Online advertising has become a prominent force in an organisation’s marketing activities, with the standard approach seeing companies create adverts based on modelling the user’s needs and interests. However, there is a surprisingly low level of effort dedicated to what actually happens after an advert is clicked on (Becker et al, 2009).
Advertisers spend obscene amounts of money on buying traffic, but the effort that they devote to the landing page in which the user is sent to is often negligible (Ash, 2008). In many cases, strong adverts are created which encourage users to click, however, once users arrive on the landing page the bounce rate is high, which impacts negatively on the conversion rate (Zigmond et al, 2009).
Of course, it is difficult to answer why users do not respond to landing pages but there are certain tips that you can follow in order to create a successful landing page (Ash, 2008).
Firstly, what is a landing page and why is it important?
A landing page is any webpage on which an online visitor first arrives on their way to an important action that you would like them to take. The landing page may be part of your main website, or a stand-alone page designed specifically to receive traffic from a digital marketing campaign (Ash, Ginty & Page, 2012).
The ultimate goal of advertising is conversion, which is the transformation of a user who has clicked on the advert into a ‘buyer’ of the product or service which is being advertised (Becker et al, 2009). If a user clicks on your advert, but the landing page is ineffective in encouraging them to convert, this is going to ultimately affect your overall goal and waste advertising spend.
With this in mind, I have provided a combination of key points to help you ensure that your landing page is effective in encouraging users to complete the desired action on your webpage:
1) Keep it simple and relevant
The amount of information that users have access to online is vast (Cranor, 2012), therefore they are able to consciously or subconsciously avoid the information that they do not find relevant. If a user lands on your page and is faced with an overload of information, it is likely to decrease the perceived quality of the message that you are conveying, and defer them away from completing the desired action (Salyer, 2013).
An often forgotten, but fundamental aspect to ensure landing page success is relevancy. One of the main reasons that organisations fail in their online advertising efforts is that their landing page does not deliver what the advert promises (Ash, 2008).
That is why it is important to make sure that your landing page is simple and relevant. Ensure that it contains a minimalistic level of relevant content in order to match the needs of the user and defer away from creating an information overload.
As an example, let’s take a look at an advert on Facebook and the landing page:
Facebook advert:
Landing page:
The landing page created by Adobe is an effective example of a landing page which contains minimalist information which is not only relevant to the advert upon which a user clicks, but also does not require a large amount of the users time in order to absorb the level of information
2) Have a clear call-to-action
Clear call-to-actions are a fundamental aspect in advertising, as users are more likely to act when they are prompted to do so (Loomer, 2014). If you do not make it obvious what you want the user to do when they land on your page, it is likely to defer them away from completing the desired action.
The type of call-to-action is dependent on the product/service that you are advertising, so make sure that it is relevant. For example, in the retail sector it could be ‘Buy Now’, whereas in the public sector it could be ‘Find Out More’ or ‘Register Your Interest’.
3) Do not ask for a large amount of information
As online advertising increases, users are far more in control of the choices that they make in relation to the actions that they choose to take (Salyer, 2013). Their patience for completing long-winded actions is deteriorating, therefore if they perceive that performing an action is going to take a large amount of time, they are likely to defer away from doing so (Rauniar et al, 2014).
This is related to the Davis (1989) Technology Acceptance Model, which although may be viewed as a dated model, still remains a useful source for organisations seeking to understand user acceptance of technology (Park, 2009).
Source: Davis (1989)
The main aspect which can be utilised for understanding landing page success is the perceived ease of use. This is the degree to which the prospective user expects the action to be free of effort (Sago, 2013). The lower the level of perceived effort, the more likely it is that the user will convert, so make sure that you only ask for the information that you really need.
4) Split test
It is difficult to understand why users do or do not respond to a landing page (Ash, 2008), but split testing your landing pages can help determine the type of content which is likely to encourage your audience to convert.
Every user is different, which means that their preferred choice of content also differs. Create multiple landing pages with different content in order to distinguish which best resonate with your audience.
For more information on the importance of split testing please find my previous blog here.
5) Communicate the benefits & include testimonials
Online users today are more sceptical than ever, meaning that the most difficult challenges that organisations face are communicating why a user should choose their product/service rather than a competitors and what makes their offering distinctive and unique (McKenna, 2006).
The problem is that most organisations believe that focusing primarily on factual information is sufficient enough in encouraging the user to convert (Kim & Fesenmaier, 2008). What many do not realise is that once the user has landed on the page, it is important that the benefits of converting are also communicated. This is because online users are primarily interested in completing actions which are going to provide them with some form of benefit, whether it be tangible or intangible (Cataneda, Rodriguez & Luque, 2009).
An effective way of communicating the benefits is through implementing testimonials. A testimonial is a written form of communication from a user about your product/service offering which states what is special about your firm and your firm’s offering. The power of a testimonial can unlock the subconscious minds of your audience and draw them in by providing evidence of success, building trust and providing credibility and reassurance (McKenna, 2006).
Below is an example of a testimonial taken from Salesforce. The aspect which is particularly strong is how the firm has referred to its testimonials as ‘customer stories’. This method creates emotional impact and indicates that the organisation care about the difference that their system makes to customers.
Source: Salesforce (2015)
To look further at the testimonials created by Salesforce for thoughts and ideas click here.
