As a business owner, you know that getting your message in front of potential customers is crucial to your success. Google and Facebook paid ads are powerful tools that can help you reach the right people at the right time, and drive more sales to your business.

We know it’s not easy to generate organic engagement on social media. We also know that it’s hard to compete with large organizations and businesses that have a significant marketing and ad budget. BUT, when done the right way, a little can go a long way and ensure you’re not burning your budget.

Ads target one thing: users’ attention. And isn’t that what we all want?

• By the end of 2021, the total digital paid ad spending reached $705 billion, up from $634 billion in 2019 (Zenithmedia). It will rise to $873 billion by 2024.
• Facebook reaches 59% of the world’s social networking population (eMarketer).
• Google Ads is currently the biggest provider of search engine paid ads, with 92% market share (TechJury).
• In 2022, the average internet user has clicks/views $286.60 worth of paid search ads per year (Statistia).

With such high usage of ads by marketers/businesses across the globe, can you afford not to be playing in the online paid advertising space?

This very targeted form of advertising allows for targeting a custom audience, increased brand awareness, higher conversion rates, cost-effective marketing, and flexibility.

It enables businesses to reach specific demographics and geographic locations, consistently deliver their message to a targeted audience, drive higher engagement and website traffic, control their marketing budget and track their return on investment (ROI).

Fight Against Organic Reach Decrease

Problem: Organic social media content has been on the decline for a few years now. According to Studio93, the average reach of an organic post on a Facebook Page is a super low 2.2%!

Solution: Boost your distribution by increasing your paid social media ad budget. You’re guaranteed to reach a defined audience and can utilize your content to elevate your brand with specific targeting and get more qualified leads.

Affordable

Problem: Relying heavily on organic reach can actually deplete your resources and budget in terms of your ROI.

Solution: When you’re running paid advertising campaigns, you’re able to reach a very targeted audience. Costs related to these ads are dependent on the objective or type of ad you are running – you have COMPLETE control over the spend and the outcome.

Targeted Targeted Targeted

Problem: Your posts aren’t being seen by the right people or are not engaging with your ideal customer.

Solution: Paid ad targeting can be very specific and allows you to reach relevant visitors who are interested in your brand, fit the demographics of your sales personas and reside in the exact geographic location you want to target.

Measurable

This data collected will help you refine your messaging and help you build a holistic understanding of your audience and their interests.

AND ADJUST! Use your results to adjust your ads and move forward stronger than the last.

Retargeting

Problem: A user found your website, but walked away with nothing in hand (service, quote, product, etc.)

Solution: Once a visitor has viewed your website, clicked through an ad or engaged with your business, you can run a retargeting campaign. Retargeted ads will show them highly relevant ads to continuously engage your prospects who have shown an interest in your product or service that otherwise could have slipped away.

Stay On Their Mind – Retention

By pushing yourself in front of your potential customers, you are constantly in the back of the mind of your potential customers and therefore increasing your ROI.

You are also top of mind with existing clients that are due for a visit to or check-in with your business.

Despite the large benefit of paid ads, just make sure you don’t rely on paid ads only.

Organic search rankings take time to build. You need to be building that capability WHILE you run your paid ads. Don’t leave your social or website addicted to a permanent spend on paid ads.

Paid ads are one of the most important channels in your marketing arsenal. BUT, they are not one-size-fits-all.

While they are not your only options, Google Ads and Facebook Ads are the two OG online advertising platforms that may be the best starting point for you.

Google Ads and Facebook Ads are able to coexist as hugely popular advertising platforms as they have different benefits and solutions to offer. Read on below to learn more about each.

Facebook Ads is for those looking to reach browsers where they hang out – on social media. It’s known for its advanced targeting options and abundance of user data.

Facebook has an enormous social reach. There are approximately 2.93 billion monthly active users worldwide. And given that Facebook is a social media platform, you get access to a different kind of advertising here. It’s a more creative and authentic medium. Modern consumers are ready and willing to discover new products and brands via social media these days.

Though the audience is massive, what makes Facebook Ads truly special is the ability to target users in a granular way based on their demographic information and interests. Facebook Ads is better for targeting niche audiences and casual browsers looking to discover new things. While Google Ads is better for targeting those that are in research mode, actively looking for a business or product.

Google Ads is known for its enormous global reach across its channels and partner network. The platform has a variety of advertising options that’ll help you convert interested consumers. Right now you can bag $500 in free ad spend credit when you spend $500 with Google Ads.

One selling point of Google Ads is that it offers a variety of ad types to suit different kinds of businesses and multiple objectives. Here are a few examples:

• Search ads to generate leads on the search engine results pages (SERPs)
• Display ads to expand reach via relevant third-party sites
• Shopping ads to increase e-commerce sales
• Maps ads if you have a brick-and-mortar location

Overall, you can use the platform to drive traffic to your website, foot traffic to your location, and inquiries for your business large or small.

But the best thing about this traffic and interest is that it’s qualified. Google is the first place people go before making some kind of purchase decision. At the time of writing, there are on average 105,000+ Google searches per second. So your ads show up precisely when somebody is searching for a new tee, a gardener, a bar to drink at, and so on. You get to grab people with transactional intent when the timing is right.

Another aspect that makes Google stand out among providers is, unsurprisingly, its smart technology. Google’s tech does the hard work of refining the creation, launch, and monitoring of ads for you. Smart campaigns help you choose the best, most relevant keywords to go after; while smart bidding maximizes the return on your advertising spend (ROAS).

All in all, it’s not that one advertising platform rules supreme here. Facebook Ads and Google Ads have different strong suits and different use cases, as we’re about to delve into in more detail. The same goes for all other avenues and platforms for paid advertising.

And yes, there are many possibilities, platforms, types of paid ads and campaign types to choose from. But make a call and focus on one or two. Don’t dilute your message too much. 

With paid ads, you can tailor your brand and message in any way you see fit and consistently test to see what works and what does not. With hard work and consistent optimization, you will strike gold and find yourself with more quality leads and conversions as a result.

At the end of the day, you need to make an informed decision before you go spending your advertising budget haphazardly.

If your only reason for not tapping into paid ads is feeling overwhelmed or unprepared, you know where to go! Pathfinder is here to help with all of your marketing solutions – including paid ads. From content and design, to ad creation and tracking, we can help ensure your business is getting noticed!