Paid social advertising can feel like a burden for many people. Small businesses, especially those that got a start with social media accounts, may feel that paid social advertising is a leap they should not have to make. But paid social advertising is a reality for any effective marketing plan.
The fact is, that more than 80 percent of all businesses run paid social advertising. The reason for this is that it works. If you are to develop an effective marketing campaign that drives traffic to your website and leads to conversions, paid social advertising will need to be part of this campaign.
The problem for many businesses is where to start with paid social advertising. There are so many social media platforms, each with its own demographics, that it can be difficult to determine which will work best for you. For small businesses that were launched on social media, that platform will be a likely place to start. But how to branch out into paid social advertising will be the challenge.
What is paid social advertising? What are the pros and cons of paid social advertising? And what are the details of paid social advertising? This guide will take you through the features of paid social advertising and help you get started with a marketing campaign that works.
What is paid social media?
When we talk about paid social advertising, what we mean are paid social media ads. These are basically social media posts or status updates that you pay for to get that social media platform to regularly run the post or status update. These differ from organic social media posts in that they are given greater exposure and are made to appear more frequently than regular posts.
Paid social advertising looks like any other organic social media post. But paid social advertising will first of all be flagged as a paid post. It will also get priority over organic posts depending on how a particular social media platform’s terms for paid advertising.
Pros and Cons Main Social Media Platforms for Paid Social
The key to successful paid social advertising is choosing the platform that works best for your brand. Each social media platform has it’s own dominant demographic, and this will determine whether or not it works for your business goals. And each social media platform has its own advantages and disadvantages. The pros and cons of social media platforms and paid social advertising include:
Facebook is the largest of all the main social media platforms. Currently, there are over two billion active Facebook users. Since most people who use social media have Facebook accounts, it is a great place to begin with paid social advertising. When you create a Facebook account for your business, you effectively create a community out of your customer base. This is great for getting messages out about things like new deals from your business and new products and services.
Another major advantage of Facebook is that it is extremely easy to create a business account for your business. Once you create the account, it is easy to upload photos, and status updates, and reach out to a larger community to gain followers. You can also cross-promote your business website from your Facebook page. This is great for small businesses that do not have a paid staff to constantly administer their Facebook account.
The cons of Facebook are that it demands constant interaction to stay active. If you do not have a staff to continuously engage your Facebook account, it will lose visibility. Facebook is also best suited for smartphones, and this can lead to difficulties with keeping your webpage engaged.
Instagram is the newer of the main social media platforms. However, its growth has been enormous in a relatively short time. There are now about 1 billion active users on Instagram. Instagram has a younger demographic. Users are primarily under 35. This makes Instagram a great platform to target a younger demographic. Instagram also tends toward a more urban group of people. Things like digital technology, fashion, and cultural topics are favored on Instagram.
Instagram makes it possible to post photos and short videos (reels). Instagram has begun to favor reels, and it boosts them in the main feed. One major advantage of Instagram is that it is easy to coordinate your paid social advertising between Facebook and Instagram. You do not need to generate two sets of content for the two platforms.
One of the main disadvantages of Instagram is that you really need to have some decent photographic skills to stand out on this platform. Instagram is geared toward images, and you are limited by the kinds of text you can use and the amount of text you can use. This means it can be difficult to craft a specific message on Instagram.
Tik Tok
Tik Tok is another of the newer social media platforms. Tik Tok has over 800 million monthly users worldwide. The average Tik Tok user is Gen Z and younger. This is the platform to reach a younger demographic, and it is one you must take on if you are operating a business that relies on a younger customer base.
The distinct advantage of paid social advertising on Tik Tok is that it currently generates more than 140 billion dollars for marketers in the U.S alone. That is a revenue stream you cannot afford to ignore. The average Tik Tok user is under 30. These people grew up on social media, and they are uniquely aware of its uses and disadvantages. They, therefore, tend to value privacy and anonymity—things that are more difficult to sustain on Facebook and Instagram.
A huge pro for small businesses is that Tik Tok makes it extremely easy to self-administer your paid advertising. And they maintain low rates for entry into their paid social advertising streams. Small businesses can gain access to paid social advertising on Tik Tok for as little as 50 dollars.