6) Include links to social media
Users are increasingly seeking to engage with brands on social media (Schawbel, 2015), so make sure that you include links to your social media sites in order to encourage users to connect with you, thus increasing your social media fan base.
Utilise your social media links not just by encouraging users to become a member of your fan base, but also by encouraging them to share your product/service offering with their peers. By tapping into online communities, your audience reach is broadened and the opportunity of online word-of-mouth is created (Jahn & Kunz, 2012).
Concluding Points
The points discussed above are predominantly focused on the goal of conversions; however, what is also important in your digital marketing efforts is creating awareness and engagement. Many businesses focus solely on getting users to convert, with a lack of understanding in regards to the importance of creating online awareness.
It should be understood that an effective landing page is not enough for success, it is also very much about a user’s attitude towards the product/service, brand, brand behaviour and the firm itself (Cataneda, Rodriguez & Luque, 2009). You may have strong advertising and an effective landing page, but if a user is not aware of your brand or has a negative perception, they are likely to defer away from converting, so make sure that you focus just as much attention on creating a positive online brand presence.
To determine the effectiveness of your landing page, ask yourself the following questions which can be found in an interesting Forbes article here.
For further reading on the subject, please see the references below:
Ash, T. 2008, Start Thinking About LANDING PAGE OPTIMIZATION, Penton Media, Inc., Penton Business Media, Inc. and their subsidiaries, Rockville [accessed 09 April 2015]
Ash, T., Ginty, M., & Page, R. (2012). Landing page optimization: the definitive guide to testing and tuning for conversions. John Wiley & Sons.
Castañeda, J.A., Rodríguez, M.A. & Luque, T. 2009, “Attitudes’ hierarchy of effects in online user behaviour”, Online Information Review, vol. 33, no. 1, pp. 7-21.
Cranor, L.F. 2012, “Can Users Control Online Behavioral Advertising Effectively?”, IEEE Security&Privacy Magazine, vol. 10, no. 2, pp. 93-96.
Davis, F.D. (1989). Perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, and user acceptance of information technology. MIS Quarterly, 13(3), 331-340
Jahn, B. & Kunz, W. 2012, “How to transform consumers into fans of your brand”, Journal of service management, vol. 23, no. 3, pp. 344-361.
Kim, H. & Fesenmaier, D.R. 2008, “Persuasive Design of Destination Web Sites: An Analysis of First Impression”, Journal of Travel Research, vol. 47, no. 1, pp. 3-13.
McKenna, P.J. 2006, “Testimonials as a differentiation tool”, Of Counsel, vol. 25, no. 11, pp. 5
Park, S. Y. (2009). An Analysis of the Technology Acceptance Model in Understanding University Students’ Behavioral Intention to Use e-Learning. Educational Technology & Society, 12 (3), 150–162.
Sago, B (2013) ‘Factors influencing social media adoption & frequency of use: An examination of Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Google +’ [Online], Vol 3 (Issue 1) [accessed 14 April 2015]
Zigmond, D, Sundar, D, Interian, Y, Navemiouk, I (2009) ‘Measuring advertising quality based on audience retention’ Journal of Advertising Research [Online], Vol 49 (Issue 4) [accessed 09 April 2015]
When writing one of my recent posts ‘Best Practice Guide: Facebook Advertising For Councils and Local Authorities‘, it highlighted just how important it is in Facebook advertising to split test your adverts. I have therefore decided to write a post on the importance of split testing, and how to best go about it.
One of the biggest reasons that brands fail in their Facebook advertising efforts is that they do not split test (Loomer, 2012). They create one or two ads, find that they do not succeed and label it a failure. That is why you must try out multiple variations in order to understand what resonates with your target audience. When you realise something that does not work, stop spending money on it, when you discover something that does, keep going with it.
What is split testing?
Split testing, known as A/B testing, allows you to test different elements of your advertising in order to determine which will help you to achieve your objectives (Loomer, 2012). It allows you to show different experiences to different users to measure the impact of those differences, and is thought of as a fundamental factor in obtaining value from advertising and growing your online business (Jenkins, 2014).
Split testing gives you access to data, which gives you a competitive advantage because the more data that you have on what your audience likes, the better your product/service can be (Jenkins, 2014). Many observers believe that receiving data through split testing helps organisations to ‘leapfrog’ and become the best in the class due to having the ability to make better decisions based on experience rather than intuition (McGuire, Mayika & Chui, 2012).
The question is what aspects of Facebook advertising can be split test?
The way in which you split test your adverts is dependent on the industry in which you operate and the type of products/services that you are selling. However, the following points, based on a guide written by Jon Loomer (2012) which can be found here, can be used universally and should work as a checklist to help you successfully split test your advertisements:
1) Copy
In Facebook standard adverts, you have 90 characters to persuade a user to complete a desired action (Facebook, 2015). This is a small character limit, meaning that you will need to test different variations in order to understand which type of messaging is going to be effective at persuading users to convert.
Standard advert example:
Source: Facebook (2015)
It is slightly different if choosing to advertise through sponsored posts, as the character limit for the body is 500 words; therefore you have an increased amount of words to convey your key message to your audience. Facebook does, however, advise not to fulfil the 500 word limit in order to keep the message short and catchy (Facebook, 2015).
