In this episode of 5 Business Rules, Monika and I offer up five tips to set yourself up for success. Spend 5 minutes with the video, or read on for the tips.
#1 Know your goals
This one sounds obvious: you want to sell your products or services.
Of course you do, but which one?
As an example, one of my clients offers translation services that range from public health studies to live event interpretations.
Yes, it’s possible someone wants both, but the ads are going to be much more successful if we focus on a specific service and target it to people likely to but that service.
#2 Know your audience
That rolls us right into the second tip: understanding who is going to buy this service and where to find them.
As you can imagine you’d speak very differently to a research scientist than a conference organizer, so once you’ve narrowed down what you’re selling, it’s time to focus in on the type of person likely to buy that service.
If you’ve heard of creating a persona, this is a great time to do so as it will help you identify the people most likely to purchase your service. For example:
- Do you want to sell to an HR director of a corporation, or a small business owner?
- Does location matter?
- What about age or interests?
Once you have a rough outline of your customer, you can target them.
If HR directors are who you’re after, than you’ll likely want to focus your ad campaign on LinkedIn and focus in on an audience based on their titles, seniority level, and company size.
On the other hand, if you are trying to sell products or services to brides-to-be, you’ll probably look more to Facebook or Instagram and target based on their relationship status, interests and if they are following certain businesses (such as TheKnot.com or Brides Magazine).
# 3 Test your ads
Now that you’ve laid the groundwork, it’s time to create your ads.
I’ve seen a lot of small business owners create an ad, toss some money behind it, and hope for the best. If the ads don’t result in sales, they think that ads just don’t work for their business.
The truth is that there are tons of factors that impact the success of the ad. The good news is most digital ad platforms allow you to do something called an A/B test, which allows you to try out two different versions of your ad to see what’s most effective.
Considering testing the following elements:
- Ad copy: the words you use
- Imagery
- Your audience – is your ad more effective for HR Managers or a Director of Operations?
#4 Have a dedicated landing page
When you place ads online, you’ll always have an opportunity to add a link to your website for people to click on. Many people pop in their homepage, and this more than anything is where I see a lot of ad campaigns break down.
Let’s imagine I ran an ad campaign around social media services. When someone clicks the link on my ad, they will expect to be taken to a page that elaborates on social media. Instead I send them to my homepage, where they may not see social media services featured.
Could they poke around and find that social media is listed as a service in my navigation menu? Absolutely. But the truth is most people aren’t going to both doing that. If the transition from the ad to your website isn’t seamless, than you’re likely to lose them.
#5 Have a free offer
Most people will not make a purchase immediately after seeing an online ad. In fact, recent studies show that a person has to be exposed to a company up to 20 times before they will convert!
If your products fall under the umbrella of an impulse buy, these rules don’t apply but if you are selling a product or service that’s several hundred, or several thousand dollars, it’s unlikely people will make a purchase on the ad alone.
That doesn’t mean it’s pointless to advertise! That means that you must have a free offer (ebook, webinar, downloadable template, discount) that someone will give you their email address in order to receive.
Once someone is on your email list, you have the opportunity to stay in touch and build a relationship that helps you work toward a sale.
Have more questions about ad campaigns? Set up a free consultation and let’s talk through them.
Want to turn your Google Analytics into real world insights?
Pop in your email and get our FREE cheat sheet!