Social media websites are just beaming with people. For that reason, it would seem only natural for marketers to take advantage of these social networks’ popularity through paid advertising. The three most used platforms namely Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn cater to different demographics but all of them are on to one thing: creating innovative solutions for targeted advertising. It is crucial for a small business to come up with specific goals prior to tapping any of these social media sites.
Of the three social networks mentioned, Facebook ads are far more advanced and its self-serve interface is very reminiscent of the early Google Adwords platform. The best thing about Facebook ads is that they are available to business of different scales. Facebook ads have become most popular among small businesses which often have very limited budgets.
The reason for why prices of clicks and impressions on Facebook are significantly lower than compared to Google Adwords and other mature channels is because of Facebook’s still developing platform. So although entrepreneurs won’t have to shell out more money for Facebook ads, Google Adwords still holds the edge with its more properly utilized platform.
Facebook has basically mastered targeted advertising. With the help of users’ profile information, Facebook is able to match individuals with ads that they are likely to be interested in. Entrepreneurs can reach out to people who are aged 55-65 or to 24-40 year-old women or to people who enjoy jazz music through Facebook’s targeting capability.
Because LinkedIn is a community composed of businesses and professionals, B2B industries will fare more by utilizing LinkedIn ads. LinkedIn makes use the professional information on its members’ profiles for targeted advertisements. LinkedIn’s platform allows businesses to interact only with individuals that hold specific qualifications or titles through advertisements. For instance, you can have your ads seen only be people who hold the title of director of marketing. Because LinkedIn is becoming increasingly popular, do not be surprised if there is a sudden price increase of the cost of advertising.
Although a lot of marketers have already made use of Twitter to promote businesses, this social network’s advertising platform is the most underdeveloped of the three websites. Twitter’s advertising solution is quite prohibitive as it only caters to large brands through its “Sponsored Tweets”. What basically happens is that advertisers’ tweets show up at the top of the feeds for increased visibility. However, it’s only a matter of time before Twitter will begin offering advertising solutions for smaller businesses.
Chris Marentis is an experienced marketer with over 25 starting and growing successful businesses. He is currently CEO at local internet marketing company, SureFire Social, involved in local web marketing.
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