Facebook sponsored post example:
Source: Facebook (2015)
Create adverts and switch up the copy through using different words, call to actions, tones and punctuation. Let’s say that you are a local authority or council seeking to recruit foster carers, but you are unsure on the type of messaging needed to encourage users to convert. Create three different advert variations, each with different content and a different call-to-action. For example your first advert may focus on the support and training which would be provided when becoming a foster carer with your organisation with the call to action ‘Find out more’, whereas the second may focus on making a difference to a local child’s life with the call to action ‘Register your interest’.
2) Imagery
We already know that imagery is the key to advertising success on social media, as your advert is competing for attention against user friends and family (Facebook, 2015). Imagery in advertising is so important in fact, that Rossiter (1980) believes that it has the potential to change user attitude towards completing a particular action.
What we do not know, however, is which images are likely to persuade a user to complete a desired action. It is important to remember that all users are different (Close, 2012) so the preferred imagery will be different from person to person and demographic to demographic.
Recommendations for imagery are to use different faces in different scenarios, as well as text imagery, in order to distinguish the type of image which resonates with your target audience.
3) Landing Page
Advertisers spend obscene amounts of money to buy traffic, but the effort that is devoted to the landing pages to which the user is sent is often negligible (Ash, 2008). It is important to remember that all of your hard work in creating adverts comes down to a few precious moments when the user arrives on your landing page.
You have created strong adverts through effective content and imagery which are encouraging users to click on the advert; however, users are not completing the desired action on your page. This means that your bounce rate is high, which impacts negatively on your conversion rate (Zigmond et al, 2009), therefore ultimately affecting your overall goal.
It is difficult to answer why users are or are not responding to your landing page (Ash, 2008), but there are ways to determine the type of content that encourages your audience to convert. With the same advert; create multiple landing pages in order to determine which is the most successful at increasing conversions after the initial click is made.
4) Demographics
You may have the right content, with the right imagery, but your adverts could be targeted at the wrong audience. You have the option to select different imagery and copy that will appeal to a specific demographic, or try out a generic ad and split test it to different age and gender groups (Loomer, 2012).
By running your adverts to different audiences you will be able to understand the age and gender which correlates with your product/service offering, therefore decreasing the chances of aiming your adverts to the wrong audience which can cause advertising wastage (Greenyer, 2004).
5) Detailed Targeting vs No Targeting
Facebook offers a range of audience targeting options to choose from in order to help organisation’s meet their goals. These options are custom audiences, lookalike audiences, location, demographic, interests, behaviours, education and connections (Facebook, 2015). For local authorities and councils seeking to recruit foster carers, for example, this means that you are able to target people who display interests in pages relating to fostering and caring for young people, for example ‘Fostering Network’ or ‘UK Children’s Charities’. Or for organisations in the retail sector, you are able to target people who display interests in pages relating to fashion and beauty.
These multiple targeting options provided by Facebook increase the likeliness of reaching out to the right people (Marcella, 2009), however they mean that it is sometimes possible to overthink your audience (Loomer, 2012). Targeting an advert too specifically means that you may potentially cut out a segment which is likely to respond, so it is important that you test your adverts at both a specific and broad audience in order to ensure that you are not missing out on a particular segment.
The Importance of Continuous Split Testing
Many organisations believe that split testing advertising only needs to be done once in order to create value; however it needs to be carried out on a continuous basis. This is because things change a lot.
Technology is continuously developing and adapting, which is driving the need for organisations to change the way that they market their products and services. As the population spend more time on their mobiles, tablets and laptops, organisations are realising that they need to connect with their audience through these devices (Benady, 2014). Investment in digital marketing is continuing to grow, with 77% of organisations saying that they intend to increase budgets in 2015 (Charlton, 2015).
This increase in digital marketing intensifies the competition for organisations seeking to attract the attention of users, as there are a large variety of options available for them to choose from. As technological advances increase, users are now far more empowered and in control, and their tastes and preferences are changing on a continuous basis (Forbes, 2014). Therefore, split testing your digital marketing efforts needs to be carried out on a continuous basis in order to stay ahead of competitors and meet the needs of your audience.
Concluding Points
Split testing adverts is an extremely beneficial way to understand how you can best reach your goals (Loomer, 2012), as it allows you test varying factors in order to understand both your audience type, and the type of content that resonates best with that audience. The data captured from split testing creates competitive advantage as you are able to continuously make your product/service better based on experience rather than intuition (McGuire, Mayika & Chui, 2012).
It is, however, important to remember that split testing needs to be carried out on a continuous basis in order to keep up with advances in technological systems and changes in user behaviour, tastes and preferences (Forbes, 2014).
To find out more about how you can best split test your Facebook adverts, watch the video below:
Source: YouTube (2013)
For further reading on the topic, please see the references below:
Ash, T. 2008, Start Thinking About LANDING PAGE OPTIMIZATION, Penton Media, Inc., Penton Business Media, Inc. and their subsidiaries, Rockville [accessed 09 April 2015]
Close, A. (2012) Online consumer behavior: theory and research in social media, advertising, and e-tail, Routledge Academic, London [accessed 09 April 2015]
Greenyer, A. (2004) ‘The impact of different media channels on consumers and the wastage of potential advertising opportunities through existing customer communications’, Journal of Financial Services Marketing, vol. 8, no. 3, pp. 279-290 [accessed 09 April 2015]
Marcella, V (2009) Critical Evaluation of Internet Advertising. Germany: Druck und Bindung.
