Is Facebook's advertising platform effective for small online businesses?

Everett Level X⁴

June 30, 2016, 12:33 pm

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Would you use Facebook's advertising platform to advertise for small business, or website/blog? Would you actually get website activity from Facebook's advertising platform? Can you get real leads that are willing to signup for said website, and willing to make a purchase of your product or advertising?

How effective is Facebook's advertising platform for a small online business with little budget to advertise? Should they try out Facebook's platform, or just save their money and use organic search to bring in the customers, and traffic?

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Lynne

I think Facebook is an excellent option for small businesses. When I first started working online I just couldn't figure out how to get traffic to my website via organic traffic. I didn't know about Adwords... I was a complete beginner in 2012. What I did figure out quickly is Facebook. I used ads and spent a little bit of money to get my Facebook page going. Fast forward to today and I have 40 000 loyal Facebook fans on that page.

I have to update that website and SEO it correctly and start generating organic traffic to it, but I get a nice amount of traffic from social networks, Facebook being my largest social network.

If it weren't for Facebook my online business would have fallen on its face within 3 months of launching. Instead I started making all my first sales on Facebook and not my website! Later on I was driving traffic to my website from Facebook and making sales.

I recently closed my online store and changed it just to a mommy blog so I am more free to be available for my kids and my fans are loyal readers of my blog. I can't say much about sales yet as I am still figuring out how I am going to properly monetize that blog so there are big changes on the way.

10 years ago

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TommyCarey

Facebook advertising platform can be good and bad at the same time. If you let it run without monitoring it, it can drain your bank account pretty quick and you're done for.

I've have plenty of good and bad campaigns, and I wish they all just ran like the good campaigns. You can literally duplicate a good campaign for a different niche and keep the targeting the same or edit it, and you could still do horrible. Facebooks advertising platform is a fickle mistress that will stomp on your heart and not shed a single tear for you :'(

For small businesses, I would definitely recommend facebook advertising because you don't have to deposit a ridiculous amount of money right off the bat and hope everything works out. You can set up your campaign to run on a few dollars a day and it will normally charge you at the end of the month or when you hit $100, whichever comes first.

Typcically when I'm running an ad on facebook for a new website of mine I'll set the ad for just $10 a day and not set an end date. I'll take my time and set up 6 ads, which are all different, so I can have a good amount of split testing and analytics so I can cherry pick the best ad to run full time. After the first week I remove 3 of the lowest performing ads and keep the 3 best. After week 2 I remove the worst performing ad and that will leave me with the 2 best ads from the 6. I'll let the two ads run for just one more week and see which is performing the best. If they are both performing really well and it's a close race, I'll keep both

But most of the time there is that one ad that always wins the race and I keep it while getting rid of the runner up.

Now after 3 weeks of testing I have my best ad and I know it's going to perform well. I will kick up the amount per day to $20 or $30 to see what king of profits I'm making, and if the ad brings in $100 for every $20 to $30 I'm investing, it's a winner

That's an extra $70 to $80 a day in profit and it's basically on auto pilot, which is pretty awesome

You can do the same with adwords and adcenter ;) Facebook advertising platform can be good and bad at the same time. If you let it run without monitoring it, it can drain your bank account pretty quick and you're done for. I've have plenty of good and bad campaigns, and I wish they all just ran like the good campaigns. You can literally duplicate a good campaign for a different niche and keep the targeting the same or edit it, and you could still do horrible. Facebooks advertising platform is a fickle mistress that will stomp on your heart and not shed a single tear for you :'( For small businesses, I would definitely recommend facebook advertising because you don't have to deposit a ridiculous amount of money right off the bat and hope everything works out. You can set up your campaign to run on a few dollars a day and it will normally charge you at the end of the month or when you hit $100, whichever comes first. Typcically when I'm running an ad on facebook for a new website of mine I'll set the ad for just $10 a day and not set an end date. I'll take my time and set up 6 ads, which are all different, so I can have a good amount of split testing and analytics so I can cherry pick the best ad to run full time. After the first week I remove 3 of the lowest performing ads and keep the 3 best. After week 2 I remove the worst performing ad and that will leave me with the 2 best ads from the 6. I'll let the two ads run for just one more week and see which is performing the best. If they are both performing really well and it's a close race, I'll keep both :D But most of the time there is that one ad that always wins the race and I keep it while getting rid of the runner up. Now after 3 weeks of testing I have my best ad and I know it's going to perform well. I will kick up the amount per day to $20 or $30 to see what king of profits I'm making, and if the ad brings in $100 for every $20 to $30 I'm investing, it's a winner :D That's an extra $70 to $80 a day in profit and it's basically on auto pilot, which is pretty awesome :D You can do the same with adwords and adcenter ;)

10 years ago

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ajlancer

Hi Everett thanks for your question. I just simply want to say yes! Facebook advertising for any big or small business very worth investment. We know how importance social media like facebook nowadays. And as per as I know each and every day million of user are very much active on Facebook. So mass responsive are coming from targeting area each day. I have practical experience for facebook advertising. For a website I promoted a ad by Facebook. And I got huge response for my website and huge sign too. So, Facebook very best way to get targeted audience or customer for big or small business.

Regards by Ajlancer

10 years ago

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augusta

Sure, social media can be used to market both small,medium and big businesses. The platform is for all kind of businesses both big and small.

The success of the business depends more on the advertising strategies and not the social media used.

9 years ago

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EliteWriter

I think that Facebook ads are a great option for small businesses who are trying to gain exposure. Advertising on Facebook is quite affordable when compared to other advertising options, and apart from that it is also effective. Advertisers have the advantage of choosing how much they are willing to spend on their Facebook adverts, as well as choose their preferred target markets on certain factors such as age, gender and geographical location. Mobile users can also be targeted with Facebook ads, so your audience is bigger than ever. Besides Facebook allows you to keep track of how your ads are doing, such as the number of clicks you got, impressions and reach.

10 years ago

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vinaya

Yes it is. However, how much success you can get for your small online business through facebook advertising depends on various factors.
First of all, you will have to choose between free and paid advertising. Free advertising can also give you lead, but it takes time. Paid advertising can give you lead, but there is no guarantee on this. I say this from my experience. After spending $11 on facebook advertising, I did not even sell a single product.

9 years ago

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Pixie06

I have been very successful in my business due to Facebook advertising. I created a Facebook page and started advertising for my products. My friends also help me by recommending others to join my page. I started my business on Facebook and at that time I was selling my products only locally. After some time I decided to sell to other countries too and I don't regret my decision.

9 years ago

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Barida

Using facebook advertisement is the best way small businesses can get to market their products and services at a very cheap rate without having to depend on any other factor to help them make great sales. The reason is that most people on Facebook staying close to where the business is located would like to do business with the firm marketing such goods.

9 years ago

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Kakashi2020

Facebook's advertising platform is better and way easier than Google's. If you get Facebook's services then you'll get results very fast because they make sure that your ads are seen by a lot of people.

8 years ago

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Kakashi2020

Using Facebook advertising is very cost efficient and this makes it a wise choice for small and startup businesses. You can start with just a nominal amount and increase or decrease it depending on results.

8 years ago

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Corzhens

Advertising your product is a costly activity for marketing so I am quite surprised that you can spend so little for advertising in Facebook. Maybe that is the main reason why I am seeing so many ads of small businesses on Facebook because of the affordability of the advertising package. Maybe if I have a business that will need advertising then I will turn to Facebook Ads which I think is very effective for so little expense.

8 years ago

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