So you want to create a Facebook Ad? Great! Facebook Ads are a fantastic way to spread word of mouth about your restaurant and reach tons of potential customers through Facebook. While Facebook Ads can seem daunting and complicated, you don’t have to worry – I’m here to help! As a Social Media Account Manager, I’ve created my fair share of ads and have learned the ins and outs of Facebook Ad creation. While there are many facets to consider when creating an ad, today we’ll stick with the basics and discuss what you need to consider before starting. There are three things to keep in mind when creating an ad:
1. Your Advertising Goals
First you’ll need to determine your goal for this ad. Do you want to:
- Raise awareness about your restaurant’s page and increase page likes?
- Increase reach or engagement on a post?
- Promote a specific product?
- Direct traffic to your website or app?
Determining what you would like to accomplish when creating your ad is an important first step and will be how you measure the ad’s success. This enables you to create a game plan and narrow down your goals so you can understand your objective and how to best present it to your audience! Keep in mind, there are many more options to select from but the ones listed above are what I recommend starting with.
2. Your Target Audience
What type of audience are you looking to target? Do you want to bring more millennials into your restaurant? Do you want women over the age of 30 to buy your product? Do you want to target anyone who has an interest in organic food? You’ll need to decide this before moving forward. When creating an ad, you can get as specific as you’d like with your targeting options. Here are some additional things to consider when targeting your ad:
Demographics
- You can refine your ad’s target audience based on content people have shared about themselves in their Facebook profiles, such as age, gender, relationship status, education and type of work they do.
Location
- Location targeting allows you to reach customers in key locations by country, state/province, city and zip code. This can be especially beneficial if you’re trying to bring it more locals or opening up a new location and need to spread the word.
Interests
- Interest targeting lets you define your ideal audience by their interests, hobbies and Pages they like on Facebook. An example of this would be targeting an audience based their interests in something like Mexican food or Chinese food.
- You can even exclude certain people from seeing your ad in the interests section. For example, if you want to promote the brisket at your BBQ joint, you can exclude vegetarians from seeing the ad to nail down your target audience even further and avoid any negative commentary on your ad.
You’d be surprised at how detailed you can get with Facebook Ad targeting, so play around to see what may work best for your restaurant.
3. Your Budget
Lastly, you’ll need to determine how much you would like to spend on an ad and the amount of time you want to run this ad. Depending on your goals for the ad (like promotion dates for example), you may want to run it for a day, a week, or even a month. The amount that you’re willing to spend to show your ads to people in your target audience is called your Facebook Ad Budget. This can run from $5 to hundreds of dollars, depending on your goals to reach a specific audience. There are two options within that budget:
- Daily Budget: The amount you’re willing to spend on an ad set every day. Daily budgets are beneficial if you are promoting a daily special and want to spend a certain amount of money on it in a single day.
- Lifetime Budget: The amount you’re willing to spend over the duration of an ad set. This option is generally easier, especially for beginners, as it is hard to tell how much an ad could run for each day, without analyzing data and costs from previous ads. If you choose to run an ad for a week or so, Facebook will spread your budget out to reach the most people in the allotted amount of time.
In conclusion, Facebook Ads can be extremely useful when promoting your restaurant. Many times it will take a bit of trial and error to see what works for your restaurant’s page in terms of budget and targeting, but once you have your audience figured out it’s the perfect way connect with your customers and grow your business at a faster rate!
Still not entirely sure where to get started? Schedule a free consultation from our website and we’ll help you get started!
Happy Facebooking!
Did you know?
We've been managing social media accounts for restaurants since 2012. For almost a decade, we've partnered with restauranteurs who are serious about using social media to generate business. Whether you're a good fit for our service or not, let's schedule a call and we'll give you free personalized advice on how to improve your social media presence. Either way, you'll walk away from the call more confident about your ability to promote yourself online - completely for free.
