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EPIC FACEBOOK AD FAILURE…IT WAS ALL MY FAULT

May 5, 2017 by Tracy Reed in category Pink Pad by Tracy Reed tagged as Ads, Facebook, Marketing, Newsletters

I am a huge fan of Facebook [FB] Ads. Having said that. Let’s get started.

Like most Indie Writers, I am my own marketing director and publicist. Ultimately, I am the only one getting the word out about my books. No matter how many people I bribe, I mean beg to post on their social media or who voluntarily spread the word, getting the word out is on me.

I have been fortunate to participate in book promotional events

I have been very fortunate to participate in a couple of book promotional events that helped build my mailing list. As well as, using Facebook ads.

The first time I placed a FB ad, I didn’t expect thousands or even hundreds of subscribers. I was just hoping someone clicked the ad.

I thought my first FB ad, did decent…reach 3,050, subscribers 46 and $23.47 over a 5 day period. The second time I placed a FB ad the reach was 2,589, number of subscribers 81 and $53.49 over a 7 day period. [I might be off on my duration by a day or two.] Again, I thought those were good numbers. I tried it one more time. This time the reach was 3,609 with 144 subscribers at a cost of $74.47. [Each ad was done with a different book or a free book.]

Reality Check

I recently got a reality check when it came to my results…these were not that good. Another thing I didn’t do, was keep good records. All I was looking at was how many subscriptions I got and not going over budget.

I recently completed Mark Dawson’s course on Facebook Ads and realize I could have done better. [This isn’t a post for the course or Mark Dawson.] Some of my classmates have been posting their results and even the examples in the lectures, revealed, I could have done much, much better.

I finished the class excited about correcting my mistakes. I know I can’t fall prey to the writer’s golden rule, “Don’t compare your progress/success to another writer. I hear myself saying the words and see them in this post. Yet, I can’t help but compare my results to much more successful writers.

I ran a couple, okay a few ads and the results were horrible. See for yourself.

Reach Clicks

1,416 50

3,307 43

1,318 32

686 29

No, those aren’t my Amazon rankings, but the results of my FB ads. I got so frustrated. I ran these numbers by my accountability group and in the FB group for my class. Check out the ads throughout the post and tell me, what the problem is, because I’m stumped.

My numbers were doing so badly, I would change ads in the middle of the day or only let the ad run a day, maybe two. I finally settled on one ad and then I pulled the rest. I let that ad run three days, but the numbers never got any better.

I posted my issue on my class group and someone in my FB group came up with the only thing that made since…reviews. I have a nice library or catalogue, but I don’t have a lot of reviews on the books I was trying to sell. True, there are a couple of ads that are bad, but the reviews is the thing that really made the most sense. I also changed the audience, but the numbers didn’t improve.

The ad with the reluctant heiress, is the one I finally settled on.

Apparently, reviews play a much bigger part than I knew. Let me back track, because that makes me sound ill-informed. I know reviews are very important. It was just when I ran the ads to increase my mailing list they really didn’t matter because I was looking to increase my mailing list. Not sell books.

Again, not to push Mark’s course, but in the course, he shared a way to build a mailing list via an email sequence. [I’m in the process of setting up an email sequence. I’ll post about that later.] I thought I could dive right into the ad game without expanding my mailing list. My mailing list is over 2,100. Like most writers, I’ve had some unsubscribe, which is cool. I’ve also had some join organically. However, I need to bump that number up. Let me rephrase that, I want to bump it up. A larger list, can improve my sales numbers. More possible readers equals more possible sales. Which can also mean a bigger pool or source of reviews.

I am determined to correct my epic FB ad fail and start over. Step one, increase my email list. Step two, set up a new FB ad attached to an email sequence. Step three, get some reviews.

I plan to put my new plan into action on next week. I’ll update you next month.