A lot of photographers completely ignore Facebook ads.
Maybe it’s because they once tried boosting a post and nothing came of it.
Or maybe it’s because posts on Facebook used to get such good visibility, so they invested time and energy into making their page great — only to find out Facebook isn’t showing their posts to enough people anymore.
Those are legitimate reasons to be frustrated, so we don’t blame you if you’re not super enthusiastic about using Facebook ads for your photography business. But the reality is, when executed correctly, the benefits of these ads far outweigh the drawbacks.
In other words, photographers should definitely have them in their marketing arsenal. Here’s why:
1. The Number Of People On Facebook Has Grown Exponentially
Whether you want to give Facebook the time of day or not, the hard truth remains the same: Your clients — past, present, and future — are on it. As of March, 2017, Facebook has over 1.94 billion monthly active users. Now, contrast that massive number with the number of people on the platform when it started, which is just one million in 2004.
That means, if you gave up on using Facebook a while back, chances are you have a lot more potential clients on the platform now than you did when you started. It’s definitely worth exploring for that reason alone.
2. Laser-Focused Targeting
One major thing sets Facebook apart from other marketing avenues: its capacity to completely customize the market you’re targeting. You can target the exact demographic you’re after and exclude groups unlikely to use your services.
For example, if you’re a wedding photographer, you can create a Facebook ad for people who live within 15 miles of your city, are between 25 and 35 years old, and have gotten engaged within the last three months. Pretty cool, right? But that’s not all. You can refine the market even further to target by annual income and homeowners.
3. Getting Better At Facebook Ads Makes You Better At All Marketing
Marketing within the digital era means best practices and techniques are shifting and evolving at rapid speed, so the best way to stay sharp through it all is to stay involved and keep practicing. Working with Facebook ads provides that practice.
Marketing is similar to a muscle you’d work out with at the gym; the more you work with it, the stronger it gets. Since Facebook allows for so much customization, you have a ton of opportunities to sharpen and refine your approach to branding, marketing, and copywriting.
4. You Can Gauge The Demand For Services In Real Time
Back in the day, before Facebook existed, if you were thinking about adding new services to your business, such as senior photography or wedding photos, you’d have to build a list of prospective clients from scratch.
But with Facebook, you don’t have to start only with what you already have; you can easily branch outside of your existing network and put your feelers out via your Facebook lists to gauge potential interest.
5. They’re Not As Expensive As You Think
One of the biggest complaints I hear about Facebook ads from other photographers is that they’re too expensive. While they can be costly, they don’t have to be. You can easily control your budget for each ad and start marketing for as little as $1 per day.
To put it another way, for a fraction of the cost you spent on that new lens, you can invest in a Facebook service that will test every type of audience in your town and see exactly who’s responding to your messaging. It’s real-time feedback that’s almost impossible to get otherwise.
6. The Ability To Remarket
While you don’t need to start your Facebook marketing journey here, you should aim to install the Facebook marketing pixel ASAP. That’s because it gives you the ability to discover your clients’ habits and recapture those who’ve visited your site to learn more about your services.
For example, you can remarket to everyone who’s visited your site in the last 90 days to take advantage of a promo. Or you can add your Facebook pixel to your StickyAlbums: that way, when your client shares them, you can exclusively send ads to people they’ve shared them with for pennies on the dollar.
7. Easily Track ROI
One of the most difficult challenges around marketing is knowing whether it’s working. It can be downright scary to spend loads of money and time on a marketing effort without any real assurance that it will pay off.
Facebook takes the guesswork out of tracking. Their marketing services are so granular that you can see exactly how much you’re spending, down to the click, and adjust accordingly for its effectiveness and your budget.
Bonus: WiFi Connection Only
In addition to those game-changing benefits, as a bonus, you can opt to have your ads sent only when a client is connected to WiFi, which means they’re probably on their computer versus their phone and more likely to be focused (and ready to make a purchase decision) when reviewing your ad and the webpage the ad links to.
The moral of the story? If you want to expand your photography business to its greatest capacity, then you need Facebook ads in your corner.