Despite many of its more dedicated fans arguing to the contrary, PPC’s hold over paid digital marketing has started to slip in recent months. As costs per click (CPC) increase to an all-time high across both Google and Bing, and mobile edges out the amount of advertising space, it’s time for marketers to look at new ways to get their paid promotions to their users – and they’ve found it in paid social ads.
What Are Social Media Ads?
It’s as straightforward as it sounds: social media ads are simply paid promotions created on and distributed across platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. On all of these sites there are different options users can take – including promoting pre-existing posts and tweets, or creating adverts tailored for the newsfeed or sidebar from scratch. And when weighing up the pros and cons, social ads are showing themselves to be a clear winner – here’s why:
Popularity & PPC’s Shortcomings
Although they’ve been around for a while, paid social media ads have found a great deal of popularity in recent months, with most of the credit going to PPC falling out of favour. It’s no secret now that most internet users are logging on with mobile devices – and for social media users, it’s the go-to method for checking the likes of Facebook and Twitter. Unfortunately for digital marketers, there’s less space on mobile for adverts in searches, driving up the demand but limiting the delivery. Thankfully though, there’s plenty of space on social platforms for those adverts instead.
Designed for Beginners
Another huge advantage social media advertising has over PPC is the ease with which it can be used. Each platform’s advertising tool is designed to be utilised by someone with no prior experience of creating complex PPC campaigns. Instead, it’s a simple set up that guides you through uploading the correct image, making the right style choices (such as avoiding 25% text as a rule on Facebook) and even step-by-step audience targeting. It really doesn’t take an expert to put together a successful advertising campaign on social media in a matter of minutes.
Money, Money, Money
With PPC becoming more competitive thanks to a limit on advertising spaces, the cost per click has risen to new levels. Unfortunately, this means that smaller firms are stuck on the wrong side of PPC, unable to afford a lengthy campaign - and as many PPC veterans will know, once you’ve stopped paying for those clicks, they tend to dry up quickly. With social ads, not only does each platform recommend bids per click and offer flexible budgets, but they also offer much better value for money as the CPC is much, much lower as standard.
Mass Targeting on Busy Platforms
Of course all of this is great, but there’s also an audience to think about. Social media platforms are some of the busiest sites in the world, accessed by millions of users every day, so you’ll never have to worry about an audience drying up. Additionally, with the targeting tools available, you won’t have to simply focus on keywords they’re using in searches; campaigns can instead be catered towards individuals on the basis of their relationship status, recent life events, hobbies, age and even what TV shows they tweet about. Why access a limited audience with PPC when you can access a huge fraction of the world’s internet users, broken down by the metrics which matter most to you and your campaign?
All in all, it’s no mystery why social media advertising has become the golden child of paid digital marketing – so why aren’t you taking advantage of it yet? If you’re unsure where to start, or you’re looking for support in creating paid social media advertising campaigns, get in touch and let’s discuss how the Christian Michaels agency can help you!