McGuire, T., Manyika, J. & Chui, M. 2012, “WHY BIG DATA IS THE NEW COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE”, Ivey Business Journal Online, , pp. N_A. [accessed 09 April 2015]
Rossiter, J.R. 1980, “Attitude Change through Visual Imagery in Advertising”, Journal of Advertising, vol. 9, no. 2, pp. 10-16 [accessed 09 April 2015]
Zigmond, D, Sundar, D, Interian, Y, Navemiouk, I (2009) ‘Measuring advertising quality based on audience retention’ Journal of Advertising Research [Online], Vol 49 (Issue 4) [accessed 09 April 2015]
The benefits of Facebook advertising have been argued upon, with some stating that it is a highly effective method for reaching targeted online communities (Tuten, 2008) and others sceptical about the level of privacy it provides the online user with due to the platforms ability to access a high level of user information (Truong & Simmons, 2010).
The aim of this blog is to provide an insight into two Facebook advertising features which have been criticised for harnessing privacy concerns, but that could, however, help local authorities and councils to reach out to the right people. My previous blog focuses on Facebook advertising best practice guidelines, if you are interested, please find it here.
Custom Audiences
Custom audience targeting is a feature which has recently been introduced by Facebook that allows you to target your advertisements to a specific set of people who you have already established a relationship with on or off Facebook (Facebook, 2015).
Let’s say that you have a selection of email addresses or phone numbers of people who have displayed an interest in becoming a foster carer. These details could have been captured from a fostering event, for example. You can then upload this list of email addresses or phone numbers to Facebook, and if the contact details match the details on the user’s profile, Facebook will deliver your ads to those people. It is important to remember, however, that the list needs to include at least 100 people and that the larger the audience size, the more successful the campaign is likely to be (Facebook, 2015).
Source: Facebook, 2015
The custom audience feature means that you when you target your adverts, the call to action button will become enhanced, therefore increasing both the likeliness of catching the attention of the user, and the likeliness of that user converting (B&T, 2014).
Source: Facebook, 2015
By using custom audiences, you are able to reinforce your messaging to an audience of users who have already displayed an interest in becoming a foster carer. This, therefore, impacts on the level of engagement and the rate of conversion (Jon Loomer, 2014).
For advertisers that would like to find out more about Facebook custom audiences, please click here.
Lookalike Audiences
Creating a lookalike audience can be an effective accompaniment to custom audiences. The feature allows you to reach new people who may be interested in becoming a foster carer by utilising attributes such as interests or demographics, which are possessed by people in your custom audience list, fans of your Facebook page or visitors to your website (B&T, 2013).
Simply put, lookalike audiences let you use information you already have to reach a more interesting audience through the following sources:
Custom audience list: This allows you to show your adverts to people who resemble the people whose email addresses or phone numbers you have;
Page fans: This allows you to target people who look like fans of your page but who do not yet know about your organisation;
Website visitors: This allows you target people who are similar to visitors who have visited your website, visitors who have visited a specific section of your website and visitors who have visited a specific page on your website.
Source: Facebook, 2015
The success of lookalike audiences, however, is highly dependent on the sector in which the organisation operates in. Let’s take the retail sector for example, the likeliness of a consumer converting who shares similar characteristics on Facebook to an organisation’s current customer base is relatively high, therefore lookalike audiences for the retail sector have harnessed many benefits (Loomer, 2014). For the recruitment of foster carers, it is difficult to assume that a user who possesses similar characteristics to those from the above three sources has an interest in becoming a foster carer; therefore it is far more complex.
Based on this, a recommendation for implementing lookalike audiences in order to reach out to potential foster carers would be to split test the three sources discussed above. Create one advert and target it at three different lookalike audience types: 1) Those who are similar to your custom audience list 2) Those that are similar to users who have liked your page 3) Those that are similar to visitors who have visited the fostering section of your website. From this, measure which of your three lookalike audiences are generating the most enquiries and which are not in order to understand which of your lookalike audiences are the most effective at helping to reach your goals.
For advertisers that would like to find out more about Facebook lookalike audiences, please click here.
Privacy Concerns
The ability to collect a large amount of personal data from users and use this data to target marketing appeals, however, has increased the privacy concerns of users. Users may perceive the personalised advert content as appealing and aligned with their interests, or they may view it as off-putting if they believe that their privacy has been violated (Tucker, 2014).
If users feel that their privacy is being invaded, it is likely to lead to “reactance”, which is a motivational state in which a user resists something that they find forced by behaving in the opposite way to intended (Tucker, 2014).
There are mixed opinions on the use of custom audiences and lookalike audiences, with some stating that the targeting options are an invasion of user privacy and others stating that an email address is no less sensitive than the data which is accumulated with partner categories, such as buying histories, lifestyle and home ownership status (Loomer, 2012).
Recommendations
Heightened user privacy concerns and user reactance should be viewed upon as highly important aspects to address. The type of advert content implemented is a key method for distilling away from appearing intrusive. For example, messaging such as ‘Are you considering fostering?’ or ‘Interested in fostering but worried about taking the next step?’ would be effective at softly communicating the key message and decreasing the chances of user reactance.
The changes to alter user privacy concerns also need to be made my Facebook. Its current privacy policy contains an overwhelming amount of information, which would benefit from being condensed into a presentable, user-friendly document. Although many Facebook users may still refrain from reading the policy, clear communication of its privacy practices is vital (O’Brien & Torres, 2012).
