, they’re just going to skip that ad and actually great. I don’t have to pay for that view. They’re gone.
But if I answer Yes, well, then I want them to keep watching.
And so the other critical component with the in stream ads is that if somebody clicks skip ad, less than 30 seconds, so they’ve obviously watched that mandatory five seconds, but then I’ve piqued their interest somewhat.
And you know, they skip before the 32nd. Mark. I, you know, theoretically don’t pay anything to Google.
I mean, admittedly for any sort of savvy ad managers, you know, really paid by CPM model anyway, but that’s the way they sell it.
Andrea Vahl:
They charge it differently. Charge differently. the image just looks different, right? The numbers, that’s how they do it.
Ilana:
That’s right. But, but essentially, that’s the way it works. And so what you don’t want to do then on YouTube is have a video that is really less than 30 seconds, because they might get to the end of the video, had no intention of watching or buying and they’ve just enjoyed your ad and never hit that skip button, you know?
And the big thing also, which I also like to incorporate in the creative on the YouTube side of things is a countdown timer at the end.
I don’t know if you’ve ever experienced like if you’re watching a video on YouTube and an ad comes up, you’re like, Oh, that’s been interesting. And then you start watching anything. I’m actually kind of interested and then suddenly the ad just ends and it vanishes and you can’t get it back.
So I often like to add in a countdown timer at the end, you know, five seconds or three seconds, giving people a chance to click so they know that this video is coming to an end.
They want to click, Now is your time. You know, pick your hand up, put your hand on the mouse.
We find that actually has had good results as well. Interesting. Yeah. Interesting.
Thoughts on Dynamic Ads on Facebook
Going back to Facebook, what are your thoughts on dynamic creative, which is Facebook’s way of you know, you load in, you know, five different images, three different copies, and they mix and match.
Andrea Vahl:
Yeah, I have mixed feelings on that, because my feeling is that Facebook doesn’t always optimize the right way. And oftentimes, they’re picking a winner too soon.
So they will only give like five cents to one image. And any, you know, you don’t who knows how good that image is after five cents, you know. So you don’t want to use dynamic creative in the testing phase, you want to use it when you’ve tested and found your best images.
And then you’re putting those into kind of, you know, dynamic creative, or you’re also, you know, you’re also maybe, you know, putting your best audiences into a campaign budget optimization, set type of format, where you can scale in a different way.
And you’re, you’re knowing that you’ve got the winners in there, instead of possibly having a dud in there that, you know, you might be wasting money on anyway. So definitely don’t use dynamic creative in the, in the testing phase, if you want to know how an image performs.
It can be I have seen it do. I used to not like it at all, but I have seen it do really well, especially in the e-commerce space, when you do want to have a lot of different creative things coming through for people.
I haven’t used it as much in b2b.
Working Through Facebook’s Issue In Split Testing Dynamic Ads
Ilana:
Yeah, right. On that topic of Facebook making a decision too quickly which is the winning ad, how do you combat that same problem?
Let’s say you’ve got you know, one campaign in one ad, set it to confuse a group with an ad set with? And then let’s say you’ve got four different creative that you’re testing within that one ad set.
How do you get around Facebook doing a proper split test that way?
Andrea Vahl:
Yeah, you’d either have to set if you really do want a proper split test, you’d either have to set it up yourself, which is what I do, because it’s an old school way of testing it, or you have to, you know, or you can use Facebook split testing tool as well.
And that will tell you the winner there, you’ve got, I don’t like Facebook split testing tool, I don’t like it kind of to me, it is too wonky, and I have my own system. So that’s why I don’t use it.
Or you have to be okay with the fact that you might have some mis-optimizations in there. The other thing you can do is manually kind of turn things on and off if you want to do that.
But that’s kind of a little less than ideal, I suppose. So if you really, truly want to test you can use Facebook’s split test tool or you can set up your own ad set where you just have one image underneath each ad set and dedicate the budget to it.
