#059: Ideas Will Make or Break Your Facebook Ads

Read Time: 4 Minutes

There are a few foundational things you need for a solid Facebook Ads strategy:

– Targeting

– Placements

– Account Structure

This makes up about 20% of your Facebook Ads success.

The other 80% of your success comes down to your Ads themselves.

It's easy to tinker with the targeting, the placements and the account structure, so that's the natural thing to do when "optimizing" our Facebook Ads.

But this will have a limited impact on your overall results.

The harder thing to do is create new Ads; new ideas, new angles, new concepts, etc.

But that's what will make or break your success with Facebook Ads and is where your results can skyrocket with one stellar Ad.

So today, I'd like to dive into the key part of my Facebook Ads research process and show you what I do to craft an Ad that not only generates a lot of sales, but also runs for months without fatiguing.

We need a way to consistently come up with new ideas to avoid subconsciously regurgitating the same ideas again and again.

Better ideas, better angles, better concepts = better results.

Let's begin...

Understanding Your Readers

To drive the right people to your books, you need to understand:

– Who they are (demographics and to some extent, psychographics)

– The tropes of your genre(s) they enjoy

– The tropes of your genre(s) they don't enjoy

– What draws them to their next book to read

– Other author's books they have enjoyed reading

You can go down a rabbit hole understanding your readers, but you only need to go so deep.

There comes a point where you lose yourself in research rather than taking action on that research and seeing tangible results.

Go Where Your Readers Are

Sure, you could talk to your readers one-on-one to understand them, but that's just not a sustainable strategy for the long term.

Plus, people are often much more open and transparent when writing online from behind the protection of a keyboard and computer screen.

To understand my wife, Lori's, readers, I go to the following places:

– Amazon Reviews

– Goodreads Reviews

– Facebook Ads Comments

These 3 places are an absolute goldmine for understanding what readers do and don't like about your books.

Just a word of warning here... Goodreads reviewers can be brutal. If you think some reviewers are harsh in your Amazon reviews, take a stiff cup of your favorite beverage with you when you look at your Goodreads reviews.

Another option that can yield some incredible insights and ideas is emails from your readers.

If you have a newsletter or an email autoresponder in place (something I highly recommend), you can ask your readers questions, such as:

– Who are your favorite authors of all time?

– What are your 3 favorite books of all time?

– What are 5 of your favorite books in the [YOUR GENRE] genre?

As a bonus, asking questions also helps build a deeper connection with your readers and improves your email deliverability when people reply to you.

Using Social Proof In Your Facebook Ads

Every single one of our Ads that has driven significant results for us contains some form of social proof (i.e. reader reviews).

Sometimes this social proof is in the image or video, other times it's in the Headline or Primary Text, or even all 3 of these places.

If you look at how Amazon uses social proof to sell products (not just books), you can understand why social proof works so well in Ads.

A "mistake" I've made in the past was using generic reader review quotes that could apply to any book in any genre.

For example:

"Best book I've read in years"

"Best series I've ever read"

"One of the best books I've ever read"

"This book is unputdownable"

"Kept me reading until 3am"

You know every little detail about your book; it's your baby. And reader review quotes like the above fill you with pride, as they should.

But when we're advertising to a cold audience, they know nothing about your book.

I've found we get 10x better results with our Facebook Ads when we use reader review quotes that are more specific to our books, such as:

"Best fantasy book I've ever read"

"My favorite fantasy series ever"

"A little fantasy, a little romance and a little clan of the cave bear"

Using genre-related keywords in your Facebook Ads not only helps Facebook find your readers (because your Ads create the audience), it also helps readers relate to your Ads, which in turn leads to:

– Cheaper Clicks

– More Relevant Clicks

– Cheaper CPMs (Cost Per 1,000 impressions)

– Higher Click-Through Rates

– More Sales and/or Page Reads

It's important to note here that not all reader review quotes are created equal. Some will work 100x better than others.

For example, with Lori's Ads, any Ads with reader review quotes that mention "Clan of The Cave Bear" (a book based in a similar time period as Lori's) results in a great performing Ad, most of the time.

But the background image I use on the Ad has an impact as well.

I can use the same reader review quote, the same primary text, and the same headline, but a different background image in the Ad, and one Ad can deliver amazing results, the other Ad tanks.

So yes, reader review quotes can work incredibly well, but they also need testing to figure out which ones your readers respond best to from a conversion (sales) perspective.

Wrapping Up...

If you're struggling with ideas on where to start crafting your Facebook Ads, the first place I would go is your Amazon reviews and pick out 10-20 genre/book-related reader review quotes.

Next, I would go to The Facebook Ads Library and search for Ads by other authors in your genre (and outside your genre) to see how they are designing and crafting their Ads:

– Images/Videos they're using

– The types of Headlines they're using

– The style and length of Primary Text they're using

After that, start creating different Ads based on your research and begin the testing process.

Facebook Ads isn't a one-and-done thing. It's something you'll need to work on week in and week out to get the best results from it.

And the key thing you'll be working on... the Ads. Not the targeting, the placements or the account structure.

Which is why you need a pool of ideas to pull from each time you create a new Ad.

This is where looking at your reviews specifically can give you so many new ideas and angles to approach your Ads from.

Enjoy the process and the results you'll achieve from taking the time to truly understand your readers.

Thank you for reading.

See you next week.

To Your Success
– Matt