Facebook advertisements are a smart way for marketers and NFPs to get their goods and services to their audience.

Are you targeting the right audience?

There is no longer the need to guess who may be viewing the advertisement, Facebook gives you the capacity to target your audience based on who they are and what they like. No guess work required. As long as you are aware of your audience then building your membership is the next logical step.

Facebook can be used for more than just additional likes to a Facebook page. It can help you increase your members or raise awareness for an event. Online marketing can provide you with offline memberships especially if the targeting of the advertisement is hitting your niche market. Don’t forget with Facebook you have the ability to hone your advertisements to a certain sex, age, location and interest; particularly helpful if you wish to make your dollars work for you.

Is the Return on Investment (ROI) worth the spend?

You may be hesitant about paying for online advertising, and we understand your hesitancy. However if there is a good return on investment on your advertising spend, then it may be worth it. Facebook ads operate on a Cost Per Click (CPC) model; this means that for each person who clicks on your ad and is directed to your page will, in turn, cost you money. This differs to a cost per impression (CPM) model where you pay for everyone who sees your ad. It is important to note that you can cap your daily spend so that you never go over your budget.

You can also use Facebook to target your already existing members for an event, cause or promotion. By exporting your membership database, you can opt to send a specific custom audience to your website.

When targeting new members then it is important that you use the geographic targeting and neighbouring areas, if relevant. You can always choose to widen the ad if your ad is not working.

As Facebook advertising is designed with your particular campaign objective in mind, it is worth taking the time to get it right. Available objectives include page likes, website conversions, event responses, offer claims and local awareness to name just a few.

It is important to start small while you are trialling ads to see what works. The great news is you can choose the start and end date to coincide with your event or fundraiser. As you have limited text to play with (headline, 25 characters; description, 90 characters; news feed link description, 20 characters), it is important to get it right. Note that a picture is really worth a thousand words so again choose one which will stand out and promote your message. There is even a sign-up button on the Facebook ad which will enable you to directly increase those memberships without too much effort.

Once you have ascertained the effectiveness of your ad through the Facebook Ads Manager, you can tweak or continue depending on your needs. If signing up for your newsletter or registering for an event was your aim, and you achieved that, then wonderful. If you received the clicks but not the final sign ups or commitment to interest, then you may have to re-launch your ad, slightly reworded for maximum effect.

There may be slight differences to your specific ad depending on your circumstances. The sophisticated dashboard, however, is quite intuitive, even for beginners. Therefore, don’t be afraid to play around with it to get a feel for the way it works. The ad will not become live until you are ready therefore you have endless opportunities to get it right, maximise your reach and build up your membership.