Ilana:
Yeah, right. So what you mean is like adding one creative per ad set so yeah, yeah, two ad sets with let’s say the same targeting the same budget, but each ad set is often what we’ll do as well.
Long Copy vs. Short Copy in Facebook Ads
And one last question on the creative side of things for Facebook is what is your opinion on long copy versus short copy?
And and what I mean, is that text above either the image or the video yeah, long copy versus short copy.
Andrea Vahl:
I feel like long copy works really well, when you want to kind of explain things a little bit deeper or tell a story.
Now I typically just see and I don’t do as much in the e-commerce space.
You know, true ecommerce where you’re just only doing sales ads and purchase ads all the time.
So I’m not doing quite as much there but I know that a lot of times the shorter copy can work better there with any other with lead magnets or purchases, I’m more often doing longer copy to get people kind of warmed up before they go over to the landing page where they have to you know, opt in or maybe it is make a purchase.
I’m more often though doing kind of a lead generation campaign on Facebook and then letting the sales sequence the email sequence or the you know, webinar or whatever that we might be sending the ads to do the selling piece of it from there.
So you know, I feel like the long copy can really help tell a more of a story and it does really well and really can appeal to people.
It is challenging, more challenging these days with Facebook’s personality traits issue because you can’t call out conditions, you can’t assume personality traits that someone has to you know, Facebook will stop those ads or disprove them. So you have to write creatively.
Ilana:
Yeah, absolutely. It’s definitely tricky. I personally, it’s funny when I’m back in the day, and I first started split testing, long copy versus long copy, the person inside was thinking long copy is never gonna work, you know, who’s got the attention span, you know, everyone got, you know, potential out of a goldfish.
And time and time again, I was just proven wrong, that long copy just like worked over and over again. And almost because I thought about it, it always becomes like a mini landing page, and we test….
Andrea Vahl:
It is really, really is it really is, especially, you definitely want to use long copy ads, if you’re using a lead generation ad, because that is your only lead generation ads are the ones that pop up on Facebook, that is your only copy that you have, you’re not sending people to a website, it’s all within that ad itself.
And so that’s the only place you have to explain everything that that people will get if they opt in or you know, are going to get a call from you, or whatever you’re doing for that lead generation ad.
So it’s, um, you definitely want to have longer ad copy there.
Ilana:
That’s maybe what was my downfall, I’ve never had great success with the lead generation ads, what I found is the quality of the leads weren’t great. I’ll tell you a little story I went to somewent some, many, many years ago, when lead generation ads first came out, I thought, this is going to be awesome.
So I had a client that was like a personal trainer. And so we were running an offer of like a week’s free personal training with lead generation ads. As I set it all up getting leads, it’s fantastic.
And this client was like, really responsive. As soon as the lead would come in. And we had their phone number, obviously he would get on the phone and call them you know.
So this lead came in one day and he called the guy who is in Australia and said “Hey, mate, how can I help you?” And he says, “Who is this?” And he said, “Well, you registered for a week’s free personal training. I was just calling to see when you’d like to come in for your first session”. He goes “No, mate. I didn’t do that. I thought I was just liking the ad.”
Andrea Vahl:
I know there is a lot of Yeah, definitely is. It’s a little Yeah, can be a little dicey with those.
Ilana:
But perhaps your method of doing a long copy ad is a way of qualifying people a little bit more so that they do know that they actually they’re signing up for something and they’re raising their hand and saying, “Yes, I want more information. And you can contact me” as opposed to the doc that my client got when he got you know, just kind of abused on the other end of the phone.
And it’s like, Yeah, he’s out made like, register.
Offers that Works in Facebook
Anyway, all right, so we’ve touched on the targeting, now we’ve touched on the creative differences of creative, let’s talk about the offer. And in your experience.
I mean, you know, this is the holy grail with online advertising is what was drummed in me many, many years ago is an offer that converts, you can have the best targeting in the world, you’re going to have the most slick creative, you don’t have what people want, then no amount of good targeting and no amount of creative is going to make it work. So it is a critical, critical component to successfully advertising online.
