7 Most Effective Social Media Advertising for Your Industry

As a marketer or business owner, it’s normal to feel like you have to be present for your audience across all social media platforms. But it depends on your business’s nature and target audience, you need to make sure you’re using the same platforms as they are.

After investing time and money on your digital marketing efforts, you may find that you keep getting inconsistent results that are not aligned with your expected social media goals you have set for your business.

The problem isn’t social media alone but perhaps lies in choosing the right social media platforms for your business. There are plenty of social media networks out there to be on, but some platforms are better suited for your business than others.

When you’re a marketer or are running a business, it’s almost impossible to be active on all the social media platforms out there, so by narrowing down your options to a select few platforms, it will allow you to focus on your social media advertising efforts and get the return of investment you desire.

Table of Contents:

Let’s get to the 7 effective social media advertising types:

1. Facebook

About this channel

It’s no surprise this social network is on our list because it is a multi-faceted powerhouse with a diverse audience when it comes to building personal relationships and professional relationships with your audience. With over 2.7 billion monthly users on it on the planet, it’s safe to say that it’s the most widely used platform worldwide.

This is the platform most businesses use to reach their audience, as it is a strong social site to grow meaningful relationships and also provides all types of businesses the opportunity to engage with their targeted users.

Businesses can rely on Facebook to introduce their brand name, products, and services through consistent communication via Facebook messenger which allows you to reach your targeted audience directly. All these features on Facebook help generate valuable leads and a potentially loyal following for your brand. So, whatever the goal is for your business is, whether it’s to create brand awareness, increase traffic to your website, lead generation, increase online conversions, and more, Facebook is the place to be (if executed well) to bring you one step closer to achieving your business goals.

What’s the target audience?

Facebook is the world’s largest social media platform with a diverse audience, and you can find users of all ages on it with over 1.69 billion users worldwide.

Let’s take a look at the statistics by NapoleanCat on Facebook users in Malaysia, as of August 2020.

According to the statistics above, there were 26,500,000 million Facebook users in Malaysia which accounts for 79.8% of the entire population.

People aged 25-34 years were the largest group (9,400,000) of users.

Within the age group of 25-34, men lead by 1,200,000 users in Malaysia.

Based on statistics alone, it indicates that Facebook is a definite must-have for marketers or business owners to include in their toolkit one of their main social media platforms based on its large audience number and multipurpose features, and it’s a powerful tool to get connected with your audience.

Ad types available and its use:

Facebook offers many ad types for marketers and business owners like you to advertise to your targeted audience. Let’s take a sneak peek at the choices available:

i. Image Ads

These are one of the simplest ones and easy to use type of ads. All you need is a strong ad copy that’s informative and concise. Avoid wordiness or Facebook’s algorithms may not work as great too.

ii. Video Ads

These are similar to image ads, except it’s a video. Facebook recommends your video to be summarized in 15 seconds. The audience today have short attention so make your brand, product, and message short, snappy, and catchy in 15 seconds to get your audience’s attention.

iii. Slideshow Ads

This is a good alternative to video ads and allows you to include multiple images in one and add effects and music to it.

iv. Carousel Ads

These ads are the best when you want to showcase all your products and allows you to share up to 10 images and videos to send your message across to your audience.

Marketers or B2B business owners can use this type of ad to hyper-target their audience locally to target a group with a specific need (e.g. Food delivery apps). It can also go beyond borders to promote your company’s effort or if you want to host a charitable cause, and the list of ideas goes on.

Tip: Use a Carousel ad if you have under 10 products. Anything beyond 10, you should consider the Dynamic Ad type.

v. Collection Ads

Collection ads go a long way when telling your brand story to a consumer. Marketers or business owners can highlight their products and services impactfully with good content and images.

Once the people you’re targeting on Facebook tap on the ad, it will link them directly to a fast-loading landing page, allowing your audience to browse through up to 50 products, from there people are able to purchase a product that will link to a retailer’s site. The layout of a collection ad comprises of a video on the top and 4 recommended products below, usually appearing on the Facebook newsfeed.

According to statistics from Facebook, brands like Adidas, Tommy Hilfiger, Sport Chek, and Michael Kors are among the top brands that have tested this ad format and the brand Sport Chek ran a campaign with the use of GIFs during the holidays, the retailers witnessed doubled conversions and 28% increase in online sales.

In addition, Adidas claimed a 1.8X decrease in cost-per-conversion with one of their campaigns where they posted a hoodie and similar products.

It seems like this ad format is a great way to showcase your products and to drive sales for marketers and apply them to many businesses.

vi. Instant Experience

Previously known as Canvas Ads, Instant Experience is fully optimized for mobile, providing an immersive experience for the targeted audience with beautiful images with the option to zoom in on panoramic images and to even tilt the screen.

This ad format gives marketers, advertisers, and business owners the opportunity to attract their target audience with a unique viewing experience.

Advertising on mobile platforms has always been a challenge for businesses due to the loading time and slow response, but Facebook never fails to disappoint with their cutting-edge technology by creating Instant Experience Ads, apparently 10X faster than other mobile platforms in loading speed.

Instant Experience Ads would be an ideal platform to create a successful mobile marketing campaign, reaching out to a majority of people on their phones.

vii. Lead Generation Ads

If your business depends on generating leads, then this ad is for you. A lead ad is basically a lead form that collects the information you require in order to subscribe or to receive email newsletters from your brand or service. Usually, your audience would be required to specify general information (You can choose to customize or use Facebook’s template) such as full name, email, etc.

It’s a good way to grow your database and fill that email list with interested subscribers and their information.

Tip: Avoid asking for too much information as it will make the audience uncomfortable to pursue sharing further.

viii. Dynamic Ads

Dynamic ads are designed to help advertisers promote multiple products or an entire catalog across all devices the consumers use. These ads are able to target certain products to a specific target audience.

These ads empower marketers to retarget and track down potential customers that have previously visited added to an online shopping cart on your website.

Tip: If your business has over 10-20 products, you should consider using Dynamic ads.

Which industry is recommended?

We are all aware of Facebook’s popularity and how it is home to billions in the world, and also how we all check it a few times a day too (admit it).

However, the success of your business on this platform can only be measured by how applicable your content marketing and social media advertising strategy is — overall, knowing your audience to the very core.

All these key aspects contribute to a well-executed marketing plan and in turn the success of your campaign and social media advertising efforts.

However, as diverse as Facebook is, there are several industries where Facebook advertising works better than others — but don’t let that burst your bubble.

The top industries where Facebook Advertising works best are:

According to the most recent statistics in Statista 2020, the industry that dominates Facebook is Ecommerce with 32.3 million, followed by services, retail, fashion, and FMCG food, and probably more industries too with strong social media marketing plan and know their audience well.

One thing these industries all have in common when advertising their business on Facebook is having visually oriented and quality images to grab their audience’s attention. They adapt to the Facebook culture and format of advertising.

Given Facebook’s diverse target audience, it also allows you to identify your specific audience and reach out to them according to specifics such as location, age, interests, behavior, and many more specifications that maximize the opportunities for many industries trying to target their ideal target audience.

And you should too. Here’s a gist of targeting your audience on Facebook for business with the Facebook Ads Manager.

Due to Facebook’s incredible features, marketers and business owners can now reach their people by targeting and building relationships with their desired audience.