Still worth buying Facebook ads?

Does advertising your FB page on FB still pay off?

[Augustus]

Hey guys, I just signed up to WebmasterWorld and I want to start off my first post with a quick question,

Is it still worth buying Facebook ads for your facebook page?

I have a hefty twitter following but my Facebook page is basically non-existent with 18 likes (~10 of them are people from my friends list). I was looking to experiment spending $50 at a time to see if this money would translate into likes so I can get people on my page sharing my content. I run a Canadian news website for those who are wondering.

From what I've been browsing on WebmasterWorld it seems some users are also complaining that their posts are showing up less in newsfeeds and their facebook pages are not driving as much traffic. If this is true, would investing money promoting a page be well-spent? I am fairly confident that my content will appeal to my audience as it has on twitter and that people will be inclined to share, but what is the point if facebook blocks you from even appearing on people's newsfeeds?

[edited by: not2easy at 12:28 pm (utc) on Jun 4, 2015]
[edit reason] TOS compliance [/edit]

[Augustus]

Update: I decided to try and spend $40 over 4 days to see what happens. I'll let you all know of my progress and results. Let me know if you have any questions.

[Notorious]

Hey Augustus, I too am a new WebmasterWorld user. Looks like we're in this together eh?

Anyway,

It is true that Facebook posts are showing up less in newsfeeds, which is incredibly frustrating. For example, I have a Facebook page for my new company with 700 likes, however not all of those 700 people will see a post I make. Under a post, you can see the 'reach' which is generally far less than the number of 'likes' you have to the page. For Facebook pages with a small following this really hurts us. My previous employers, who I was with for nearly 5 years, had 1.1 million Facebook page 'likes' and Facebook was our main source of traffic.

Going from a company with a large following, to my own company, I am realizing that Social Media is a huge key to traffic, the 'issue' (for lack of a better word) is building a Social Media following big enough to get to that point.

I have had success when advertising my page through Facebook, with it costing slightly less than $1 per page 'like'.

Hope this helps,

Cheers!

[isellstuff]

I've got 38K facebook followers and when I do a post, less than 100 people see it. I can spend $15 bucks and reach about 4K-6K people who already liked my page. With Facebook you have to pay to play now-a-days. If you have a loyal following and the budget to promote all of your posts, then it might be a decent idea.

I'm personally upset with Facebook, they went for the money and alienated companies that were using their platform for brand building. There are probably better ways to maintain a conversation with customers. (Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, Youtube, etc).

[Notorious]

Hey again,

There's actually a petition that I stumbled across on Change.org to get Facebook to stop making small businesses pay to reach people that already 'like' their page. Hopefully it gets us somewhere with extending our reach to people who already 'like' our page.

[Augustus]

Thanks for the comments guy! I don't have time to respond to everybody but I read all your responses and will give a more detailed response myself later! In the meantime here is another quick update from me:

spent ~$10 for 7 likes. So far it's a waste of money. I checked all the accounts that liked, they were all real people but all of them have +2000 likes so my page will be buried. I targeted older people (45-65+) because I assumed they would have more time to spend checking news 24/7 but I lowered the min age to 35 and I may lower further because it seems these older folks just like everything and don't really know how to use facebook too well. I also put a max bid of $0.3 CPC because I'm not paying over $1 for a like that won't translate into shares or more traffic.

[Planet13]

There's actually a petition that I stumbled across on Change.org to get Facebook to stop making small businesses pay to reach people that already 'like' their page. Hopefully it gets us somewhere with extending our reach to people who already 'like' our page.

I am skeptical about the potential effectiveness of such a petition.

It seems that one would get a much better return on investment by getting people to sign up for their own email list or getting them to go to their websites, rather than spending money to get people to like their facebook profile.

You are basically paying money to facebook so they can have MORE control over your marketing efforts.

At least, that's how it seems to me.

[Cabby]

I only have 13 likes, but my Facebook page still sends me a lot of business. People mention that's how they found me quite often. With that said I do have 3 major keywords I am targeting in the URL, and I am in a small market for my niche. I own a small taxi service in a city of around a 100,000.

Liza

[mikhailblaze]

Hi there.

Back in the day, it was so damn easy to reach people not in your target audience. I run a basketball fan page, and we have over 50,000 likes. On average, our posts are only seen by 5% of our audience.

Regardless, yes, Facebook ads are worth it. Depending on the amount you shell out, a page with 645 likes can get over a few hundred impressions from the people you target. A dozen clicks is already a bonus, particularly if you reach your desired audience.