Facebook ads are great. They are easy to set up and can be super effective at a fraction of the cost of other ad networks.

But how do you optimise your Facebook ads? How can you ensure maximum conversion?

1. Do you know your ads?

You should know which kind of Facebook ads are performing well. If you don’t, install Facebook Pixel on your website now. It is a simple snippet of code that will allow you to track a user after he click on your Facebook ad. Details like whether a user fill out a form or browse your product pages will give you great insights into which ads are generating leads and convert best.

Image 1: Pixel dashboard gives you a wealth of information.

Ads that get people to click through to your website are great but it’s even better if they get them to click on the buy button. Such insights help to optimise your limited marketing dollar and help to make you look good in front of your boss.

2. Lookalike audiences

It makes sense that customers of a particular demographic and psychographic should behave similarly. If you have identified a particular group of customers that converts well, you can get Facebook to help identify similar group. You can do this in Facebook’s ads manager or Power Editor.

Image 2: Audience creation menu in Facebook Ad Manager.

You will need to provide Facebook with an original audience source. This can be from a conversion tracking pixel (from point 1) or a Page audience. You can specify people who clicked through to become fans of your Facebook page or people who clicked an ad and completed a form on your website.

Image 3: Creating a lookalike audience for better conversion

This method allows you to save time and budget and ensure you focus on people who are most likely to convert.

3. Refresh your ads

We have short attention span and we lose interest quickly. This technique is a simple one; make sure you update and refresh your ads image and copy regularly. Newer looking ads typically convert better.

Image 4 and 5: Change your image and copy to make your ad look fresh.

Swapping images and copies also allows you to do A/B testing to discover the winning formula to get people to convert in drove.

4. Use carousel ads to feature a product line or retarget customers

If you are selling a large inventory of products, you can use carousel ad unit to display more than one product at a time. This kind of ads are great for cross selling similar products or retargeting
customers who have visited your websites but have moved on without buying anything.

Image 6: Carousel ad unit

5. Facebook + Instagram

Although the audience on both Facebook and Instagram can be vastly different, they share the same targeting options when it comes to advertising on these networks. This means you can quite
quickly replicate your winning Facebook formula onto the photo centric network.

Image 7 and 8: The same targeting in Facebook can be used in Instagram.

But for ads to work on instagram, you have makes sure to pick the right kind of images. Users on the network are typically attracted to visually appealing posts