If the legendary genie in the lamp really existed, many business owners and marketers would ask it to take care of their Facebook™ ads: create the visuals and copy, set them up and launch them. Unfortunately, there is no proof that this magic character exists.
Instead, Facebook™ has a new tool that will help you stay on top of your marketing efforts during very busy periods: Facebook™ automated ads.
What Exactly Are Facebook Automated Ads?
Imagine that you had the Facebook™ team working for you to create and run your ads. All you have to do is tell them what your business does and what you want to achieve with your ad campaigns.
That is exactly how Facebook™ automated ads work. The social media platform will take care of every aspect of your ads. In no more than 15 minutes, you can set up such a campaign from scratch.
If we’ve got your interest, let us show you the most salient points about Facebook™ automated ads.
1. Where Can You Find This Option?
Facebook™ is always careful to promote its new features prominently. Thus, you will find the option to set up automated ads at the top of your business page, right under the box for creating a new post.
You will see a magic wand symbol and the text: “Get started with Automated Ads”.
2. Tell Facebook™ about Your Business
Once you clicked on the link for getting started with Facebook™ automated ads, you will see an initial pop-up screen that gives you a few details about what these ads do for you and has a button at the bottom right side: “Get Started”.
You will be requested to describe your business by selecting up to three fields of activity. Once you start typing, Facebook™ will display a drop-down box with the most popular business categories.
3. Select the Way You Want Customers to Reach You
Here you tell Facebook™ how where you want to direct the leads: to your brick & mortar store, to your website or to contact you in person. The actual options to choose from are:
Online – here, you will have to specify the URL where you want to send the leads who click on the ad;
Direct contact – emails, phone calls or messages;
In-person – here, you will have to specify your business address.
3. Your Custom Plan for Facebook™ Automated Ads Is Created
Once you’ve filled in all the required details, Facebook™ starts creating your ad. First of all, you will see the custom spending plan determined by Facebook™. There is nothing to do here, but accept the suggestion and move on or cancel the ad altogether.
If you click on the Next button, you get to the actual nitty-gritty part. Facebook™ will select up to 6 photos from your Facebook™ page to use as visuals for the ads. The page states that the most engaging Facebook™ automated ads will be shown more frequently.
4. Set Up the CTA Button
Once you approved the photo selection, you move on to the final part. Here, you will select headlines for your ads, the text, as well as the CTA button. For Facebook™ automated ads, you can opt between:
Contact Us
Learn More
Shop Now
The CTA button is not a mandatory part of the ad, and you can opt-out by selecting No Button from the drop-down list.
5. Finish Up
Your Facebook™ ads are nearly ready now. You will have to select the audience for your ad (you can use general, custom or lookalike audiences). The last step is to review the ad set-up and launch it.
At this point, you can opt to receive updates on Messenger regarding your Facebook™ automated ads, as well as various tips for creating better ads.
It sounds quite simple and straightforward, and that’s exactly how these ads are meant to be. Also, it is a good idea to get used to the concept of Facebook™ managing your ad campaign. Starting with September this year, all ad campaigns will be migrated to an automated budget allocation platform.
This means that marketers will no longer be able to set a budget for each ad campaigns, but only set up a central budget for all their campaigns. Facebook™ will automate the distribution of this budget among your campaigns. We’ll just have to wait and see how this new system will be actually implemented.