Facebook campaigns are considered as the most promising activities in the field of performance marketing. Especially using retargeting campaigns fantastic CPO (Cost-per-order) and ROAS (Return on Advertising Spend) results are achievable. For my customer projects, I try to place a Facebook retargeting campaign as fast as possible because comparatively great profitable results by investing little effort is possible. I will now present my instructions for placing Facebook retargeting campaigns, so you can make use of highly profitable Facebook campaigns, too.
What are Facebook retargeting campaigns?
In the end retargeting campaigns are anew addressing of users that already had contact with your company. Generally retargeting campaigns are not limited to the Facebook network but also can be, as I presented earlier, placed in the Google network. The basic idea of retargeting campaigns is to address users anew to increase the conversion rate. This idea originates from eCommerce where only in the rarest cases the first visits of the online store leads to a direct purchase. Due to that anew addressing of user is even more important. Also, the usage of retargeting campaigns was strengthened because of the strongly increasing number of mobile device users. It is known that on average the conversion rate on mobile devices is lower than on desktop computers, thus a retargeting of users with retargeting campaigns is imperative.
Different retargeting target groups in Facebook advertising cosmos
As mentioned before, a retargeting campaign is the anew addressing of users. To ensure a successful anew addressing, the target group one wants to address must be specified. Fortunately, Facebook offers a great number of possible target group definitions, which I will further explain in the following.
Custom audiences as prerequisite for retargeting campaigns
Custom start target groups for Facebook retargeting campaigns are called custom audiences. Before a retargeting campaign can be started, a custom audience must be specified and created.
Different types of custom audiences:
- Website Custom Audience
- Custom Audience based on customer lists
- App Custom Audience
- Offline Custom Audience
- Engagement Custom Audience
Website Custom Audience:
The website custom audience is the most known and most used custom audience. Guests of your website are used as custom audience in which a very variable target group definition is possible. For example, one can only address users who visited specific under pages. Thus, one can ensure that only relevant persons will be addressed again. This type of target group definition can be recommended for online stores in particular because here specific users, who already viewed certain products, put them in their shopping cart but did not complete the ordering process, can be addressed. The term for such type of Facebook retargeting campaign is dynamic product ads. In the paragraph §dynamic product ads" I will explain how to place them. In order to generally address the visitors of your website, the implementation of Facebook pixels is essential. How to implement your Facebook pixels and create a website custom audience based on user interactions you can learn here.
Custom Audience based on customer lists:
In principle, you do not require Facebook-Pixels to place retargeting campaigns based on customer lists, nevertheless I recommend the implementation of Facebook-Pixels so you can evaluate Facebook campaigns more effective. To create a custom audience based on customer lists you only need some information (E-mail, names etc.) on the respective target group, these you can upload as CSV- or TXT-File on Facebook. Generally, applies that the more information you provide Facebook the more users Facebook will recognize. Because only if Facebook can assign contact details to a user a successful match will occur. Considered from the side of data security and protection, the creation of custom audiences based on customer lists is a tricky subject and therefore should be checked by a Lawyer beforehand.
App Custom Audience:
With the help of app custom audience, one can create a list of users, who used your app or made certain actions. Therefore, custom audiences can be created based on events such as app installation, registration in the app or purchases. Especially retargeting campaigns that address users who downloaded your app though but did not register in the app can be useful to increase the engagement rate of your mobile app.
Offline Custom Audience:
Offline custom audiences are a list of people who did not get in touch with your company on the internet. Offline custom audiences are interesting for companies whose final conversion is not depicted digitally. As a result, stationary trader can advertise their store and create a custom audience based on collected information (e-mail, names etc.).
Engagement Custom Audience:
Through engagement custom audiences you create a list of users who interacted via Facebook or Instagram with your content. This way you can create inter alia a custom audience of people who watched your video or liked a post on your Facebook fan page. Also, people who participated in one of your events can be taken over into your specific target group. There are a lot of choice and combination possibilities for engagement custom audiences, however I will not describe them furthermore.
Which Custom Audience should I create for my Facebook retargeting campaign?
When creating Facebook retargeting campaigns, it is recommended to address users who are located at the lower part of the funnel but did not place the wanted conversion yet. For instance, it is recommended for Online Shops to address users who viewed a product respectively put it in their shopping cart but did not completed the purchase of the product yet. The same applies for advertising events on Facebook, persons who already visited the event page but did not confirm that their attendance at the event yet should be addressed anew.
Dynamic retargeting ads - Instruction
Now I will show you how you can place dynamic retargeting ads for your Online Shop and how I generated 3.311,90 € in sales with only 67,89 € this way. Subsequent you see a screenshot that depict those conversion results.
What are dynamic retargeting ads?
The advertising in the Facebook advertising network of products, that users viewed but did not buy, is called dynamic retargeting ads. At that the design of the ads can be defined as usual on Facebook. As you can see below, I personally really like to work with carrousel ads when placing dynamic retargeting ads.
Prerequisites for the placement of dynamic retargeting ads
Some requirements have to be fulfilled to place dynamic retargeting ads:
- Product catalog feed must be handed over to Facebook.
- Facebook pixel must be implemented & the most important events (add-to-cart, purchase) must be applied.
