A crucial element, especially when launching your Ecommerce operation: because the Internet is so vast, there is next-to-no chance that your target will stumble across your site by chance. So it is up to you to guide them to the right place and to encourage them to place an order. To achieve this, there is nothing better than online advertising campaigns...but you need to know about the best practices for them to be successful. Joseph Donyo, Facebook Ads consultant, shares his best-kept secrets with us.
Define a clear objective
It is difficult to achieve a goal without having defined it well in advance. And when we say one, we mean ONE. Each objective has its own campaign, and it is essential to avoid a "catch-all" campaign.
Your Ecommerce operation may have various aims: creating a community, increasing the number of followers on your Instagram account, gaining subscribers to your newsletter, guiding readers to your lead magnet, etc. Whatever it may be, it corresponds to a specific campaign.
Moreover, defining your objective well in advance will allow you to effectively measure the success of your campaign afterwards.
Installing the Facebook pixel correctly
You have defined the objective of your media campaign, well done! Now it's time to move on to the configuration and a crucial step that you shouldn't miss: installing the Facebook Ads pixel.
Need a refresher course on the Facebook Ads pixel? Simply put, it's a piece of code that you'll install on your Ecommerce site. It will allow you to track the activity of your website visitors and follow the conversions generated by your Facebook and Instagram ads.
Often, only the purchase parameters have been properly set up and all other events in the conversion funnel are forgotten about. As a result, it is very difficult to draw conclusions from the data obtained. To obtain sufficient and relevant data, you need to add as much information as possible to each event. For example, currency, product category, amount, reference, etc. on your product pages. All this data will enable you to optimize your advertising campaigns and to retarget your audiences more accurately in future campaigns.
Do not invest heavily before validating your product/market fit
Product/market fit is a key element for your Ecommerce: it is about validating the existence of a demand for your product. Advertisements can help you to refine this, by testing with small budgets. You gather additional information on your target, the sensitivity to a given visual for example.
It makes sense to refine your MFP through online advertising, but don't verify the existence of your MFP through them. Otherwise, you run the risk of throwing a huge amount of money at advertising campaigns that won't deliver the expected results...simply because there is no demand for the product in question.
Don't micro-manage your media campaigns
Some e-tailers want to manage their media campaigns like day trading, making adjustments by the hour or several times a day. This is a mistake. If you change several parameters 5 times in one day, you will not be able to draw any conclusions from your campaign.
Of course, it is important to test different scenarios for your campaigns, but not in such a short timeframe. Instead, set a test cycle of one week, without touching your ad. The data obtained will enable you to analyze its real performance and identify areas for improvement.
Investing a sufficient budget to achieve results
While it is counterproductive to spend too much money before you have verified your product/market fit, you must then invest sufficient funds to get worthwhile results from your ads. In concrete terms, Google Ads and Facebook Ads work with a bidding system. Google does not impose a minimum daily budget, while Facebook requires a minimum investment of $1 per day.
Of course, you have to know how to measure your budget, but don't try to be at the lowest price to test your campaigns. Indeed, if the budget dedicated to your ads is too low, you will have few impressions and the results will not be convincing. This will not help you generate traffic and optimize your future campaigns.
Once you've found the right recipe, don't underestimate the budget to invest heavily in your marketing and make an impact on your sales. And if you need a helping hand with campaign funding, Silvr can help!
Be patient
A final example of good practice: patience! Some people sell hacks and magic formulae that will supposedly help you make 10,000 sales in 24 hours. Spoiler alert: there is no such thing. The key to successful media campaigns is your patience.
A lot of testing and adjustment is needed to make a campaign as effective as possible. Remember that most tests will not work. So be patient and thorough when testing. Adopt week-long test cycles, so that the algorithm can roll out and find the right pockets of audience. This is how you will improve your media campaigns, step by step.
Online acquisition campaigns are the best way to make your Ecommerce site stand out online. Thanks to Joseph's advice, we hope your next campaigns will be even more successful! Don't hesitate to come and talk to us ;-)
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Joseph Donyo is a trainer and consultant specializing in Facebook Ads since 2016. He helps SMEs, startups, creators and entrepreneurs to develop their business by coaching them in managing their advertising campaigns on Facebook and Instagram. He publishes the Neomedia newsletter newsletter twice a month and hosts the podcast No Pay No Play.
