Facebook ads tend to come with a lot of baggage. You need to know about the available ad tools, how to use them, your targeting and bidding options, and character count and text on image rules. You need to know about split testing, and what makes for a “good” CPC price. You need to know about the different ad types, and how to read reports.

Then once you have all of those things figured out, you need to create a strategy for your Facebook ads, and follow through with it.

And not to intentionally put a wrinkle in your Facebook ad strategy, but the ads you are choosing to run right now can serve an immediate need like getting the word out about a new sale or product launch while also setting the stage for the next ad in your line-up.

4 Ways Today’s Facebook Ad will Improve Tomorrow’s

• Facebook Ads Reports will show you who clicked (and who didn’t) The most difficult ad to set up is always the first one. You may know the ins and outs of your ideal customer profile, have done your targeting research, and have your text and images ready, but until you plug it all in and run at least one Facebook ad, you don’t really know what kind of response you are going to get. The interest targeting that *should* work the best might only be so-so. The core age range of buyers might not be the core age range of Facebook users interacting with your ad. And the image you’re split-testing with what you thought was the less desirable color, may be the one that performs the best. No matter what, once your first ad is complete, you’ll have actionable data to guide (better) future Facebook ad campaigns.
• Run a promoted post to increase website visits…to build your custom audience A promoted post is one of the most common types of Facebook ads and can be used to advertise most anything. If you use a promoted post to push people to visit your website or online store, you are also helping to grow your custom audience through retargeting. Once your custom audience is of a respectable size, you can use it for a future ad.
• Run a Likes ad to increase Page Likes…to be able to advertise to only your fans I’m not a fan of Page Likes ads just for the sake of having a higher number of Likes. Yes, you’ll want an initial base for an element of social proof, but it’s been well-established by this point all the challenges involved with Facebook’s pay-to-play algorithm. My point about Page Likes ads is always this: Why pay Facebook to accumulate more people who aren’t (organically) seeing what you post? A caveat to this is the ability to advertise only to people who already Like your page. If you do some smart and legitimate Page Likes ads and you accumulate relevant followers, you can create a nice advertising base to use for future ad campaigns. We all know that it’s easier to sell to people who are already familiar with your brand.
• Promote a contest, then invite those post likes to become fans One of the “happy side effects”, as I call them, for running a paid Facebook ad campaign is the high number of Post Likes you receive. Post Likes are the easiest engagement to come by, and something you’ll receive even without asking for them. And then? You can click on the count of Post Likes, and then click to invite anyone on that list who isn’t already a fan of your page.

With a little bit of extra planning, you can help your future ads pack a bigger punch thanks to the Facebook ads you are running right now.