5 Common Facebook Advertising Mistakes (And How To Avoid Them)

After working with multiple clients for years I’ve noticed some common issues people make when it comes to their Facebook advertising.

Here’s a list of the top five mistakes I often see:

1) Not Having Conversions Set Up Properly

One of the biggest mistakes I see clients make with their Facebook advertising is not having conversions set up properly. You can’t attribute sales from ads without properly setting up your conversion tracking.

To set up your conversion tracking make sure you have your Facebook pixel properly installed on your website.

Luckily, most eCommerce websites (such as Shopify) have easy integration where you can just copy/paste your Facebook Pixel ID.

When your website has the Facebook Pixel installed, it will send conversion events to Facebook such as “add to cart”, “purchase”, etc. After your pixel is installed, you can view more data and analytics on user behavior on your website.

You can also run Facebook campaigns with the conversion objective of the event you have set up (such as a purchase).

Without having your conversion tracking set up properly you don’t truly know what ads of yours are actually working. Without knowing which ads are working you really are just throwing money away with ads that could be optimized more. Don’t be that person!

Once your conversion tracking is set up properly, its time to set up remarketing audiences!

Do you need help setting up your conversion tracking?

Connect with me here or email me at tony@tonydoesads.com.

2) Not Remarketing To Website Visitors

I still sadly see businesses running ads and not remarketing them to website visitors they’ve had.

Previous website visitors are one of the most essential and valuable audiences that you should advertise to. Time and time again, I see these audiences converting best with advertisements targeting them.

Why?

They already know about your business!

Again, make sure you have your Facebook pixel installed which will be vital in creating a custom audience based on a view of your website.

Try creating a few different audiences based on how many days since they have visited your website. If you get a lot of website traffic, a one-day or seven-day custom website audience will be great for you to target. If you get less traffic, I’d suggest a longer period such as 30 days or so.

Just know the longer out you wait to remarket to a website visitor, the less the visitor will remember going to your website. 

Facebook allows you to create a custom website audience as far out as 180 days. I barely remember what I did last month.

3) Not Using The Right Campaign Objective

Your campaign objective should always match the goal you have with your ads.

I will see businesses from time to time run traffic campaigns and optimize for clicks when they are trying to sell items on their website.

Why is this wrong?

Facebook optimizes your campaigns based on your objective.

If you click the Traffic objective, for example, Facebook will show your ads to people that are clicky users on Facebook. This doesn’t mean your ads will be shown to people that are the most likely to purchase compared to if you chose the conversion objective.

Make sure you select the marketing objective you want Facebook to optimize for.

4) Not Hitting The Right Audience At The Right Time With Ads

I was walking down the Las Vegas Strip and a guy approached me and said, “Want to buy my mixtape?”

I replied, “no” for a few reasons:

1. I never have met the guy and therefore had no clue if he was a great rapper or not.

2. Although I am a fan of hip-hop, I didn’t travel down to Vegas in search of a new mixtape.

3. I don’t even have a CD player anymore! haha

The point is, this is what I see business owners do with their Facebook advertising!

Instead, imagine if the man tried one of these different approaches:

1. Introducing himself to me first and telling me his story.

2. Performing his songs in Vegas (providing value first before attempting to sell).

3. Approaching people outside of a rap show (the RIGHT audience).

Ensure you are hitting the RIGHT audience at the RIGHT time (and don’t just go for a sell before anything else happens).

How can you target your audiences better? This brings me to the next mistake I see:

5) Not Sequencing Ads With Customers

“On sale!” – This product you have never seen.

You must work to bring audiences from KNOW to LIKE to TRUST.

This is not a new marketing strategy, it is fundamental to how you should be running your ads.

Work to create campaigns that introduce you and your services, provide value and THEN sell. Don’t do it in reverse.

Conclusion

It’s easy to quickly throw away money with Facebook advertising, especially if you are a small business focusing on other things. Ensure to avoid these costly mistakes when you start your Facebook campaigns.

Already advertising on Facebook? What other Facebook tips would you give to small business owners?

Let me know in the comments.