Getting Started with Facebook Video Ads

Getting Started with Facebook Video Ads

Video ads are powerful and Facebook Video Ads have been offered as a service for about a year now.  I’m certainlyst no expert, but I thought I’d share some of the things I have discovered and help you get started….Let’s start with a straight video ad going to a sales page, squeeze page or a pre-sale page.  (Then we will look at videos displayed on a Fan Page that you own.)

Where will the Facebook Video Ads Show?

These ads will appear in the newsfeed for the people you target.  The usual recommendation seems to be to remove the right sidebar ads, but leave the mobile device ads.

ReTargeting

Targeting inside the Facebook ad system is outside the scope of this article, but I will mention that it is foolish to send traffic to a website you own and not be collecting the people who visit your page.  These people have self-selected themselves as a person who is interested in your product enough to at least click on your ad.   That probably marks them as 1000 percent more likely to buy your current product or your next related product.  Since it is VERY easy to start the collection process you should take moment and do that right now.  If you won’d know how, here are a three articles that should help.  (Getting Started with Facebook Retargeting  and Action Steps to Install Retargeting on Your Website, Installing Facebook Pixels on your Shopify Store).  If you do nothing more than install a little piece of code on your website (the second article show how), you will be collecting people you can seen ultra-targeting ads to later.

What Should the Video Look Like?

Here are a few guidelines:

1. The video must have less than 20% of its area covered with text.
2. The video should probably be less than one minute long.
3. The video will autoplay with no sound when person scrolls past it in their newsfeed – ditch the long intro.
4. There should be some text, perhaps scrolling text to describe the benefits of using your product.  (These can be added by a fiverr.com gig with very little effort or cost.)
5. All the standard prohibitions for Facebook advertising still apply.  (See this article for more about that.)
6. Recommended Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1 / 4:3 / SDTV, 1.375:1 / film, 1.77 / 16.9 / HDTV, 1.85:1 / Film, 2:39:1 or 2:40:1 / Widescreen, no pillar boxing or letter boxing   Note that the standard sizes 4:3 to 16:9 are buried in there.
7. In Camtasia these aspect ratios become
   1. Standard 4:3: 320×240, 640×480, 800×600, 1024×768
   2. Widescreen 16:9: 640×360, 800×450, 960×540, 1024×576, 1280×720, and 1920×1080

Why Worry About Facebook Video Ads?

Facebook video ads read the most people for the least money – by far.  In my early tests, I am getting $.01 clicks on a simple vadio that I chopped out of a manufacturer’s video.  (I chopped out short hair dogs and then long hair dogs and then cats to run in separate ads targeted to different people.)

NOTES one Facebook Video Ads

There are two basic types of video ads that you can run. FAN PAGE POSTS If you have a large Fan Page, you can place a live post on the page.  My experience so far is that these posts get about 10 times more exposure than image ads do.  They are still throttled back compared to Meme’s and articles, but people do share them, comment on them and like them much more than then do straight ads with a still image. For example on my Boxer Page, I have 37,000 likes and my normal meme’s get around 2,000 likes and 100 shares (sometimes less and stometimes way more.)   When I ost an image and a discription and link to a product I usually get around 150 views.   When I post a video ad I usually get between 800 and 1000 views.  That is not a lot, but it is MUCH better than 120 or 150 view. These are NOT Paid Ads.   Since these are not paid ads, you do not have to abide by the 20% text rule.  You can start with an intro with text about what your product is if you want to. SHORT INTRO – The vidoes auto play when the view scrolls past them.  I recommend you use a very short intro or they won’t actually see any of you video as they scroll down their newsfeed.  In my case I have a video of someone grooming lots of hair off a dog.  I want people to see that ASAP. Start by Indicating you want an Image or Video Post.

Video Post

Then you Select a Video  instead of an Image

Select a Video File

A Video Post Screen will pop up

Video Post Screen

#1 – Copy and Past your text – including a link you want people to click on.

#2 – Enter a Title (Type SLOW, it really drags here.)

