When it comes to Facebook and Instagram ads you used to have two options – you could have images without ANY text at all and you’d be safe. If you want to add any text to your image ads then you had to use the Facebook Text Overlay Tool. Now Facebook is saying that There is no longer a limit on the amount of text that can exist in your ad image. The text overlay tool is no longer available. And while that’s all good and makes life easier for your designers, it doesn’t mean you can go crazy with text. Here are some tips for new Facebook ads:
Testing is the best way to find out what works with your audience. As you decide on the right approach for your ads, here are some common practices that we’ve seen work well for advertisers.
Show your product or brand. People scroll through Feeds quickly. Show what you’re selling, your brand or your logo to communicate your message efficiently.
Avoid too much image text. We’ve found that images with less than 20% text perform better.
Focus your message. Crop tightly around the important part of the image. To show multiple images, use the carousel format.
Preview your ads. Use Creative Hub to experience your ads as your audiences will on computers and phones.
And note that Instagram is still a platform for photos and videos. If you start using ads with a lot of text your ads will stand out as well, ads. To integrate seamlessly into feeds and stories, we still recommend using images and videos without a lot (or any) text.
Good bye Text Overlay Tool. You really won’t be missed.
We were asked by the MN Theater Alliance for some advice on how to keep their organizations relevant and engaged during the shutdown. We work with a number of theaters so we put together some ideas for how to recycle old content, engage your followers, and use Google Analytics to drive your content. The presentation was recorded and is here for you! While it’s aimed at arts organizations (theatres in particular), this can be applied to most social media strategies during Covid and beyond. As always, let us know if you have any questions!
Using Social Media to Maintain Your Online Presence During Covid
Presented by Prairie Pixel Brad Larson, Ted Kozlowski & Rachael Kozlowski May 27 2020
Agenda:
1.State of the world in social advertising
2. What’s your current social communications status? Quiet? Evergreen content? Bracing to re-open?
3. How and when to re-open / re-launch your messaging.
4. How to stand out – fundraising
5. Best practices for organic posts during the pandemic
6. Recycle/ update existing content
7. Boost or Business? Why they are different.
8. .Best practices for paid placements
9. Tricks to create unique audience profiles
10. Targeting audience through remarketing
11. Differentiate audiences by where they are in the buying process (sales funnel)
12. .Should I put all my marketing efforts into social advertising?
13. Analytics – friend or foe? Use Analytics to understand your audience, adjust content, increase ROI
14. New Chrome browser update – is it affecting my analytics/audience tracking?
15. Q&A
State of the world in social advertising – According to the New York Times, people have been using social media to connect and stay informed during Covid with facebook.com seeing a 27% increase in visitors and YouTube seeing a 15% increase. It’s a great time to use social media for organic posts and paid posts to keep your audience updated and engaged.
We’re thinking about challenges you may be facing right now and how we can help. All of us at Facebook Audience Network are together with you, and we want to support you and your business in any way we can.
We’ve compiled a list of resources publishers have requested to help optimize their ad placements and improve monetization.
Get Revenue Optimization Tips: At Building for Better Revenue, our hub of monetization information, find tips and information including revenue basics, ad components, optimizing for engagement, and setting price targets.
Maximizing Earning Potential: We recommend taking a look at your CPM targets and optimizing mid- and low-level waterfall CPM targets at this time. Our Price Settings Guide shows how to adjust CPM targets.
Bidding Guide: If you are already testing bidding, consult our Essential App Bidding Guide for help in optimizing.
Gaming Growth Resources: Find the latest strategies, research and best practices to help you grow your gaming business at Supercharge Your Game.
Publisher Help Center: Search for common monetization topics and get answers right away at our Help Center. Discover ways to improve interstitial and rewarded video ad implementations, get information on using Monetization Manager, and search for topics on payouts.
Publisher Concierge: Reach us by email or chat with concerns or questions.
Webinars and Videos: Visit our YouTube channel to watch publisher success stories, webinars on monetization topics, and more.
We’re working to provide you with the information and solutions you need for your business, now and in the future. We hope you find these resources useful. Please let us know through the Publisher Concierge if there are any other resources that would be helpful to you.
