Facebook Ads: An Essential Guide for E-Commerce Retailers

Find the perfect ad campaign to target your market audience.
 
As an e-commerce retailer, to target consumers and funnel them to your Facebook business page or even your website, you need to understand how to use Facebook ads to your utmost advantage.
 
Let’s take a closer look at some of the Facebook ad benefits, the types of campaigns best used for retailers, and talk about a few methods to display your product and more importantly—your brand.

Benefits of Facebook ads for e-commerce retailersFacebook ads are a powerful inbound marketing tool for driving traffic to your site.  And it’s excellent for long-term growth.
 
Each ad campaign type uses cost-per-thousand impressions (CPM) bidding, which offers a cost-effective way to attract new consumers for e-commerce retailers. Instead of paying for each click, retailers are charged per 1,000 views.

Marketing objectives: which campaign do you choose?When you decide to create a campaign and begin the setup process, expect to be asked: “What’s your marketing objective?”

Start by choosing one of the two available campaigns: Reach and Brand Awareness.  The main difference between these two ads is this:

Reach ads essentially target the audience you need.

Because this type of ad is designed to reach the maximum viewers as possible, you get a “frequency cap” before it’s shown to the same person twice.

With this ad, you are also charged per impression—excellent for capturing the attention of a small audience.  

Brand Awareness ads go a step further, casting a more widespread net.

If your brand is new, you may need to launch an ad campaign simply to get noticed. Facebook calls this a Brand Awareness ad.

It’s wise to go with Brand Awareness first. It grabs the attention of would-be consumers, who choose to “Follow” or “Like” your product, which will eventually help build demographics and drive more targeted—and profitable!—Reach ads.
 
Using ad recall lift optimization, your e-commerce business page will only present ads to users who are most likely to become customers (by maximizing reach and recall through impressions.)
 
You are also only charged per impression, not per click. And the bid is automatic.

Build out and direct ad viewers to a Product CatalogOne optimal way e-commerce retailers can take advantage of their Facebook business page is by launching “product catalog sales” campaigns.
 
Offering products for sale on a Facebook catalog is just a start. But when retailers set a “product catalog sales” campaign objective, it returns people to products in which they’ve shown previous interest.

Use Carousels to display products Available are several ways to capture the attention of your audience:
 

• Images

• Videos

• Carousels

• Collections

 
Out of the four, Carousels offer an excellent way to dangle products in front of potential consumers. This interactive ad format prompts Facebook users to swipe “cards” to view more products.
 
But what makes this style perfect for e-commerce retailers is that it allows you to display up to ten images or videos, optimizing your ad campaign! And on each “card,” you can highlight product details, create Call-to-Actions, and even link to different landing pages.
 
Let’s also assume for a second that you’re not a direct to consumer brand and instead sell directly to designers and other businesses. Even if you lack a product catalog on your Facebook business page, Carousels can provide a product story instead.
 
If you sell tableware, imagine each card featuring an image of a dining table as it’s prepared for guests. And the final card as everyone gathered around the table enjoying themselves.   

Final thoughts on Facebook adsFacebook ads offer numerous ways to promote your brand to 2.32 billion monthly active users (MAU) worldwide. That’s an enormous amount of people.
 
But to reach the right people, it’s important to understand your brand and your target market audience. Fortunately, Facebook allows you to do both, tracking analytics and demographics. You might be surprised who your target audience is or who they become! So it’s also important to continuously monitor your analytics as you push those campaigns.
 
Now, what are you waiting for? Create your first Facebook ad!