My first foray into Facebook ads
Are you on Facebook? Who isn’t, right? Well, I wasn’t until recently. I had a personal account, but I never spent any time there. It just didn’t appeal to me.
But we’re writers and everyone says it’s important to have a presence, so I set up an author account last year, and now I do spend a little time there. (I still prefer Instagram, however, and I’m starting to meet other writers on Twitter. Took me forever, but it’s happening. Please Friend and Follow me if you’re there too!)
Anyway, this is about Facebook. And ads. Ads are another thing I avoided for as long as possible. Seems weird because I published two books, and you would think I would want to advertise them. But that’s just how much advertising scares me.
In addition, a few respected marketing experts suggest not getting into paid advertising right away. Wait until you've published more books, they say. Some part of me also worried that I might get addicted to running ads and end up going overboard with them. So, I guess you could say I’m timid when it comes to diving into the ad campaign world.
Earlier this month, I gave it a shot. And I have to say, it wasn’t horrible.
CREATE AD
First, go to your Author Page on Facebook. In the left-hand column, about halfway down, you’ll find a button labeled Ad Center. Click that, and you’ll arrive at the page that allows you to create an ad.
The great thing about Facebook ads, in my opinion, is that they let you create six different ads at once. Facebook's algorithms quickly figure out which are getting the best response (i.e., the most clicks), and it homes in on them—meaning it has those ads appear on more pages.
So, I took some of my favorite photos of my books and quickly put together six ads. I used an elevator pitch of my book for the copy, and I selected the Learn More button, which would send interested parties to my website. I also included a link to They Will Be Coming for Us’s Amazon page in the body copy of the ad.
I was floored by how easy it was to put these together.
SELECT AUDIENCE
Next, I had to decide who I wanted to see the ads. The audience, in other words. Choosing an audience is probably the trickiest part. It requires you to think about the people who want to read books like yours. While you can use “readers” as a word that describes your intended audience, you'll want to narrow it down. Who is your targeted reader? What do people who like your book genre like outside of book reading? For instance, do romance readers often take yoga classes? Then you may want to target those who take yoga. Do thriller readers enjoy superhero movies? If so, you might want to target those who go to superhero movies.
I chose the following for my audience: those who enjoy science fiction movies, coffee, love stories, and astronomy. The next time I make ads, I’ll try other words and phrases, and see if the ads do any better.
SET BUDGET
As for the budget, I needn’t have worried about spinning out of control. The budget was set to $3.00 a day from the start—and I decided that was enough to get a feel for how the ads were doing and which ones appealed to people and drew the most clicks. Unless I completely forgot about the ads and let them run for a year, I didn’t have to worry about piling up a great expense. I checked on the ads every day. It was fun to see the numbers accrue: the clicks and the cost per click. The plan was to run them for one week.
On the fifth day of the ad campaign, my website experienced a traffic spike. That just means my website had a significantly higher number of visitors than expected that day. The traffic, I learned, came from social media. Definitely Facebook. Why the fifth day of the campaign? I have no idea.
RESULTS
Did I sell a bunch of books? To be honest, no I did not. I sold a few, not bunches. I’m hopeful that I’ll sell more using subsequent ads. This was my first foray, and my ads most likely reached people who had never seen my books before. The more they see them, the greater chance they’ll buy them. I'm going to research other FB ads and see what types of photos/copy have been successful, then tweak my own designs with that new knowledge in mind.
Overall, my ads reached 3,381 FB users and accrued 149 clicks and 153 post engagements. They achieved a $0.15 cost per link click (which is pretty good from what I can discern).
When it comes to advertising, I am the first to admit that I have a lot to learn!
If you have any Facebook ad tips, I’d love to hear them. Simply comment below.
Kim Catanzarite is an editor and a blogger, and the author of The Jovian Duology. She looks forward to giving Facebook ads another try. Learn more about her and her books at www.AuthorKimCatanzarite.com.
