Last week I wrapped up my first in-depth social media marketing experience/experiment. By “in-depth” I mean that I tried ad campaigns on a few different major social media and other web-based platforms, tracked traffic by means of Facebook pixels and Google Analytics, and came to a few observations based on a pretty good amount of data.* In short, I developed a product, set up what I think is a solid business structure, and did create marketing materials ahead of time — but made no attempt to build an audience until I launched. Here are my conclusions so far:
Even a good product and a ton of money can’t overcome the lack of an audience.
I don’t have the ability to brute-force reach even a relatively small goal with no pre-launch audience whatsoever. I assumed that going in, but felt like taking the plunge would be good for personal momentum, and provide some valuable experience.**
There’s no point in spending money on Reddit ads. With over 400M users and the incredibly precise targeting offered by Reddit’s basic framework, you’d think Reddit would be prime advertising.*** The problem is that is that ad blocking on Reddit is so cheap, nobody sees the ads. Even my Reddit friends who complain about being on a ramen budget for weeks at a time use non-ad Reddit accounts. Go figure.
Facebook could sure stand to rationalize its business platforms. Even staying strictly within the FB environment (Not creating FB campaigns through a Wix designer, for instance) it’s easy to end up with marketing efforts being managed by what seem to be totally separate FB platforms. I ended up with FB campaigns being managed via the business web page, other campaigns being managed through Facebook Business Manager, and one campaign that I could never find again after launching it. The bill managed to find me, though.
And in the realm of “valuable learnings,” my time should apparently be spent heavily on my conversion pages. One of my more successful moments was a FB ad campaign that generated well over 800 clicks in less than 12 hours. (For $10, not bad!) However, those clicks generated exactly 1 sale.****
So, now that I’ve tried the “dive in with little training and no preparation route,” I’ve got a more coherent plan moving forward, and we’ll see if August 2020 turns out to be solid experience or just a fleeting hobby.
* Also, it cost me a fair bit of cash. That makes anything a legit experience, right?
** Maybe if I were more talented at marketing or more willing to throw a ton of money at it. On the other hand, even throwing a ton of money at an unprepared product doesn’t necessarily sell it.
*** And since Reddit’s projected to make $250M in ad revenue in 2021, plenty of other people believe Reddit should be a viable marketing platform.
**** You know things are low when you’re measuring by outright number, not percentages.