Concluding Points
Both custom and lookalike audiences are beneficial methods for local authorities and councils seeking to recruit foster carers, due to their ability to increase the chances of reaching out to the right people. If choosing to implement custom audiences it is important to remember that you need at least 100 contact details (Facebook, 2015). If choosing to implement lookalike audiences a suggestion is that you split test all three available sources in order to determine which audience gains foster carer enquiries and which audience does not.
It is, also, vitally important to remember that the increase of social media usage is accompanied by a rise in user privacy concerns (Goldfarb & Tucker, 2010). Therefore the type of messaging that you choose to implement is critical in order to avoid appearing intrusive.
For further reading on the topic, please see the references below:
“Facebook launches Custom Audiences”, 2014, B & T Weekly, [Online] [accessed 06 April 2015]
“Facebook rolls out lookalike audiences globally”, 2013, B & T Weekly, [Online] [accessed 06 April 2015]
Goldfarb, A., Tucker, C. (2011) ‘Privacy Regulation and Online Advertising’. Privacy Regulation and Online Advertising,[Online] Vol 57 (Issue 1), pp. 57-71 <pubsonline.informs.org/doi/abs/10.1287/mnsc.1100.1246> [accessed 6 April 2015]
O’Brien, D. & Torres, A.M. (2012), “Social networking and online privacy: Facebook users’ perceptions”, The Irish journal of management, vol. 31, no. 2, pp. 63-97 [accessed 07 April 2015]
Truong, Y., Simmons, G. (2010) Perceived intrusiveness in digital advertising: strategic marketing implications. Journal of Strategic Marketing, [Online] Vol 18 (Issue 3) [accessed 06 April 2015]
Tucker, C.E. 2014, “Social networks, personalized advertising, and privacy controls”, Journal of Marketing Research, vol. 51, no. 5, pp. 546.
Tuten, T (2008) Advertising 2.0: Social Media Marketing in a Web 2.0 World. United States: Praeger Publishers.
Many councils and local authorities fear having a presence on social media, with questions such as “How should we use it?”, “Isn’t it very risky?”, “Do we have an audience to target?” What many do not realise is that, if done well, social media advertising has the real potential to change the way that things are done and deliver meaningful impact (BDO, 2012).
In order to experience the benefits from Facebook advertising, it is important that there is a level of understanding on how to best implement it, as a bad page is often worse than no page at all. So, here is my best practice guide for local authorities and councils looking to develop Facebook advertising into their marketing activities in order to recruit foster carers:
1) Understand the needs and preferences of potential foster carers
The starting point for using social media is to understand what potential fosters want to see, and use this information to drive how you advertise. It is harmful, however, to assume that all potential foster carers are interested in finding out about the same factors, but advertising can be formed on a basis of addressing a wide array of potential foster carer needs.
A way of doing this could be to utilise your current network of foster carers. Ask them collectively what their thought process was and worries were in the primary stages of considering fostering and use this understanding to create advertising content. This way, you are producing content based on factual evidence of what it is foster carers want to see. Here are a few of my suggestions on the types of content to include:
– Training & support;
– Different types of fostering;
– Foster carer allowances;
– Real-life success stories of current foster carers.
The following link provides an overview of common fostering FAQs which may prove useful when shaping Facebook advertising content around the needs and preferences of foster carers: http://bit.ly/1Dnn3LE
2) Show the benefit that people would get from becoming a foster carer
In light of best practice point number one, it is important that, as well as remembering about your audience of users who may already be considering fostering, you also remember about users who may not have it in their mind-set to become a foster carer.
This is through showing the benefits that people would get from becoming a foster carer, rather than focusing on the informational aspects such as training, support and allowances. The key message to portray is the difference that the individual would be making to a child’s life and their own by becoming a foster carer.
3) Use strong imagery
Once you have created content, you need to focus on the type of imagery that you choose. Remember, your ad is competing for people’s attention with stories from their friends and family, so it is important that the ad is perceived as belonging in the individual’s newsfeed (Facebook, 2015). The use of imagery is critical as it is likely to be the first part of the advertisement that the user is drawn to (Chang, 2013).
Below is an image which has been used by Manchester City Council. The use of text and the words which have been used are both extremely powerful factors in grabbing the attention of the user. The text signifies the difference that would be made by becoming a foster carer.
Source: Manchester City Council, 2015
4) Split test your adverts
One of the biggest reasons that organisations fail in their Facebook advertising is that they do not split test. Instead, they create one or two adverts, and if they do not find success, they label it a failure (Loomer, 2012).
Split testing your adverts allows you to test different content and imagery against different demographics, however, Facebook recommends that you keep all targeting consistent within a campaign whilst testing different adverts, or alternatively, keep all advert components the same whilst testing different target audiences (Facebook, 2015). This method of testing, known as A/B testing, allows you to determine which content and audience will help you to achieve your objectives by providing understanding into what works and what does not (Loomer, 2012). Try it, if it fails, stop spending money on it, if it works, keep going with it.
4) Educate, train and communicate with staff
You may have powerful content and imagery, however, it is also important that staff are educated and trained on how to monitor engagement. A survey found that 82% of staff at local authorities and councils experience some level of confusion in relation to using social media advertising (BDO, 2012). Risk is a common concern due to messages on social media spreading fast, so reinforce confidence into your staff members by providing consistent education and training (Norman, 2012).