We’re still waiting for summer here in Minnesota and have been paying attention to Google’s big marketing updates; you can catch up on their announcements here: https://adsonair.withgoogle.com/events/marketinglive Here’s what we’re keeping an eye on and what we’re reading for fun:
Game of Thrones: Disappointed in the ending? Most people seem to be. Check out this John Hughes-type alternate ending; it made me laugh: http://bit.ly/2QiARjO
PPC – Google Ads: Key Takeaways from the Google Marketing Live Talks including shopping campaigns & discovery campaigns: http://bit.ly/2WkvMgw 3 Most Common eCommerce Advertising Mistakes (and how to stay away from them): http://bit.ly/2WfaroJ Performance Planner now live in Google Ads: Shows predicted impact of campaign changes on conversions, clicks, more: https://selnd.com/2HNrCo8 10 Visual AdWords Reports You Could Be Using: http://bit.ly/30zHeUR
Search Engine Optimization: Image SEO: Optimizing images for search engines: http://bit.ly/2EsA1w6 Top Three Things A Developer Can Do For Search Rankings Don’t Include Links: http://bit.ly/30F3WLk 12 reasons your SEO traffic is plateauing and how to fix it: http://bit.ly/2X0yd51 7 Proven SEO Reporting Best Practices That Boost Client Retention: http://bit.ly/2WX09Xg
Local Search: Step up your favicon game. Google is making a minor tweak to its search design: http://bit.ly/2X32u2X Google My Business Suggests Positive Reviews to Share as Posts: http://bit.ly/30HHDoj
What else we’re reading: Fake pictures of faces are getting much harder to detect: http://bit.ly/2VWzxt1 Can you spot the real face versus the computer generated face? We passed with 90% but think we’ll do even better after we read the tutorial. Check out the test: http://www.whichfaceisreal.com/ Speaking of fakes, can you tell when you’re reading a fake review on Amazon? Or on any site? Run it through here: https://www.fakespot.com/ Random good news? You can now take your Amazon returns to Kohls: https://tcrn.ch/2YJqWHc And finally, who doesn’t want more emojis to communicate? Here’s an 🥳 Emoji Keyboard so you can include even more: http://bit.ly/2M32Sxg🥳♻️
There’s always a lot going on in the digital marketing world! This fall, we’re saying good-bye to Google+, hello to conversational AI (we now have a Google Home in our house – a little scary), yes to updating our Google Data Studio templates and another good-bye to Google Adwords (it’s now just Google Ads).;
Online Advertising (Search & Social):
YouTube now counts ‘engagement’ for YouTube for action ads at 10 seconds, not 30: https://selnd.com/2q5hgax
We’re hunkered down against the April MN snow/hail storm-blizzard catching up on what’s new in digitalmarketing. Here’s what we’re reading while we wait for the storm to pass and the snow to melt:
PPC: Avoid the 8 most common pitfalls of automated bidding- we’ve never been huge fans of automated bidding, here’s how you can use it wisely: https://selnd.com/2Ubr92U Are Dynamic Ad Varieties A Waste Of Your Time? https://selnd.com/2IgZM6e Winning on Amazon: Here are 3 strategies that can help: https://mklnd.com/2Ks77BL 1,100+ Kids YouTube Channels to Exclude From Your Video Campaigns: http://bit.ly/2UcqoH5
Social Media – Facebook is taking transparency seriously. Here are some of their updates: Facebook launches searchable transparency library of all active ads (including Donald Trumps election ads): https://tcrn.ch/2uVZ45M Facebook shows users when a Custom Audience list was uploaded: https://mklnd.com/2Z53jtx Facebook to replace Exclude Categories with new brand safety ad filters: https://mklnd.com/2Itk9MW Remove, Reduce, Inform: FB’s New Steps to Manage Problematic Content on their platforms including Facebook/Instagram: http://bit.ly/2X5Sp58
Search Engine Optimization: How to Approach Technical SEO in a New Light: http://bit.ly/2UudCsp How To Boost the SEO of Your Organization’s LinkedIn Page: http://bit.ly/2USYKTK
Google Analytics – GTM – Data Studio: Year In Review Template For Google Data Studio from our own DQ instructor Jeff Sauer of Jeffalytics: http://bit.ly/2VFadU3 How to calculate Conversion Rates in Google Data Studio: http://bit.ly/2UHpBlV Here’s how to use Google Tag Manager’s new Trigger Groups – This update offers a new way to manage how often, and under what circumstances, a tag will fire in GTM: https://selnd.com/2UtgeXq How to Export Data from Google Analytics and Search Console (without 3rd Party Software): http://bit.ly/2UthE4c
What else we’re reading: How Technology is Hijacking Your Mind — from a Magician and Google Design Ethicist: http://bit.ly/2P7tBXG
Also, our spring digitalmarketing classes are starting in less then a week and there’s still time to save! Sign up today and get 10% off your registration with promo code SPRINGSAVINGS. Quick reminder ] that most of our classes will only be offered in spring 2019. Don’t miss out!
Search Engine Optimization (Spring 2019 only) Learn how to optimize your website to get to the top of search engines organically. April 17 & 24
Jeff Sauer’s Google Marketing Platform Series (Spring 2019 only) Whether you’re new to Google Analytics or looking to dig deep into GTM or Data Studio, this will be Jeff’s only training session with us this year so be sure to join us! Intro to Google Analytics – May 1 Google Tag Manager – May 8 Google Data Studio – May 15
Social Media Advertising Learn how to create and optimize social media advertising campaigns on the platforms that will perform best for your company. Apri 18 & 25
Google Ads (AdWords) Complete Series (Spring 2019 only) From set-up to optimization plus all that’s new in AdWords (which is a lot), learn how to improve your ROI and get better results from your ads. May 2, 9, & 16
If you’ve thought about learning new skills or refreshing your current digitalmarketingskills, spring 2019 is the time to do it! Here’s a screenshot of where to enter promo code SPRINGSAVINGS.
emojis to communicate? Here’s an 🥳 Emoji Keyboard so you can include even more: 