Introducing Facebook Ads

I am going to start by using Joe's page as a case study. Joe is an admin to PrepAgent. Before we get into creating ads, let's take a look at an example. Here in the newsfeed, along with all the posts by Joe's friends and pages he follows, if we scroll down we will stumble on an advertisement from Zillow.com. Now, you might also notice the small advertisement in the right column of the page. This is called a sidebar ad. But for now, we are going to be focusing on the newsfeed.

Let's take a look at this ad by Zillow.com. If you are not familiar with Zillow yet, you will be soon as you get more involved in real estate. Zillow is a big name in real estate, and you will be using the same advertising techniques as Zillow. How many people in your real estate office can say that?

Now at first glance, it looks like any other post. But you might notice that in the upper left-hand corner it has the word "sponsored". This lets us know it's a paid promotion. To really understand what's going on, let's take an even closer look. Many ads will contain social information at the very top of the advertisement. This occurs when a friend connected with your page likes the post, comments on it, or even shares it. Facebook will try to share the most relevant social information to the user.

In this case, Joe has a friend who likes Zillow.com, and that social information helps make Facebook ads really effective. The fact that Joe has a friend interested in Zillow.com provides the ad with more credibility. It's the same as if you go to the coffee shop with your friend, see an ad for a new flavor, and you friend looks at you and says, "Oh ya. That's good stuff." It adds credibility to the ad when it's endorsed by somebody you have a relationship with-which as we all know is HUGE in real estate.

Next, we'll see some information about the business. If you were to click the logo or the brand name, Facebook would direct you to their Facebook page. Clicking the sponsored link directs the user to a page that describes Facebook advertising. Below this, we see the message and the main advertising copy. Its goal is to hook the reader, so let your creative juices flow!

Below that, you have the visual asset. In this case, it's an image of a book because this advertisement is promoting this book on how to get listings. This section can also contain a video or it can be left blank. Now, this ad happens to be a link ad, and we'll be talking more about ad types in a later post, but because this links to a page outside of Facebook, it has a second section that contains a headline and a description of the link. This information can be customized by the advertiser. Some ads also include a custom call to action.

In this case, we see it as a button labeled "Like Page" in the top right. Facebook will give you the option to include one if it's relevant, and they'll also provide several other options for the custom call to action, such as "Shop Now", "Learn More", "Download", and so on. And again, we'll be getting into those details a little later. As we explore Facebook advertising, I'll help you identify the right type of ad to create, the right message to promote, and provide tips to help you get meaningful results that are specific to real estate.