Besides educating and training staff, it is also important to be open and clear about what your organisation hopes to achieve from Facebook advertising. Keeping staff ‘in the loop’ is a fundamental way of keeping them engaged and motivated (Fallon, 2014).
5) Measure your activity
By measuring the engagement levels and response rate received as a result of your Facebook advertising, future marketing decisions can be made based on experience rather than intuition, which are often, better made decisions. Measuring what your audience responds to also allows you to tailor marketing activities and produce effective, personalised marketing which matches the wants and needs of your audience (Mcafee & Brynjolfsson, 2012).
An interesting Harvard Business Review article can be found here which discusses the importance of measuring your activity and how it can benefit organisations.
Limitations & further recommendations
Although Facebook advertising harnesses many benefits, it is important to remember that unlike Google Search advertising, which is in the form of pull advertising (Google AdWords, 2015), Facebook is in the form of push advertising. This means that, in essence, you are fighting for people’s attention against stories from their friends and family (Facebook, 2015), whereas with Google Search your advert is appearing against a search term made by a user who displays a clear interest in becoming a foster carer.
This is why it is fundamental that the content is tailored closely to what you think users want to see, and that the imagery used is sharp and effective at catching the attention of the user. Of course, it is difficult to assume that the content you create is what your audience wants to see, therefore a recommendation is to split test your adverts in order to find out what works (Loomer, 2012).
Concluding points
The best practice guidelines given above can be beneficial for local authorities and councils seeking to implement Facebook advertising into their marketing activities, however, it should be understood that these points alone are not enough to secure success. For further recommendations on how to best implement social media advertising into your marketing activities, an interesting article can be found here by The Guardian which suggests seven tips for using Facebook if you work in the public sector.
My next blog will look into the features offered by Facebook advertising which I think may be of use to local authorities and councils, so please keep reading if you are interested 🙂
For further reading on the topic, please see the references below:
It’s been LGBT Fostering & Adoption week this month, so I’ve decided to create a post on using Facebook for creating awareness and reaching out to people to bust those common ‘fostering myths’.
First of all, let’s take a look at the most common misconceptions about who can foster:
– ‘I’d love to foster, but I am gay’ 1 in 3 people are under the assumption that if you are gay you can’t foster. Whether you are straight, gay or lesbian, you can foster.
– ‘I’d love to foster, but I think I am too old’ 44% of the nation think that if you are over 55 you cannot foster, however, the only age requirement is that foster carers are over 21.
– ‘I’d love to foster, but I am male’ A fifth of people believe that if you are a man you cannot foster, however both men and women can foster.
– ‘I’d love to foster, but I am single’ There are no marital status requirements to foster, you can be single.
(Action for children, 2014)
These common fostering myths are threatening to cause a fostering crisis in the UK, a crisis which can easily be prevented (Burns, 2013). It is, therefore, fundamental that local authorities and councils work hard to diminish these common misconceptions and show people that they can foster.
How? This is where creating awareness through Facebook advertising comes in.
Facebook advertising is becoming increasingly popular for raising awareness and encouraging users to become part of a form of beneficial behaviour (Thackeray, 2012). This is because it enables organisations to reach out to a wide amount of people (Danker,2014), whilst increasing the chance of reaching out to the right people through specific targeting options (Hollis, 2005).
In order to understand how organisations can effectively create awareness through Facebook advertising, let’s take a look at a recent high performing, awareness raising social media campaign:
Action for Children Fostering Myth Busting Campaign
Action for children, a UK children’s charity, ran a campaign in September 2014 as part of a drive to tackle incorrect fostering beliefs. The fostering campaign focused on the lives of 15 foster carers who were once among the large amount of people who are drawn away from enquiring due to the common misconceptions.
(Source: Action for Children, 2014)
Facebook advertising for the campaign got 786 users talking, created 1,027 stories through these users liking, commenting on and sharing the content, reached 55,175 usersand gained 155 new page likes (Action for Children, 2014). Besides a huge amount of engagement, the campaign resulted in 734 fostering enquiries, a 204% increase on their last recruitment campaign (Action for Children, 2014).
What were the key reasons for such success?
Of course, it is important to remember that Action for Children is one of the largest UK children’s charities so has the advantage of a strong brand name and Facebook fan base, but to gain 734 new fostering enquiries shows that the way in which the charity advertised through Facebook was extremely effective.
The key reasons that I think the campaign was such a success was the implementation of content around real-life stories and the use of clear call-to-actions. Social media users like to be able to relate to the content that they are being shown, therefore by the charity telling stories of foster parents, it allowed users to form emotional attachments and increased the likeliness of engagement (Rauniar et al, 2013). The charity also focused specifically on telling users what to do through clear call-to-actions. Research suggests that people are far more likely to engage with an organisation if they are being told what to do and if what they are being told to do is perceived as simple (Marketing Week, 2015).
It should be understood that these are not the sole reasons for the campaigns success, but the use of real life stories and clear call-to-actions are likely to be incremental factors which increased the number of users who chose to engage with the campaign.
Why should local authorities and councils use Facebook to raise awareness?
The campaign results for Action for Children imply that consumer behaviour towards brand messages has changed from being “passive” receivers of content, such as TV and radio advertising, to becoming co-creators and multipliers of brand messages, enabling viral effects and opportunities for online word-of-mouth marketing (Jahn & Kunz, 2012). In a way, social media converts users into marketers based on the fact that they are able to share, like and comment on content; if they find the content interesting, they are likely to engage and share the messaging with their online peers (Roberts & Kraynak, 2008).
