Everybody's on Facebook.
That’s what makes it such a great platform to advertise on.
There, you can easily find your perfect type of clients in abundance.
The problem, however, is that most realtors find it way too hard to use.
If you ever had a look at the power editor, then you know exactly what I’m talking about.
There are so many things you can do, that you simply don't know where to start.
And this can easily cause you to feel overwhelmed.
And if you’re like most people, you turn to the internet for answers….
But have you noticed that just makes things worse?
Every thought leader has something different to say.
They each have their own unique strategy (and keep pushing their courses onto you).
That’s because there's money to be made in complexity.
You see… the “guru's” don't want to make it simple for you.
They all want to make it seem like rocket science.
That way you can hire them for consulting, buy their courses, and contract their agency.
As a matter of fact: there's an entire industry built upon this.
The less you know - they more money they can make…
However, don't get us wrong… we're not saying it's easy either!
And we’re not bashing legitimate facebook advertisers too.
There's a reason why so many people have different methods.
That’s because this isn't a “one-size-fits-all” type of thing.
And the people who do offer these services and can get you tangible results are worth every penny.
What we're saying is: if you understand the basics, the fundamentals, that should be enough to generate leads and become well known in your local community.
Knowing this information can also help you to better manage people to run your ads in the future too.
And that's exactly what we're going to be covering in this blog post.
We're going to share everything you need to know to make Facebook Ads work and convert!
Why Facebook Ads?
Simply because: everyone’s on it.
On other platforms like pinterest and instagram, the majority of their user base is made up of a specific group of people.
On Facebook however, you can find people from all walks of life.
This is great because you can target your message to a very specific group of people.
You can segment them based on:
- Age
- Sex
- Income
- Location
- Interests
- And so much more...
Now compare this to traditional advertising (TV, radio, and billboard)
If you chose this route, everybody would see the same thing.
However with Facebook ads, you can create a marketing piece for each type of person you want to attract. It doesn't get any better than that!
The Psychology Of Users On The Platform
One of the biggest mistakes people make on Facebook is failing to communicate in the right context.
Let me explain…
In real life, a lot of times our actions change based upon our location.
You would act differently at a library as opposed to a nightclub.
You would act differently in a boardroom compared to a locker room.
The key is: there's a right way to act in each place.
This is where people get Facebook wrong.
It's called social media for a reason - people are there to socialize.
This is a platform where people go to chat with their friends, see what they're up to, engage in group discussions, and see funny videos.
However, most people fail at Facebook advertising because they try to sell too soon.
Now, we know the goal is to get an ROI from your efforts, but you can't lead with selling.
You lead with helping.
You lead by engaging with users.
And you lead by caring.
Most people throw up an offer that:
- Looks like an ad
- Sounds like an ad
- And asks for the sale up front.
What you will notice after running enough ads is that….
The best Facebook ads don't look like an ad.
It looks like regular content that you'd normally see on your news feed.
It's authentic, is written in a casual tone, and has no signs of any hard selling involved.
Developing Your Strategy
When we tell people they’re not supposed to be “salesy” on Facebook, we also get another reaction…
They start to post too many things at random.
This is also counterproductive.
Taking a bunch of action without the right intention is a waste of time.
The first thing you need to do is develop a strategy.
You need to understand why you're doing things.
This will be the foundation of the actions you need to take in order to achieve your goal.
Exercise:
Before creating your Facebook ad campaign, ask yourself:
- What service am I promoting?
- Who am I promoting it to?
- What are their pains and problems?
- What are the objections they have?
- What is the goal of my campaign?
Remember, in the 80/20 guide: your goal is to get traffic, convert it, and make a profit.
That’s why we recommend using Facebook Ads for lead generation campaigns (and less focus on branding, views, and impression).
Writing Your Ad
Here lies the biggest misconception in Facebook Ads.
Most realtors feel overwhelmed because of the complexity of the tools.
They focus so much on the tech side of thing and forget the most important thing:
It's all about your message.
