Use These 5 Facebook Ad Hacks to Send Your Ecommerce Sales Soaring Looking for strong e-commerce growth in 2019? Think about white space on photos, a call to action button and just what your headlines say.
By Steve Tan •
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Building your own ecommerce brand can seem like quite the challenge. After all, there are a lot of other ecommerce stores out there, making it hard for your target audience to simply stumble upon your products.
Instead, you have to be aggressive by chasing ad placements that will put your products front and center -- and in my experience, few platforms are better suited for this mentality than Facebook. Though Facebook gives you plenty of options for managing how much your campaigns will cost, to see real results for your ecommerce store, you have to create ads that truly speak to your target audience.
Related: 6 Hacks to Improve Your Facebook Ad Conversions
When done right, these can dramatically improve your ecommerce sales -- and all via a single platform. Here are five essential hacks to help you get that done:
1. Use white backgrounds and the "rule of thirds" to make your product pop.
We all know that high-quality images are a must for any social media post. But when you're trying to sell a product, you need to make sure it stands out as users scroll through their feed. White space will ensure that this happens.
White backgrounds make the colors and edges of your product stand out that much more, enticing viewers to click. Following the rule of thirds will also lend an attractive balance to your ad images, creating an appealing visual layout that creates space for the product and your branding.
2. Rethink the way you target your audience.
Targeting for Facebook ads is a point that's hammered home again and again -- and for good reason. Some analyses have found that changing your audience could yield a 1,000 percent difference in the cost per click for a Facebook ad. Then, of course, there's the matter of ad effectiveness.
If you really want your Facebook ads to be effective, you need to take a very deep dive into your targeting options. For example, you can target "engaged shoppers" under the "purchase behavior" subcategory to find individuals who are more likely to buy products when they're exposed to a Facebook ad in the first place. You can even target parents based on how old their kids are -- something that can yield big dividends for certain product categories.
Great targeting requires more than the process of selecting age and location. Targeting based on user interests can also be a great way to find the most relevant audience. When you dig deep into the many subcategories that are available, you can split-test different targeting options for your ads.
From there, you can let Facebook's data do the talking to help you identify which audiences are responding best to your content. By making data-driven decisions, you'll stretch your budget further and ensure that your ads are delivered to those who are most likely to buy.
3. Unleash the power of the call to action button.
Adding a call to action button may seem like a simple step, but it's one that is surprisingly overlooked in many ecommerce campaigns. Yet past studies have found that simply embedding a call to action button in a Facebook ad can increase clickthrough rates by over 84 percent while cutting acquisition costs in half, as this Adweek article points out.
Better still, Facebook offers several different options for your call to action button, allowing you to better customize it to fit the needs of your campaign. Naturally, for most ecommerce brands, the "Shop Now" button will be the best option. However, if you also offer a subscription service, a "Sign Up" button could be even more effective.
4. Focus on your current customers.
Most ecommerce advertising seems to be focused on gaining new customers, but if you truly want to increase your sales, you may be better off focusing on the people who have already purchased from you or visited your store in the past. In fact, 60 percent of customers, according to a Nielsen study, prefer to buy products from a brand they already know and trust.
Related: 10 Hidden Facebook Marketing Hacks You Can Try Today
Facebook makes it easy to target your current customers with helpful features like the Facebook Pixel, a code which you can embed into your website and then use to retarget existing customers with your ads. You can also target those who have viewed or liked your page on Facebook to ensure an even greater return on your marketing investment.
5. Master the art of the headline.
An incredible 59 percent of Facebook users, according to a study by Columbia University and French researchers, will share a news article after only reading the headline. They won't even click on the link to see what the article actually says before sharing it with friends and family.
This somewhat sobering statistic also has a direct impact on your Facebook ads. Chances are, the vast majority of people who see your ad will glance only at the headline before deciding whether to click through or scroll away. This means you need to get your most important information into the headline -- it can't be buried later on in the ad.
Try to include special offers, pricing or other factors that make your product or service unique. If you wait to mention this information until the body text of the ad, there's a good chance the majority of your audience will never see it in the first place.
Related: How to Growth Hack the Facebook Algorithm to Reach Your Most Engaged Fans
A sound Facebook ad campaign isn't the be-all, end-all of building a successful ecommerce brand. After all, you need to properly price your products and ensure reliable fulfillment of orders if you want to create a successful store. But if you want to make a great first impression and start boosting your sales numbers, these Facebook hacks will get you off on the right foot.