Potential limitations
In light of the Action for Children campaign, it is important to remember, however, that not all content received through a Facebook awareness campaign is going to be positive. The opinion of the public varies, so local authorities and councils need to ensure that they have a skilled workforce available to respond to any negative comments in order to diminish the chances of tarnishing the brand .This has the potential to provide both timely and costly as increased training and labour may be required (Rogers, 2014), however, the benefits of doing so are likely to outweigh the costs.
If you would like to read more about the Action for Children Myth Busting campaign, please click the following link: http://bit.ly/1CmyP6S
Danker, S. (2014). BRAND: Identity, Image and Relationships. Art Education. 67 (1), 41-51.
Hollis, N. (2005). Ten Years of Learning on How Online Advertising Builds Brands. Journal of advertising research. 45 (2), 255-268.
Jahn, B. & Kunz, W. (2012) ‘How to transform consumers into fans of your brand’, Journal of service management, vol. 23, no. 3, pp. 344-361 [accessed 21 March 2015]
Rauniar, R., Rawski, G., Johnson, B. & Yang, J. 2013, “Social Media User Satisfaction – Theory Development and Research Findings”, Journal of Internet Commerce, vol. 12, no. 2, pp. 195.
Roberts, R. R., and J. Kraynak. 2008. Walk like a giant, sell like a madman. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.
Rogers, A. (2014). Managing the Gaps in Health Care Digital Marketing. Marketing health services. 1 (2), 1.
Thackeray, R. (2012). Integrating Social Media and Social Marketing. Health Promotion Practice. 13 (2), 165-168.
With the continuous rise of organisations adapting digital & social advertising into their marketing activities, there is one aspect that has interested me the most: The use of social media advertising for promoting socially beneficial behavior in local communities.
With the number of social media users continuously growing, and users becoming increasingly reliant upon the internet for research reasons and to communicate with peers (Ryan, 2014), it is no wonder the local government and not-for-profit sector are moving a high proportion of their advertising activities online.
Social media advertising allows the sector to specifically target audiences based on age, gender, location and interests, therefore decreasing advertising wastage, (Hollis, 2005), but what it also does, unlike traditional methods of advertising such as TV, is create online social communities of people creating, co-creating, commenting and engaging in content which is applicable to their own likes and interests (Tuten, 2008). It transforms the sector’s ability to reach and engage with their target audience, through diminishing the one-way communication seen in traditional methods of advertising where an individual sees a bus advert and the journey ends there, to two-way communication whereby the user is encouraged to communicate and share their thoughts and opinions.
For example, lets take spreading the awareness of the need for foster carers in local communities. Traditionally, you may see a billboard with the words ‘Make a difference, foster with ______ Council’. This method may be successful at grabbing the attention of individuals passing by and spreading awareness, but really, the journey ends there and there is no way to clearly measure whether the advertisement has led to fostering enquiries. With social media advertising, the journey is trackable and users are able to comment on, like and share the adverts that they see. This not only creates two-way communication between a local authority and their audience, but also spreads awareness through online word-of-mouth advertising as foster carers and prospective foster carers share their thoughts in an online, public space.
Something a little bit different, but also relevant to promoting socially beneficial behavior, is a social media campaign success story based in the US. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention ran a social media advertising campaign targeting parents aged 30-55, encouraging them to inspire their children to exercise more. Awareness of the campaign grew as more and more users were encouraged to become part of bettering the health of children in the US, and after just one year, results showed a 34% increase in weekly physical activities among 8.6 million children ages 9-10 in the US (Sonya & Bryant, 2005).
Although the social media campaign ran by the CDC may not have been focusing on local communities in particular, rather the US as a whole, it provides evidence that the power of social media advertising cannot be under-estimated in creating online word-of-mouth advertising and encouraging users to become part of socially beneficial behavior. As social media usage continues to increase, I expect we will begin to increasingly see the sector tapping into online social communities, and utilizing them in order to spread awareness of socially beneficial behavior to help better local communities.
I’ll be researching lots more into this, so if it’s something that interests you, please keep reading :)…
Hollis, N. (2005). Ten Years of Learning on How Online Advertising Builds Brands. Journal of advertising research. 45 (2), 255-268.
Norman, C. (2012). Social media and health promotion. Global health promotion. 19 (4), 3-6.
Ryan, D (2014). Understanding digital marketing: Marketing strategies for engaging the digital generation. 3rd ed. London: Kogan Page Limited. 4-27.
Sonya, G., Bryant, C. (2005). Social marketing in public health. Annual review of public health. 26 (1), 319-323.
Thackeray, R., Neiger, B., Smith, A., Wagenen, S. (2012). Adoption and use of social media among public health departments. BMC Public Health. 12 (12), 1-12.
Tuten, T (2008) Advertising 2.0: Social Media Marketing in a Web 2.0 World. United States: Praeger Publishers.
Cupcake sales have increased rapidly in the past few years and have become a guilty pleasure for many. Through their eye catching presentation and ever-growing range of different flavours to suit consumer tastes, the competition to be different in the cupcake industry is forever growing.
As a cupcake fanatic, I’ve tried lots of different cupcake shops in Brighton! The best by far has been a lovely little shop called Catwalk Cakes in the North Laines, with it’s cute internal and external decor, the shop has a real feel of a traditional vintage cafe.