What would you say in your opinion, are certain offers that consistently work on Facebook?
Andrea Vahl:
Yeah, I mean, you know, the one thing that works the best is instant downloadables things but there also was a caveat with that, because they can work really well.
But again, it’s like sugary treats, you know, people sometimes don’t even they’re just opting into these things and they don’t consume them.
So it’s a balance between like an offer that that is that is irresistible, has a good hook that has that is really interesting to someone versus something that is actually going to do a little bit more of the sales because on Facebook, it is more about lead generation because you’re you’re kind of trying to you the targeting is such that you don’t know if someone needs a tennis racket right now even if they’re interested in tennis.
So you’ve got to talk about how wreck this racket is going to improve their you know how to improve their swing and then all of a sudden, this is the racket for that as well or whatever I don’t even know swing is that uh i don’t know tennis. I think I’m doing tennis and golf mixed up here. (laughs)
So you know that I think I like video content or webinars or something where they get to know you a little bit as an offer that will help them.
Sometimes things like summits do really well, because there’s a lot of info, you know, a lot of great information there packed in webinars can do amazing really well but again, they have to be titled, and offer some transformation that that person is going to want.
So it has to be super clear on what’s going to change for someone, when they opt into your offer. What do they want to get to?
It can’t just be about information. You know, it’s more about the, the benefits and the features, right?
Ilana:
So on the webinar thing, and I like that point that you make, that it’s going to educate people into your brand, rather than just like an ebook, which is going to sit on drive and gather dust and open on the webinar side of things, which obviously do offer that the ability for that transformation, and they can learn things and go yep, you know, I want to learn from this particular person.
Do you run Facebook ads to live webinars or the automatic webinars?
Running Ads on Live Webinars & Automatic Webinars
Andrea Vahl:
I’ve done both. And, you know, they can have there’s, there’s different components to both live webinars, have more of an event feel to it, it’s like a certain date. It’s happening that date, the challenge, there can come if the person isn’t available at that time, they’ll like, oh, I’ll listen to the recording.
Well, they never listen to the recording.
So you know, sometimes something instantly available can help as well can be good as well.
So that, you know that is, but then you’ve got to kind of have some urgency around whatever you’re selling.
At that point, you can’t just say, oh, buy this whenever you want, you know, so there, there’s has to be a little bit of thought put into an evergreen funnel.
If you’re like running an ad or running ads to a webinar that’s always available. How are you creating urgency for someone to buy something right at that moment.
So that’s, those are the two pieces of that. I think they can each have success.
I think there is more of an event feel and you can kind of get behind a big promotion around a, you know, a monthly webinar or quarterly webinar.
I have a client who runs live webinars every other week. And still, and we just does great at him and has gotten so good at his webinar pitch, he’s really improved his sales, because that’s the other piece of it, you’ve got to you know, you can’t just do one webinar pitch one time and say, Well, I that didn’t work because the art of the pitch within the webinar is huge.
Ilana:
Yeah, yeah, exactly. One thing I found, so obviously, I’ve run ads, on Facebook and on YouTube, this was more for a downloadable ad was that I got great cost per lead on Facebook.
And you know, the numbers were really attractive and, you know, subscribers coming in. But they weren’t such engaged subscribers, they didn’t open the emails.
And they didn’t end up converting later on the funnel versus on YouTube. With the intent based nature, the cost per lead was higher.
Yeah. However, they were a much more engaged subscriber.
They open the emails a lot more, their webinars came later in the funnel, they actually watch the webinar, you know, so it’s awesome. It’s not about I believe, and I don’t know, if you agree that not all clicks are created equal?
Yes, for sure.
And sometimes what we’re doing on Facebook is instead of optimizing around that lead, we’re actually even though we’re driving traffic to a evergreen webinar, we might be optimizing further down the funnel to a purchase, if that is in the you know, so that we’re, we’re trying to get past that, you know, cheap lead right into the intent based person who’s going to be more likely to purchase.
