Does advertising on Facebook work? Results and numbers.

Facebook ADS is the well-known “pay-per-click advertising system” used by businesses and professionals to advertise on Facebook. In this article, we want to talk about numbers because numbers count for SMEs.

Taking an example of an ad created for one of our clients, we will see how, by leveraging Facebook’s network through Ads, it is possible to achieve a broad communication coverage quickly and with a limited budget.

The Implicit Question

The main advantage offered by Facebook Ads is the ability to profile the target audience of an ad, using information from the social graph, i.e., the information derived from various connections that each user makes daily with other people, pages, or groups present in the network.

It is evident that the most successful ads will be those targeted towards an audience potentially interested in what is being promoted. Intersecting the implicit question, from which to create the ad, is the essential starting point for any Facebook Ads strategy.

In recent years, the number of companies, startups, or associations using Facebook Ads has been steadily increasing. Despite this, the first question asked in Social Media Marketing courses is still about the concrete results that can be obtained, rather than the methods to achieve them.

Is it really possible for a small or medium-sized brand to achieve good results in a relatively short time and with a limited budget? The case of the ad we propose here demonstrates that it is indeed possible.

The Ad

It is a “quote post” aimed at spreading Brand Awareness. In this case, the company didn’t want to present its products or services so much as express and share its mood on the fan page.

The ad had to satisfy the interest of our target audience. We looked for a phrase that aligned with the current seasonal moment and with the appealing, fresh, and easily consumable style of the brand. Based on this, we chose the text and visual, creating the right mix of the three basic ingredients for every good post:

• Quality
• Creativity
• Originality

Finally, we proceeded with the programming of the ad using Facebook Ads, profiling an audience in line with the demographic data and interests of the fan page.

The Results

Our post showed excellent performance right from the start.

Just two hours after the start of the sponsorship activity, Facebook itself notified the Page administrator, that is us, that the Post had just reached a Relevance Score of 10/10. Here’s the message sent by the system:

At the end of the sponsorship day, the final report confirmed the positive trend with which the post started:

• Budget spent: €10.00
• People reached: 29,120 (organic: 14,672 / paid: 14,480)

The excellent organic coverage was certainly possible thanks to the high interaction from the Fanpage. Here are some data:

• Likes: 1,056
• Comments: 37
• Shares: 233
• New Page Likes: 94

The success of the post continued in the following days, bringing positive long-term results to the Page.

In conclusion

Thanks to a healthy daily activity on Facebook Ads, with a dash of inspiration and a lot of hard work (also helped by 38°C in the shade), we see that growing a brand through this channel is an achievable goal.

The key to success? Always work on creating “quality content“, as Albert Einstein said: “Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value“.