Facebook search ads are the latest form of Facebook ads. Here’s how you can leverage them to promote your business on the platform.
Say what you want about Facebook ads, they will continue to be hugely popular for business owners. One of the biggest reasons for this being the fact that there are over 2.45 billion active monthly users on the platform. This makes it the biggest social media platform out there.
By using Facebook ads, you can seamlessly reach this massive audience.
This is perhaps the reason why, currently, about 140 million businesses use one or more types of Facebook ads every month.
What’s more, you ask?
This popular demand for ads has led Facebook to continually innovate and introduce new types of ads. Recently, Facebook launched a new version of ads called Facebook search ads and has made them available for all.
Before we get into how you can leverage them to promote your brand, let’s take a quick look at what they’re all about.
What are Facebook Search Ads?
Facebook search ads are one of the newest forms of ads on the platform. These ads appear in the search results when the users search for anything on the platform. This option was in beta testing for a while before it finally became available to all advertisers in the last quarter of 2019.
To use them, marketers can choose between Automatic Placement in their News Feed ads or go to Ads Manager and select “Facebook Search Ads.”
Facebook search ads are not a standalone choice, however. Advertisers can only choose this option when running a News Feed ad, and it will only appear on mobile. Also, it’s only Facebook that chooses the relevant search terms for displaying ads, not the advertiser.
Despite these limitations, Facebook search ads have the potential to put businesses in front of their target audience more effectively.
This is because people initiating a search for a product or service are already in a buyer mindset. It is particularly effective when your campaign goal is to introduce a product, generate leads, or increase conversions.
So, now that you know what Facebook search ads are all about, let’s take a look at how you can leverage them to promote your brand and products.
Leveraging Facebook Search Ads
Getting the audience to click on your ad is just the first step in the process. You also need to control where they go and what happens after that.
For this, you can leverage the other forms of Facebook ads to drive home your objective. The effectiveness of the Facebook search ads depends upon the type of ad you choose to use it with. So, let’s take a look at how you can leverage them.
1. Generate Leads
Facebook lead ads serve as the perfect way to generate leads for your brand. They allow people to download your content or sign up for your offers without leaving Facebook.
These ads essentially don’t require users to go to your landing page and get the entire process done quickly. When they show up in the search results, the chances are that the users may find your lead magnet useful.
This can prompt them to provide their information to you, especially because they don’t need to leave Facebook for it. As a result, you’ll be able to generate leads quickly and these can be stored in your CRM too.
2. Drive Traffic to Your Website
Facebook search ads can also help you drive traffic to your website. When you create link click newsfeed ads that allow interested users to click on the ad to reach your website, you can select the option of Facebook search ads.
Thus, whenever anyone is looking for something relevant to your brand or product, the chances are that your ad will show up.
You should create your ad such that it shows your website as the place that will help them find what they’re looking for. When they see this ad in their search results, they might be inclined to click on it and may land on your website. This website traffic can help you increase your sales.
3. Engage with Videos
People love videos, and Facebook knows this. The social network continues to invest in the Watch platform and video ads.
The Facebook video ads are similar to the link click ads but instead of having an image in ad, these ads contain videos. The best part about these ads is that they’re more engaging than the traditional link click ads as they contain videos.
So, what sort of videos can you use in these ads?
The video ads let you add videos of up to 120 minutes or 4GB size. When these ads show up among the search results, they might pique the interest of your audience and may prompt them to check the video out. This, in turn, may nudge them to click on your link and visit your website.
However, for this, it’s crucial to create high-quality videos. Poor quality content may not attract your audience.
You can use video creation tools to make stellar videos that can catch the attention of your audience and nudge them to check your video out.
4. Get on Marketplace
Facebook Marketplace is a surprisingly effective venue to sell your products and services and has lately become available for merchants. Along with listing your products, it’s also possible to advertise in the Facebook Marketplace.
With Facebook search ads, you can also display your ad in the Marketplace search feed. This would mean that your product or service would show up exactly when people are searching for it.
This can improve the chances of the people clicking on the ad and visiting your website to purchase your product or service.
5. Boost Your Reach
Boosted posts serve as a great way of building up the engagement on your Facebook account. By boosting the post, you can amplify its reach and engagement, which, in turn, can help you get more traction. For these ads, all you need to do is write high-quality content that people will want to share.
While these forms of ads may not directly impact your sales or lead generation, they can help build your brand awareness. By displaying these ads in the search results, you can boost your reach and engagement even further.
However, to ensure that your ads are on-point, you need to come up with powerful visuals and solid ad copy. After all, these are the two things that can convince the audience to check your post out. For this, you can leverage various tools for social media that can help you develop solid visuals and great ad copies.
Read More: Facebook Marketing Tools
6. Use Carousel Ads
Carousel ads are an extremely effective way to promote your products and services. They are especially helpful if you’ve got multiple products to showcase to your audience.
However, you can also use them to showcase the various features of a single product or service too. To display the features in an engaging manner, you can create posters using online poster makers.
What makes these ads special is that they’re interactive and engaging. Instead of being able to add just a single image or video, you have the option of adding up to 10 images and/or videos.
What’s more?
The audience can swipe through the carousel to browse through the different images or videos. This ensures that they view your post for longer and as a result, the chances of them engaging with it increase too. When these ads show up in the search results, your audience will be able to interact with these ads. This, in turn, can help you with lead generation.
7. Leverage Collection Ads
Facebook’s Collection ads help you showcase multiple products or services that are being sold on your website. This new-age ad format helps in making it easier for people to find, browse, and purchase new products or services in a visual manner.
Just like Carousel ads, the Collection ads also let you add images and videos. However, your photos can’t contain more than 20% text.
Bonus:
This feature is still in the works, but you might want to keep an eye out for when Facebook rolls out its Groups ads feature. They started beta testing ad placements in the Groups tab a few months ago with a select group of advertisers.
The idea is to find out if businesses will get a good response by extending their mobile News Feed campaign in this way. Considering how much Facebook is prioritizing Groups, the test will probably get some positive results.
This may also mean that ads may show up in the search feeds of groups.
Conclusion
Facebook ads can help you promote your brand and products to your audience with ease. The new Search ads make it possible to display your ads in the search results feed and the Marketplace search feed.
While these new ads aren’t standalone, they can be used alongside other newsfeed ads. You can use lead generation ads to generate new leads or drive traffic to your website with link ads.
To engage your audience even further, you can use video ads or boost posts. You should also use the Marketplace search ads to showcase your products and services in the Marketplace. Lastly, use Carousel and Collection ads to showcase multiple images or videos to promote your brand.
Do you have any questions about the new Search ads feature of Facebook? Let us know in the comments section below.