And that happens in audiences too. And that’s why you have to track all the way through the funnel too, because you might be getting cheap leads with one audience.
But the more expensive leads are actually the ones that are buying and your return on ad spend is much better so you got to track all the way through for both sites.
Ilana:
And I guess, you know, for our listeners who might be wondering, how would you track those differences in lead what sometimes people do is they will create a duplicate landing page with a completely different form so that they can tag people differently from that form, and then see how they progress through that that funnel.
I guess it really depends how granular you want to go. But you know, it is, I think, a worthwhile experiment, because it is not just about that top line metric of the cost per lead.
I wrote an interesting story for a member of inside Teach Traffic who I was helping. They were running Facebook ads, to a paid challenge, actually, a low cost challenge. I think it was like $29, or something.
And the Facebook ads were converting really well, the self liquidating offer, which is that the $29 paid challenge was paying for the ads itself, which is great. So they’re scaling that up? And they’re like, fantastic.
And I said, Well, you know, we need to diversify platforms, because, you know, your Facebook ad account can get shut down at any moment. Yeah. And so we then look to replicate that same offer on YouTube.
So people who, you know, did that targeting method that I was talking about earlier. And no one was buying. It was fascinating. So the same offer of the pay challenge of $29, we just created a YouTube ad, I taught him how to do it, keyword targeting, not one buyer. And it was really interesting. So I was like, okay, so I think we need to change the offer up a little bit. So we changed the offer, to be a, I think it was a kind of a free ebook for the YouTube app.
So they started converting, and then on the thank you page of the free ebook, he had a video that said, thanks so much for downloading this ebook.
Be sure to check your email in about 10 minutes, while I’ve got you here, you might be interested in this challenge that we’ve got. And he kind of explains the challenge and, and then people started buying.
And it was really interesting, you know, so I think for our listeners who you know, where you do try and replicate something from one platform. And if it doesn’t work, it doesn’t mean that that platform doesn’t work.
Yeah, it actually might mean that you just need to switch up the offer a little bit more obviously needed a little bit more trust building, then to warm up a little bit.
And then obviously, emails kicked in. And they, you know, a number of those people, even actually, interestingly, bypassed the challenge didn’t take up the challenge, but went straight to his membership.
Oh, wow, that’s so I mean, you know, like, it’s it you’ve got to offer is so important. And it’s about, you know, what offer works on what platform. I think it’s also worth mentioning that many people, you know, don’t follow a linear path. And as advertisers, they try to force people through one journey, and there’s many journeys, and there are many front doors into people’s ecosystems.
Andrea Vahl:
Right. I feel like I feel like that’s just such a beautiful statement. There are many journeys, we’re all on many journeys.
Ilana:
It’s true. In business and in personal life.
(Both laughs)
Andrea Vahl:
Wow. It’s getting really deep here.
Ilana:
Oh, my God. It’s evening for you. And it’s morning for me. I mean, it’s like, coffee or something.
So yeah, I guess, you know, in my experience with YouTube ads, you’re gonna have to test different offers and see what works for your market because there’s no one size fits all for people.
Andrea Vahl:
Exactly. Exactly. That is so true.
Ilana:
Well, I think we have covered a huge amount. And yeah, yeah, unless there’s something that I have gotten to ask, you.
Andrea Vahl:
I know, this has been so exciting. I’ve really enjoyed this.
Learn More About Andrea Vahl
Ilana:
So where can people find out a little bit more information about you?
Andrea Vahl:
Yeah, so people can find out about me at my website, Andrea Vahl. AndreaVahl.com. And there’s some free stuff there. There are lots of blog posts. Talk about a lot of stuff and connect with me there. Yeah, definitely go check out AndreaVahl.com.
Ilana:
You can also find me at TeachTraffic.com. And thank you so much for listening. Andrea, thank you so much for your time. I know you’re a really busy lady. So I really appreciate you sharing your wisdom and now Yeah, for our listeners, definitely check out AndreaVahl.com. Thank you so much!