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Change is the only constant when it comes to social media advertising. The strategies and tactics that worked well this year will soon become obsolete, and unfortunately, those who remain stagnant, and use the same approach for every campaign, will find themselves increasingly frustrated.
2019 was an interesting year, in which we saw the continued rise of video, the explosion of info-marketers selling courses, and the confirmation of good data being a core aspect of a strong social media advertising campaign.
Throughout 2019, our team has spent well over 6-figures in media dollars on social media advertising, and there are a few key trends that stood out.
Based on what we’ve experienced, here are five key social media advertising tips for improving your approach in 2020.
1. Consider Increasing Budgets
Boom – right out of the gate I hit you with the nasty b-word.
Social media channels have become increasingly competitive over the years, especially Facebook and Instagram. I’ve been doing digital advertising since Facebook implemented ads, and have been witness to the rising costs that come with successful campaigns.
In 2020, you absolutely must consider increasing your budgets if you want to be competitive. And I’m not just saying spend more because I’m a dastardly advertiser, there is logic to this approach.
All social media platforms are improving the machine learning behind their advertising platforms. For these machines to learn, they need data, and as social media advertising campaigns run, they collect and aggregate data in search of users who are most likely to convert.
Essentially, you’re paying for that data, therefore, the fewer dollars you spend, the less data you’re aggregating. Less data means longer times to optimize, and a longer waiting period to positive ROI.
Take a hard look at your budgets and make sure you are setting yourself up for success next year.
2. Video, Video, Video
Did you know that marketers who use video grow revenue roughly 49% faster than non-video users?
If you haven’t been using video in your social advertising campaigns, you’re missing out. Not only is video more engaging than other media, but it can supercharge your targeting on Facebook.
With Facebook Custom Audiences, you can create a ‘warm’ audience of people who’ve watched a certain amount of video from your page. Then, you can create a Lookalike Audience to prospect for users who look and behave just like the original video watchers.
Why is this important? Because anyone watching more than 50% of a video is likely interested in its content, and therefore more likely to buy.
A lot of brands we work with are frustrated because they don’t have video content to use, however Facebook now has some really great, lightweight tools which enable you to string together even still images to build a video. This can a perfect way to ease into using video in your social ad campaigns.
3. Get More Familiar with Pixels
Every social media platform that offers advertising has pixels, and these little snippets of code enable websites to share data with the social media providers to help inform advertising campaigns.
Facebook’s Pixel, in particular, is incredibly powerful, and should be used with every campaign.
From creating Custom Audiences to creating Custom Conversions, getting pixel-savvy is an absolute must if you want your social ad campaigns to be competitive in 2020. Not only is the access to data amazing, you can actually tell Facebook what objective you want to optimize against. This is a great way to build an effective sales funnel.
