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All About Instagram Ads

We talk about Facebook ads a lot. Like, a lot a lot. We’ve even featured Facebook Messenger ads quite a few times. But we don’t always get into Instagram ads. And they deserve way more attention than you might think. 

Today’s Listen has got the scoop on why Instagram ads have all the potential—maybe even more than FB ads. For real? Totes. Depending on your demographics, Insta might serve your ads even better. Amy Porterfield sat down with Rick Mulready of Art of Paid Traffic to hash out the ins and outs of Instagram ads.

There are some seriously eye-opening stats and insights in this episode, so fill up that coffee and tune in. The good stuff starts at 02:30 and continues from there.

• (03:20) Who exactly is on Instagram—Is your demographic even there?
• (05:00) The best days and times to post on Instagram—and the worst.
• (6:55) 3 of the best times to post (2am, 8am, 5pm)
• (07:53) The percentage of Insta users that say they learned about products and services through Instagram (spoiler alert: it’s a lot)
• (08:08) The percentage of users that say they take action such as visiting sites, searching, or telling a friend after seeing an Insta post.
• (09:00) Why Facebook is too distracting and why it’s easier to stay focused on Instagram.
• (10:39) Where and how to set up your ads (on Facebook and Instagram).
• (12:09) Which ad type would be best for your business and customers—and the parameters for each.
• (13:17) The big differences between Facebook and Instagram, and why you can’t just repurpose one for the other. They go into a ton of detail about this part, so keep your ears peeled!
• (19:22) With Insta, do you have the same targeting possibilities as Facebook?
• (22:10) How to take advantage of story ads (and what happened after Amy ran her first Insta Story ad for her List Builders Lab promo).
• (28:16) Why you need to add text and emojis to your InstaStories.
• (28:59) How to choose the right objectives when creating your Instagram ad campaigns.
• (30:45) What the audience should know about Instagram ads in general.

If you wanna take some solid notes on this episode, take a trip to the transcript here.

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9 Ways to Lower Your Facebook Ad Costs

At this point in the year, your marketing budget might be running a little low. Maybe spending a ton of your budget on those branded fidget spinners wasn’t the best idea (who would’ve guessed that something created for people with short attention spans would’ve died so quickly…?).

Anyway, if you’re running a little lean these days, we’re going to help you save a few bucks with today’s Read. It’s all about lowering the costs of your Facebook ads.

Let’s gooo…

1. Target a more specific audience. When done right, targeting a smaller audience can lower your CPC, increase your quality score, and increase your CTR. Sure, you’re going to get fewer clicks, but the clicks you do get will be more valuable. Might be time to break out that Lookalike campaign you’ve been planning.
2. Use bid caps. This one is simple, but a lot of marketers don’t use it. You can simply limit the amount you’re willing to pay for a click.
3. Look for audience overlap. Use Facebook’s Audience Overlap tool to figure out if any of your ads are competing against each other. No sense in bidding against yourself if you don’t have to.
4. Test, test, test. Keep trying different creatives and different ad copies to see what resonates with your audience best. We like to use eye-catching images. You need something that will make your audience stop scrolling. But, even when you find an ad that really works well, you’ll likely need to switch it up after a few weeks. Ad fatigue is a real thing.
5. Get very specific with retargeting. You shouldn’t just retarget all website visitors. It’s very likely that a lot of those visitors will just never buy from you. Narrow it down to just people who have visited specific pages.

Still a few more we haven’t covered…

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Low Elf-Esteem

Maybe you could by all the Halloween ads we featured in October, but… we love a good holiday spot. They’re also everywhere right now. While we miss the creepy creative of October, these latest seasonal ads boast adorable animation and narratives that warm our hearts. Which is perfect timing because Pittsburgh is hella cold right now.

Today’s Watch has it all—cute characters, a heartwarming narrative, and some added humor in the form of an elf’s existential crisis. As the story opens, we see the elf with his various pals trying to decorate a tree. (They’re all festive ornaments.) But the elf is so disenchanted by it all that he journeys across a yuletide landscape in search of ornaments that know how to hang.

The spot is for Myer, a department store in Australia, and they’ve got their social media strategy figured out. Part of the campaign includes sharing the short film on Facebook—for every post shared, Myer will donate $1 to The Salvation Army.

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