The cons of Tik Tok include the tendency toward maintaining anonymity for its users. This means your advertising needs to send a broad message which can miss a target audience. The other disadvantage of Tik Tok is that user engagement with paid social ads tends to be lower than on other social media platforms.
Twitter has over 330 million active users. It is a great social media platform for paid social advertising from both large and small businesses. Twitter features streams of new content from all over the internet. And few businesses now operate without a Twitter account that regularly updates their customer base.
One of the great advantages of using paid social advertising on Twitter is that it is one of the most accessible social media platforms around. Twitter makes it easy to convey precise and meaningful messages to a broad audience. This means building a customer base and expanding a customer base are extremely easy.
The main disadvantage of Twitter is that you are limited in what you can say in a Twitter update. Twitter limits its posts to 280 characters. This means you do not have much room to explain things. The other disadvantage is that Twitter posts everything, organic and paid, in chronological order. This means people can easily miss your message if they are not actively using the platform when you run your ads.
Pinterest is something of a lifestyle discovery platform. With 459 million users, Pinterest is a platform you must consider for paid social advertising. One of the things about Pinterest is that it is designed to interest users who are looking for inspiration and design ideas. This makes it a great platform for many businesses.
Pinterest makes it easy and affordable for small businesses to purchase paid social advertising. One of the great advantages of Pinterest is that people with limited budgets can place their ads on a site specifically designed for users who are interested in finding ideas for design, decorating, and collecting.
One of the disadvantages of Pinterest is that it may present a limited audience for some brands. The majority of Pinterest users are female, and this can limit the reach of some brands. You also have little control over where your pins end up. Paid social ads can get buried in user activity.
Differences between Paid Social vs. Organic
Organic social media content is free content that is shared by users of social media platforms. These include posts, videos, photographs, and stories. This content can usually be seen by all or a portion of users on that platform. Organic social posts can find an expanded reach with the use of things like hashtags which tie specific content to other posts that pertain to the same content.
Paid social media refers to advertising that is commercially designed to appear across social media channels like Facebook, Instagram, Tik Tok, and Pinterest. Paid social media content is designed to boost interest in a brand, product, or service. The goal of paid content is to reach as many users as possible. Paid social media content is also flagged as paid.
Keys to running a successful first campaign
While nearly all social media platforms make it easy for people to use paid social advertising, the process of this kind of marketing requires planning and care. Things to consider with paid social advertising include:
Prioritize your audience’s social platforms
Understand your audience and utilize the resources to determine which social media platform they are likely to be using. You do not want to waste resources on paid social advertising that is placed in a medium that primarily consists of a demographic that is not interested in your product or service. You do not need to advertise products geared toward an older demographic on Tik Tok, for example. That said, you should consider using all social media platforms to your advantage.
Establish goals for your campaigns
It is important to set out specific goals when using paid social advertising. Determine the kinds of things you need to achieve. For example, if your goal is to expand your customer base, set realistic and practical benchmarks for how many new followers you expect to gain.
Find inspiration for successful campaigns
Definitely do the research on other successful paid social advertising campaigns. Look at the strategies they sued and the types of social media that were targeted.
Do your research properly
Paid successful advertising can only be successful if you are getting your content on the right platforms and in the right form. Do your market research to understand how a given platform reaches people and the ways people are using this platform.
Use analytics to track your efforts
Nearly all social media platforms have some type of analytics that allow you to see who is seeing your paid social advertising and how they are responding to this advertising. Use social media analytics to guide the way you develop paid social advertising and how to make the proper adjustments as you go.
As you can see from this guide, paid social advertising is both easy and complex. To get the most out of paid social advertising, you can leave things to professionals who are knowledgeable and will invest themselves in the success of your company. HeyDay Marketing Services provides paid social advertising services that will help your business grow.
HeyDay Marketing Services can build a paid social advertising campaign that can increase your brand awareness, create loyal customers, and generate conversions. We can help you build a paid social advertising marketing campaign that works for your product or service.
HeyDay Marketing Services offers several packages for you that will create a paid social advertising campaign that works for your company. We understand that one size does not fit all. For sound SMS marketing campaigns strategies that work, allow HeyDay Marketing Services to create an integrated marketing strategy that includes paid social advertising.
