How To Succeed on Facebook – The Exciting Conclusion

In part one of this two-part post, I mentioned that I don’t really like Facebook. Between then and now, I’ve come to like it even less. You see, I spent all that time explaining how certain aspects of Facebook advertising works, and they changed the entire interface before I could write the Exciting Conclusion!

So it goes with the digital age.

Let’s have a quick look at the new interface and I’ll show you how to find the Page Like Story option that I raved about previously. Then I’ll show you another kind of “sponsored story” and how to use the two types of ads together.

We’ll wrap up with the reason you should have a Facebook advertising account even if you aren’t running ads.

The New Ad Creation Flow

When creating a new Facebook ad, you’ll initially see just one option — a prompt to select a destination.

Click in that field and you’ll be able to select your Page or type in a web address.

When you select a Page, another option appears to ask if you’re promoting the Page or a post on it.

When you specify that you want to promote your Page, you’ll finally be able to pick what kind of ad you want. The old Page Like Story is here as “People will see: Stories about their friends liking [your page].”

From there on, everything works the same. You’ll create an ad that shows to friends of your fans and tells them that their friend likes your Page.

The Page Post Like Story

To make a Page Post Like Story, you’ll select “A specific post on [your page].” when asked what you want to promote. After selecting a post, you’ll choose “People will see: Stories about their friends liking the selected post above.”

This creates an ad based on something you’ve posted on your Page, for instance a link to your blog. If anyone has clicked “Like” on that post, their friends will see this ad. They’ll see a list of their friends who have liked the post — Facebook will even try to put their closest friends first on the list. Below that, the ad will show your headline, summary and thumbnail.

It’s a great way to get traffic to a specific post. That social endorsement works wonders.

Is it any good for expanding the engaged community you’ve built for your Page? It is if you use it correctly.

Sponsored Story Synergy

Let’s say you just gave a presentation at a conference. You write up a blog entry about it and then post a link to that on your Facebook Page. Some of your fans “Like” the post because they were there and enjoyed your presentation.

Now, you make two Sponsored Story type ads.

1. Page Post Like Story that will show to the friends of the fans that “Liked” your post. Surely some of them were at the conference, too.
2. Page Like Story that will show to friends of fans. When you get new fans from the first ad, their friends will see this ad.

Between those two ads, you’ll be truly advertising through a social network. The ads will only show to friends of people you’re already connected with. Then their friends will see it when they connect. Do you see the potential for exponential growth?

Targeting for Fun and Profit

Maybe you’re not interested in actually advertising on Facebook. That’s fine, but you should still have an account even if you’re not running ads! The reason is their targeting options.

If you haven’t looked at Facebook’s targeting options, you’re missing out. You can get extremely specific, and personal. Want to know how many people in North Carolina between age 20 and 40 are single and like to play video games? There are 212,660 of them on Facebook. With 900 million active users every month, you have access to a lot of data.

So get on there and make use of it, whether you’re running ads or not!

Thanks to Marty Weintraub for helping me figure this stuff out in the first place. This post first appeared in my email newsletter.