#3 – Pick a Video Catgegory from a drop-down menu

#4 – Indicate if you want a button at the end of your video (This is a VERY week Call To Action in my humble opinion.  That is why I always ad the link in my text.

#5 – Past the Link you want the customer to go to if they click the Facebook button.

#6 – two more lines give filled in for you

#7  – You cal click PUBLISH or the little drop-down on the PUBLISH button and schedule you video for later

A screen will pop up telling you that the video is being processed.

Processing Screen

You can close this.  You will get a note on Facebook and an email when they have finished processing your image.  These images are not reviewed for advertising standards.  They are just posts on your page.

DARK POSTS Dard posts are attributed to a Fan Page, but never are seen by visitors to that page.   (All Facebook Ads are actually posts to a poge somewhere.) You create these pages when you create an ad.   I strongly recommend that you do NOT create these on the file.  Create them elsewere, check the links, spell check the text, look at the grammar and the impact and then create your ad. You are paying to have these videos displayed as ads and therefor they much adhere to all of the rules that Facebook has for advertising, including having no more than 20%  of the screen covered with text.  

Walk Through

Go into Facebook Ads Manager and click the Create Ad Button The Ad Options Screen Appears

Ad Options

You choose “Get Video Views”

This you will be asked to Pick a Page to attribute the Ad/Post to.

Choose a Fan Page

Pick One

Edit the Name of the Campaign

You need to edit the Name of the Campaign since it won’t mean anything to you later.

The next section is standard – Pick the Interest Groups and Demographics you want to target.

#1 – Pick a country or two or three that you can ship to.

#2 – Pick Age Ranges

#3- Pick Gender  (Dogs and Cats tend to have Females Owners over 35 who spend)

#4 – Pick interest groups

#5 – Aim for a significant number of people to target without getting into the millions.

Next you Pick a budget and name the Ad-Set

Budget and Ad Set Name

#1 – Pick your budget (and you can change other things)

#2 – Be sure to change the Ad Set Name to something that tells you what this ad is about

Again all this is standard to all Facebook Ads

Upload a Video

I bypassed the open screen with a PLUS sign.  It asks you to upload a video, which I did.

#1 – It shows you your Video.

#2 – You can pick one scene to be your Thumbnail.  This is not used much, but if people have turned the auto-play feature off in Facebook, this is what they will see.  Again it must be less than 20% Text.

NOTE:  The first image and the thumbnail must be less than 20% text.  That image can be set to last only a half a second and that is still okay.

#3 – Here is the text people will see – it is very short (90 characters)

#4 – You can pick on the the Call To Action buttons (like Shop Now, Sign Up or Download).

Edit Text and Pick a Call To Action Button

#1 – Here you enter 90 characters of text.  I showed you how it warns you if you are violating some of Facebook’s rules.   Note:  The SocialMediaExaminar quotes a stufy saying that Facebook viewers are four times a likely to click on a full URL than they are to click on a Bit.ly type link.

#2 – The Red Triangle indicates an error.  A pinkish one tells you that more than 90 characters are likely not boing to be seen.

#3 – You can pick one of Facebook’s Call-to-Actions buttons.  These show once you video is over

#4 – You will need to give Facebook the URL where you want people to go to if they click the button

#5 – You can have people see something different than the actual URL

#6 – This is the Sample View you are currently seeing.  You can ask for it to show you the Mobile View further down the page.

#7 – There are a couple more options off the screen.

The last option is to remove the Sidebar listing on Desktop Newsfeeds.

Remove and Submit

#1 – Remove the Desktop Right Column

#2 – Click the Paste Order.

You will see Facebook’s standard “You order is being Reivewed” screen.  That screen also lets you duplicate the ad with a different target audience if you want.

SUMMARY

Facebook Video Ads are not that difficult and they are very cost efficient.  I’ve gone over some of what I know and shown you the screens you will see.  (I’ll update this as I learn more 🙂 ) Have a Great Day!