Getting started with Facebook Ads can seem daunting, but is actually very easy. Mastering the entire platform on the other hand is definitely much more difficult. As a local business, most of the information out there does not apply to your martial arts school. Stay connected to Dojo Digital, and learn only the essential information to actually get results from Facebook Ads.

Let’s start with some must know facts about Facebook Ads:

1: Unless you pay for your Facebook posts, you will only reach an average of 2% of your page audience.

When considering whether or not you should be advertising your martial arts school on Facebook, one of the first things to keep in mind is this: Every time you post on your Business Page, only approximately 2% of your page audience will ever see that post. It is very easy to do the math: for every 1000 likes your page has gotten, you can hope 20 people (maybe) will see that post appear in their feed.

With this information on hand, you may have come to any of the following conclusions:

• You just realised you have been talking to yourself;
• Facebook Pages are a waste of time;
• You may be thinking “Now I understand why my posts get 2-3 likes”

So here is a shocking revelation: Facebook wants to make money off of businesses. So you must invest money in Facebook Ads if you want to use the platform to generate any kind of interest in your martial arts school.

2: Boosting posts is Facebook’s “Big Easy Button”

Facebook Ads can get complex, but they also make it very easy for anyone to get started. All you have to do is START A FACEBOOK ADS ACCOUNT and put a form of payment on file, and when you create a post you will have the option to BOOST IT. This is basically a way to pay for your ad to be seen. Even a £5 commitment will get your post seen by many more people than a regular post would.

3: Boosting Options

Facebook offers you 3 options to boost a post:

• People who like your Page – advertising to all your fans,
• People who like your Page and their friends – advertising to all your fans and all their friends,
• People you choose through targeting – advertising to a specific target audience you choose.

Let’s go through them:

People who like your Page:
Hopefully you didn’t “pay for likes” and the people that like your page are actual members of your business or people who at some point engaged with your Martial Arts School Facebook page and gave it a like. If you have a message that you are trying to deliver to these people, you should throw at least £5 and boost to them. This is the minimum amount Facebook requires for sponsored (paid) ads.

People who like your Page and their friends:
This is a bit of a grey area; On one hand, you can assume SOME friends of parents that like your page are also parents: However an average personal Facebook account can have 500-1000 friends. I do not suggest this, you are better off creating a post to your audience (People who like your page) and ask them to share it with their friends. Provide some value in your post, and this is more likely to happen.

People you choose through targeting:
This is a good way to reach NEW audiences and bring them into your world (Warming up a Cold Audience, as it’s referred to in digital marketing).

You have a few options such as age groups, gender, location. Stick to your city of interest, and if promoting your children program just choose PARENTS 24-65 (I like to have a bit of an older reach, as often grandparents / older relatives might pass it on to right person or engage on their behalf).

Keep in mind, this is what is referred to as a “Cold Traffic Audience”: People who never heard of your business before, or have done business with you (Read our Traffic Temperatures article to learn more on this). The kind of posts you share should be packed with value, and not just an attempt to sell a trial. For example, share an article on your website where you list some Halloween safety tips, and ask the audience to like your page and share with their peers. Inform, Educate, Engage.

4: Have a purpose when creating a paid Facebook Ad:

The very first thing you will want to do prior to creating a post you plan to spend money on is to decide TO WHOM and WHY.
Use our Customer Avatar Worksheet to profile the person you want to direct this ad to.
Then ask yourself: WHAT ARE YOU TRYING TO ACHIEVE?

• Do you want to create awareness to your martial arts school?
• Are you trying to get some Likes on you Business Page to grow your reach?
• Are you trying to sell some martial arts trials or get some leads?

Make sure you have a follow up sales process in place and that you avoid mistakes such as:

• Directing traffic to your website if you do not have the ability to sell Free or Paid Trials on your website; doing so, you will likely waste money. At the very least, you must have lead capturing forms and calls to action on every page.
• Do not write a post directing traffic to another website (such as an article you found interesting and wanted to share), or you are just paying for the other site’s traffic! Have some clear goals, and map out a marketing funnel of the exact steps you are hoping to achieve through your post.

5. Aim to turn a Facebook Fan into an email lead

Your real goals with your Facebook Ads should be to take the user OUT of Facebook and to your website, where you will want to convert the visitor into an email address lead. If you are a more experienced Facebook Advertiser, you will also want to tag them with a Facebook Pixel so you are able to advertise to them in the future. If you are not familiar with a Facebook Pixel, it is a line of code that gets installed on your website that “tracks” visitors who are also logged into their Facebook Account. It creates a new audience you can target in the future such as “People Who Previously Visited My Website”.

If you are just getting started with Ads, this might sound a bit advanced, but if you stick to this blog you will familiarise yourself with all these concepts and I will make them crystal clear for you!

Now you have the chance to get some great marketing skills check out how Website Dojo UK can help make the most of your marketing budget and time. Our sites will convert the traffic you push to your site into leads at a rate of up to 4 times more than that of a standard website. Click here to find out more