Facebook product catalog feed
The product catalogue feed contains all products that are available in your Online Shop as well as included needed information. One can hand over the product catalog feed manually but also dynamically to Facebook. When handing over it manually, you upload the Facebook feed as CSV-File on Facebook. The disadvantage of this method is that the product feed must be uploaded manually again every time a product change (Price, availability) occurs. Due to that, I recommend that you hand over the product catalog feed dynamically to Facebook so Facebook possesses the current information and can process them. In the dynamic method, your Online Shop or inventory control system hands over a URL that Facebook can use to receive the latest product information.
What information must the product catalog feed contain?
- Product ID
- Availability
- Condition of the product
- Description
- Title
- Brand/GTIN
- Price
- Link
This information must be given for every product that is supposed to be shown in the product catalog feed. Alongside these there are other information that can be given such as product category or sex.
Facebook pixels & events for retargeting campaigns
Besides of the Facebook Pixel different events have to be hand over so Facebook can tell which user viewed products in your online store. This can be done through integrating of the Facebook Pixel as well as the conversion events. Events such as Add-to-Wishlist, Add-to-Cart, Initial-Checkout, Add-Payment-Info & Purchase that are relevant for eCommerce should be implemented without doubt. Available parameter like "Item-Price" should also be handed out, too, so you can also measure the ROAS in the Facebook ad-manager.
Plugins that reduce the effort for the integration of Pixel and Events exist for a lot of Shop- and CMS-Systems. Here you find the links to the most popular plugins:
- WooCommerce (Facebook pixel & event integration: http://www.pixelyoursite.com/facebook-pixel-plugin)
- WooCommerce Product Feed (http://www.pixelyoursite.com/product-catalog-facebook)
- Shopify Pixel integration (https://apps.shopify.com/pixel-perfect)
- Shopify product feed (https://apps.shopify.com/facebook-product-catalog)
- Mageto Facebook Pixel & Event Integration (https://marketplace.magento.com/cadence-cadence-fbpixel.html)
- Magento Facebook Product Feed (https://www.xtento.com/product-feeds/magento-facebook-dynamic-product-ads-integration.html)
Tip: Through the correct integration of the product catalog one cannot only place dynamic retargeting ads but also use the product catalog information for the placement of Lookalike campaigns to advertise your products. A great combination is known for some month under the name of "dynamic product ads with broad-audience".
Creation of dynamic product ads
In the ad-manager we have to choose the advertisement target "product catalog sells", so our dynamic product ads can address the preferred custom audience. The first step on the advertisement group level is the selection of the product range. Here you chose the product catalogue that contains the products one wants to advertise for. Then the number of products will be shown immediately. After we tell Facebook the advertisement target, the name of the campaign as well as the product range we want to advertise we can now choose on the advertisement group level relevant targeting possibilities of the custom audience. These are inter alia:
- Viewed or added the product to the shopping cart but did not buy it
- Added the product to the shopping cart but did not buy it
- Up-selling products
- Cross-selling products
- Custom Combinations
As you see we cannot only place dynamic retargeting campaigns but also Up-Selling- and Cross-Selling-Campaigns to increase the average shopping cart value. In this example, I will use the targeting possibility "Viewed and added product to the shopping cart but did not buy it". One can also designate a time window in which the action was carried out. Generally, it can be said that the shorter the period of time from the view of the product and the placement of the ad on Facebook, the higher is the possibility of a conversion. For products that must be explained and have a longer decision-making-horizon (i.e. cars, heater) the usage of longer periods is recommended.
In the next step, we can - as already known - choose the placement of the advertisement (automated placement vs. edit placement). Usually I choose "edit placement" to assign an advertisement group to every placement and to adjust title and description to respective advertisement format on advertisement level.
Then I choose the option "only when connected to WIFI" under the function "specific mobile devices". By doing that I want to avoid that persons will be addressed that for instance are using their mobile phone in the subway and whose conversion rate will be limited due to the bad internet connection.
The last step on advertisement group level is as usual the configuration of the budget & time plan. Here one can choose inter alia between running term budget and daily budget. One should especially note the options "Advertisement placement optimized for" and "Type of event". We want to generate sells with dynamic product ads, that is why the conversion optimized advertisement placement is recommended. Furthermore, does the selection of the type of the event depend on the frequency of the conversion. Facebook needs 50 conversions on advertisement group level to receive an accurate picture of the optimal target group. If the 50 conversions cannot be achieved through the event "purchase" in the beginning, one should optimize an event in the upper part of the conversion funnel (Add-to-Cart, product views etc.).
Advertisement design of Facebook dynamic retargeting Campaign
Once completing the adjustments on advertisement group level, we proceed with the graphic design of the advertisements. First, we name the ad and give Facebook the name of our Facebook fan page and our Instagram page. Then we have to decide if we want to place ads in carrousel format or as a single picture. Since these are dynamic ads, products will be advertised dynamically and after interaction, therefore only products will be shown that the person viewed.
The design of the advertisements works in the same way as for usual advertisement design. However, one great difference is the dynamic description of title, text and News-Feed-Link, which are placed with the content of the product feed. That is why next to the product picture inter alia the product name as well as the price can be depicted, too. This works completely automatically.
Recently there is also the possibility to apply overlays to product pictures, currently the price, a strikethrough price and the discount in percent are available as overlays. By using overlays more information can be conveyed to the user without using up space in the title or text.
In the last step of the advertisement design one should add an UTM parameter to also ensure the problem-free tracking of conversion in Google Analytics.
I hope that you liked my article about Facebook retargeting. If you have questions feel free to send me a message.