In the 1960s a man by the name of Ed Meyer created what's called the 40-40-20 rule.
He said the success of any marketing campaign comes down to:
- 40% audience
- 40% offer
- 20% creative
Instead of focusing on Facebook’s tools, you can target your audience with relative ease and spend the rest of your time developing an offer that people want.
Now, in order to create a great offer…
You must solve a painful problem with a unique solution (and make it irresistible).
Here are the Facebook ads copywriting guidelines we use to come up with offers:
- You need to position yourself against the competition.
- What's something that you disagree with everyone in the industry?
- What's a point of view you have - that no one has?
- What's something that only you can do?
- What do people want?
- How can you offer them what they want in a way they can't refuse?
- Explain the achievability of getting results.
- What are the possible objections they have?
Once you have gathered this information the next step is to write this out in a way that is fun and engaging.
We do this by using one of two formulas:
- PAS: problem, agitation, solution
- AIDA: attention, interest, decision, action
After choosing one, write your ad within the framework and make sure your text doesn't go over 200 words.
That's because Facebook is focused on short and punchy copy.
Creating Your Ad
There are tons of steps involved to create your first ad.
That’s why we’d like to simplify it for you as best as we can.
Note: you should have a business page created. If you don’t check out this video.
Now, the most important thing is to have a good strategy behind your ads.
For real estate agents we recommend building a simple funnel.
It’s called a 2 step funnel and works like this:
Ad > landing page with lead magnet > thank you page > receives offer via email.
Now, the goal of this funnel is capture a potential prospects contact information.
You should aim to develop a relationship with them via an email or phone call later.
Remember: people need to like, know, and trust you before they agree to the sale.
When choosing an objective, we recommend you choose traffic.
That way, you will only pay every time someone clicks and lands on your page.
When choosing your target audience, this is when things get tricky.
It will vary based on what you offer and what you’re promoting to people.
From our experience, keep your audience broad and just change your location.
We recommend keeping a 10 mile radius from your community to start.
Then, let Facebook find the people most likely to click on your ads.
As for placement, we recommend you only keep “instant articles”
That’s usually the best place for people to see your ads and where you’ll get the most results.
And finally, for ad creative you’re going to need an ad design and a landing page.
For ad designs, we recommend you go to canva.com
Choose the Facebook ad option and select the template that stands out the most.
As for your landing page, go to mailchimp.com and create a landing page template.
Choose one that’s simple.
For some reason, the simpler they are, the higher the conversions.
Here’s an example of one we chose.
Note: You’ll still need to create your lead magnet. Whether that’s an ebook, video, mini-course, etc.
Measuring Your Success
While there are certainly hundreds of metrics that you can work with, I’m sure you’ve noticed that we like to keep things simple.
First, you need to learn how much you are willing to spend to acquire a client.
We usually like to work with a 2:1 ratio.
For example: we’ll spend up to $1500 to land a $3000 deal.
Next, we keep track of 3 things:.
- Number of clicks to your landing page;
- Number of clicks to email subscribers (20%);
- Number of email subscribers to clients (1%)
The percentages we placed are conservative metrics.
They’re a great baseline to work with.
You should always aim to get higher numbers.
Just try to never go below them.
As long as you are operating within those percentages and achieving a 2x ROI on your ad spend, then you should be good to go.
Final Thoughts
As you can see, once you have the fundamentals down of a Facebook ad, you can leverage the platform to start generating your own leads.
The great thing about it is that you’re dream clients and hanging out there.
Thousands of people in your local community who need your service are present.
You just need to approach them correctly.
Here are the key takeaways from this blog post:
- People are on Facebook to socialize
- Don’t try to sell too soon (go for the email / relationship)
- Make your ads seem like a regular Facebook post
- Offer something that solves your clients problems for free
- When targeting your audience:
- Go broad first;
- Choose a 10 mile radius;
- Let Facebook decide who are the best people to see your message;
- Once you get people’s contact information, nurture the relationship via email.