The cupcakes sold at Catwalk Cakes do not just taste great, they are also extremely visually pleasing for the consumer eye, a factor which Catwalk Cakes could successfully take advantage of in their digital marketing activities. So I decided to look into how it is Catwalk Cakes market their business online, and also compare their activities to those of competitors within the local area.
Yes, the shop has a presence on the three main social media platforms; Facebook, Twitter & Instagram, but are they using these platforms to their full potential? Social media marketing allows businesses to form word-of-mouth advertising as more & more people start to engage with the brand (Sago, 2013), and seeing as cupcakes are so visually pleasing, the branch could highly benefit from using the digital marketing platforms to their full potential.
My project for the new few months will be to research into my favourite Brighton cupcake shop and find out how they could be using digital marketing to it’s full potential for their marketing activities. But for now, here’s an image of some of the cupcakes they offer… Why not go and try one for yourself!
Each and every one of us receive an influx of email marketing promotions through to our inboxes every day, but what is it that makes us respond to some and ignore others?
I read an interesting article recently about how businesses need to make the online conversion process after clicking on a call to action quick, simple and user friendly as a heavy amount of content may detract a potential consumer away (Hernandez & Resnick, 2012). This is a factor which Bills, the restaurant, appears to have incorporated into their marketing techniques.
I receive, on average, 30 marketing emails a day, their origin mainly based in the retail and food sector. Due to the heavy influx, my immediate reaction is to delete them in bulk, however there was one recently that caught my eye. The subject line was clear, simple and related to my wants and needs: Bills – Dinner On Us? This email immediately caught my eye amongst the heavy amount of content displayed by other businesses.
The email content was short, concise and displayed a clear call to action. It successfully corresponded with the season of the year through pulling on people’s feelings and emotions by offering a free dinner for two in a warm, cosy environment. The advertisement was visually very appealing and easy on the eye through colours, text and imagery, all of which corresponded to create a bold advertisement without being too much for the user to take in.
The combination of the clear, simple subject line and visually appealing email advertisement corresponded effectively and encouraged me to click the call to action button which simply stated ‘CLICK HERE’. Once through to the landing page, the colours, text and imagery mirrored the email advertisement structure, therefore providing a sense of consistency, which works effectively at decreasing the drop off rate. The landing page did not require a lot of information to be entered; name, email, date of birth, post code and favourite Bills restaurant.
The example of Bills email marketing implies that businesses need to create a clear and concise subject line which feeds into the target market wants and needs. Once through to the email advertisement and the landing page, the content needs to be kept to a minimum in order to require as little as possible from the potential consumer.
Let’s hope I get that free dinner!
Hernandez, A., & Resnick, M. L. (2013, September). Placement of Call to Action Buttons for Higher Website Conversion and Acquisition An Eye Tracking Study. In Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society Annual Meeting (Vol. 57, No. 1, pp. 1042-1046). SAGE Publications.
Facebook is changing the way that organisations market to their target audience. It is transforming the traditional one-way communication whereby a target audience passively take in what is being advertised to them, into two-way communication which allows the target audience to participate more in what it is they are viewing through engaging, commenting and sharing with an organisation.
Users on the social media platform are faced on a daily basis with pages popping up on their newsfeed encouraging them to “like” the content that is being displayed, whether it be a page for a University or for a retail brand. This simple click displaying a like in a particular product or service can be used by organisations. They can use it to effectively target their Facebook advertising content at potential consumers who have displayed an interest in a product/service which is similar or corresponds with what it is they are promoting. For example, a beauty product at users who have possessed likes in beauty brand Facebook pages i.e. Loreal.
Jennifer Golbeck, director of the Human-Computer Interaction Lab at the University of Maryland, has produced varying studies into the way that people use social media. Her view is that users of Facebook should have the choice as to whether what they display an interest in on the social media platform is used by organisations for their marketing activities.
Do you agree with Jennifer and feel that Facebook users should have the right to say “I don’t want this to be used”? Or do you feel that targeting through Facebook likes is a beneficial tool to be adapted into business marketing activities and means that the content users view is tailored to their wants and needs?
Why not watch what Jennifer has to say and comment your thoughts and opinions below…
With the ever-growing strength of the internet, organisations are realising how they can use it to their advantage. Where before organisations were acting on intuition and past experiences, they are now using big data to revolutionise decision making and learn significantly more about their target audience.
The ability to learn more about their audience means that they can effectively measure not just the purchases that have been made by an online user, but also what they have looked at previously, how they navigate around the organisation’s website i.e. which website pages are receiving the most traffic, and the similarities across individuals and groups of people.
By learning more about an organisation’s target audience they are able to tailor marketing activities and produce effective, personalised marketing to match the wants and needs of the target audience, thereby increasing the chances of the online user converting to a consumer.
Marketing decisions based on Big Data rather than intuition and experience are better made decisions. Using Big Data means that the approach enables managers to decide on the basis of clear evidence. For that reason it has the potential to revolutionise the way that organisations market their products and services.
As the benefits of Big Data for an organisation increase, the cost is continuously decreasing. With these two factors in mind, it’s no wonder more and more organisations are using it to receive greater opportunities and greater competitive advantage.
Mcafee, A., & Brynjolfsson, E. (2012) Big data: the management revolution. Harvard business review, 90 (10), 60-66.
