A Quick Guide to Facebook Ad Types and Formats

A Quick Guide to Facebook Ad Types and Formats

When stepping into the Facebook Ads arena to help promote your business, it can be overwhelming to learn that there are ten categories of Facebook ads. Yes, TEN! And on top of that, there are different ad formats to choose from. So which category and format is the best for your needs? It depends.

Here is a quick rundown of each ad type and what their objectives are:

Facebook Ad Types

  • App installs: Promote downloads and installations of your desktop or mobile app
  • Brand awareness: Help get your brand noticed by a new audience
  • Conversions: Get people to perform specific actions on your website, such as purchase a product or subscribe to your email list.
  • Engagement: Drive people to your page or a post on your page to increase the number of likes, comments, shares, video views, or photo views. Also used for event promotion.
  • Lead generation: Get people to sign up for your email list and add them to your sales funnel.
  • Reach: Get your ad noticed by as many people as possible.
  • Product sales catalog: Show people ads for products that they are most likely to purchase.
  • Store visits: Get people to visit your brick and mortar store.
  • Traffic: Drive traffic to a website.
  • Video views: Get your video out in front of as many people as possible to promote brand awareness.

And within those objectives, there are six Facebook ad formats to choose from:

Photo Ads

This is just what it sounds like. Just know that images can have no more than 20% of it be text if you want it to be seen by as many people as possible. Use this Facebook ad image tool to see if your image meets the requirements.

  • Campaign types: All except video views
  • Facebook ad image sizes: 1200 x 628 pixels

Video Ads

Video is where it’s at when it comes to engagement on Facebook. Here are the specs to keep in mind when making your video (but for the most impact, the shorter the video, the better):

  • Campaign types: All
  • Facebook ad image sizes (thumbnail): Minimum width 600 pixels; match length to video aspect ratio
  • Facebook ad dimensions: Video aspect ratio of 16:9 (full landscape) or 1:1 (square) for all objectives; other aspect ratios available for specific campaign types
  • Maximum video length: 120 minutes

Slideshow Video Ads

Don’t have the time or ability to make a video? Why not create one from still images (up to 10). Just add captions, and voila! You have a video ad with very little effort.

  • Campaign types: All except post engagement and product catalog sales
  • Facebook ad image sizes: 1280 x 720 pixels

Carousel Ads

While this may seem similar to a slideshow video ad, it’s not. You can display up to 10 photos OR videos in your ad, but they will be presented in one post that displays the images separately.

  • Campaign types: All except post engagement and product catalog sales
  • Facebook ad image sizes: 600 x 600 pixels
  • Maximum video length: 2 minutes combined

Collection Ads

This is a mobile-only ad that shows off multiple products or features.

  • Campaign types: Conversions, traffic
  • Facebook ad image sizes: 1200 x 628 pixels

Canvas Ads

One of Facebook’s newer formats, it’s almost like a sales page incorporating text, up to 20 photos, and video.

  • Campaign types: Brand awareness, conversions, engagement
  • Facebook ad size: Full screen
  • Facebook ad image sizes: 66 x 882 pixels (header); 1080 x 1920 pixels (full-screen image)

Still confused about Facebook ads? Why not contact us at Smart to Finish. We will work with you on determining which ad category best suits your needs and get your Facebook ad campaign underway.

5 Tips for Effective Email Management Using Infusionsoft the Right Way

5 Tips for Effective Email Management Using Infusionsoft the Right Way

Using a CRM to manage your email list is common practice in 2017, and Infusionsoft makes it easy to do.  But, are you really managing your email list the right way?

Yes, it’s great to have a big list, but it’s even better to have an active and responsive email list.  After all, the goal is to turn those leads into buyers. And, you can’t do that if your list isn’t opening and engaging with your emails.  Here are our top 5 tips for effective email management:

1. Organic Growth & Permission

Infusionsoft requires a permission-based email marketing strategy. CAN-SPAM laws actually prohibit you from sending emails to just anyone. You must have permission to send emails to your recipients. Permission is obtained from sign up forms on your website. It’s best practice to offer something of value in exchange for someone providing you with their name and email.

Once you obtain the email address, be sure to deliver the content they requested, and let the recipient know how often to expect emails from you.  It’s also a great idea to add a checkbox to your opt-in forms asking people to check that they understand the content they will receive.

2. Confirmation

Email confirmation or “double opt-in” helps protect you from malicious bots, fake email addresses, and mistyped email addresses. All of these can negatively impact your sender reputation and prevent emails from being delivered to the inbox.

3. Segment

Don’t send every email to everyone on your list. Collect information on your contacts so you know exactly what they will be interested in. Then, tag them with their interest and only send them information that will be valuable to them.

4. Whitelist

On your thank you page or in the first email you send, ask your subscribers to add your email address to the their address book or safe sender list.

5. List Hygiene

Keep your list healthy by sending frequent communications and always providing an easy way for subscribers to opt-out of your marketing. It’s helpful to set up a regular schedule for sending emails so your recipients will come to expect when they’ll receive your messages. You also need to periodically cleanup your email list to ensure all addresses are current, active and deliverable. To keep your list clean, you’ll want to identify all engaged contacts and tag them. Engaged contacts are those that have recently:

  • Opted in via an Infusionsoft hosted web form
  • Opened an email
  • Clicked a link within an email
  • Purchased a product or service
  • Been on a recurring subscription

Once you have identified and tagged all contacts meeting at least one of the criterion above, opt-out all unengaged contacts. Please note: The general rule of thumb is to search engaged contacts within the past 120 days (four months). 

Infusionsoft even allows you to automate this step. You can easily do this by importing one of the FREE list management campaigns from the Infusionsoft Marketplace like Clean Your Contact List, Hard Bouncy Recovery and/or the Track Email Engagement campaign. Even better, one of the new updates coming to all Infusionsoft apps in August allows you to set a threshold on when your contacts are no longer considered engaged with your list.  You can read more about this update here.

These are just some of the ways to keep your Infusionsoft list clean and ensure your emails are delivered to the right contacts at the right time. For more tips for effective email management and ensuring you are compliant with CAN-SPAM laws, contact the Smart to Finish Team for support.  We’ll be glad to implement these and other best practices so you can focus on creating new and valuable content and generating even more revenue for your business.