How can I get better results on social media?

Social media platforms don’t always make it easy for a business online, especially when it comes to adverts and paid-for boosting. Is it useful? Is it expensive? How does it work? Sit down, grab a cup of tea (maybe a biscuit or two) and take a read through our experiences so you don’t have to keep Googling it.

Is boosting a post on Facebook worth doing.

Yes, social media boosting is a great tool and can find those new audiences that are hard to find using organic posts alone. All you need to do is to get your target audience right, to avoid spending money needlessly on people who aren’t likely to be that interested in your brand.

Facebook and Instagram advertising are linked up via the Meta Business Suite, which makes your promotions on these two platforms easier and more consistent between the two. Boosting social media posts is not expensive and you can pin down a wide range of people according to the audiences that you choose.

You can advertise on Instagram via Facebook Ads Manager and Business Suite by either choosing to boost a post from within Instagram that will then hop you into Facebook Ads Manager to set it up and pay for it, or you can boost a post from within Facebook and check the box ‘Run promotion on Instagram’ to run the same creative across both platforms.

How to target specific groups of people when boosting a post

You can choose how to target specific audiences by clicking on the pencil icon on the top right of this section in Meta Business Suite. This will bring up the full options available such as age, location, and specific interests.

This will then open a new window where you can define the audience and it will also display the estimated reach or audience size. But be aware – these are always big numbers as social media platforms love to show off, so if you have a niche offer just make sure you define your audience and don’t get swayed by BIG numbers.

When boosting you can also choose between boosting a post to “people who liked your page and their friends” or to “people you choose through targeting”. Choosing who to target is an effective way of reaching out to people through location, interests, demographics, relationships status, spending power etc..

What is the difference between boosting and advertising on Facebook and Instagram

Both are paid for advertising options on social media and the main differences are that boosting a post is exactly that, and advertising runs in the background and can offer more customised targeting than a boost.

Boosting a post means that you select a specific post that is already on your timeline and give it a budget to reach a wider audience than you would normally achieve with an organic post. It is a great way to promote that brilliant post that has a call to action such as page engagement, likes, click to your website, phone number, messenger, and WhatsApp.

Advertising lets you create a specific advert (not a post) that doesn’t appear on your timeline, so this is a great way of reaching an audience that may not already engage with your Facebook or Instagram platform. There is also the added benefit of choosing placements in Facebook Feed side ads, Messenger ads, Instagram Stories, Facebook Instant Articles and Meta Audience Network

Here are a few things you should consider with boosting and advertising:

• Use a clear high-quality image with very little or no text. We are attracted to something we want immediately by what it looks like, and people are more likely to interact if they like your post or are interested in the content. Facebook also penalises images with text when advertising and the ad or boost may be disapproved as a result.
• When boosting, find posts that are already doing well. If you have a selection of posts you want to test out, then create multiple audiences, save them and see which audiences respond the best to your paid-for posts. This will help hone down the people most likely to convert.
• When creating an advert make sure you spend a little time thinking about what you want to achieve. Do you want page engagement, website link clicks, direct enquiries, for example. Design an ad that fits your goals. You have the option of creating carousel ads, specific descriptions and add a call-to-action button that will drive more people to take action.
• Be flexible in your approach. If your post or ad doesn’t get any engagement, try to change it or just pause the spend and move onto something else. Putting more money behind a post or ad that is not creating clicks, likes or sales won’t make it successful. Be prepared to learn through analysing and you will soon find that you start to understand your audience better.

Part of the reason for boosting posts is to also increase audience engagement organically. Organic engagement is not paid-for and so is more valuable to a brand. When a post is being boosted and attracts a lot of likes and comments, you need to keep on replying to comments, inviting people to like the page and generally keep the conversation going. This way there is more chance for that post to also reach a larger organic audience at the same time which makes the most of your ad spend.

Measure your Results!

To know if an online advert has been successful you need to measure your success. This is essential.

• See if the traffic on your website has increased.
• Did you get more followers, likes and shares since the advert launch?
• Have sales and enquiries increased?

On Facebook you will be able to see how boosting on this platform has had an effect in the ‘Insights’ tab at the top of the page (and it would include the statistics from Instagram too if you boosted onto there at the same time).

As well as an at-a-glance view of how many people were reached and how many engagements you got for your budget, you can drill into each post individually to examine how well certain posts performed. If you have multiple audiences that you have been testing out, you will also be able to see if one works better for your brand than another, helping you with learning to understand your audience better. This kind of observation helps you in other areas of your business when putting together your sales messaging.

Final note – never forget engagement.

One of the best ways to grow your audience, make an impact and keep people interested in your brand is to engage. Answer questions quickly, respond to comments, listen to your audience and comment on other people’s posts that align with your brand. That’s free, it just takes a little time.

If this is too much to take in – give us a call we can talk you through it.