Marketing Analytics Blog for Growth Hackers | Popcorn Metrics

Facebook Ads: "Who in this target audience would NOT be interested in my ad?"

Paul Boyce -

"Every cent you spend on
Facebook Ads needs to be putting
an impression in front of
somebody who is HIGHLY likely to be interested."

So says John Parkes, Facebook Ads guru and coach at Click-funnels.

His interview is interesting because of what John says about mindset and targeting.

This video skips right to the best part:

Mindset is so important!

Here are a few key points I took from what he said. (Forgive any typos, I am typing fast to keep up with the video!):

"One of the pitfalls with adsets and targeting is trying to have the right mindset."

I say "Is this a targeted Ad Set?"

And they say "Well… there is somebody in that ad set who might be interested in my ad."

So you’re running your adset for 10,000 people who aren’t interested for every ONE that is interested.

The goal is to get as targeted as possible.

So the thing to ask yourself is not "if they may be interested?"

..but the reverse, "Who in this target audience would NOT be interested in my ad?"

And then how to cut them out of the Ad Set?

So there are ways to exclude. When you’re building out your Ad Set you can exclude audiences and you can trim things down ... until you’ve gotten to where you’re pretty sure that everybody who was NOT interested is not seeing your ad.

Because.. every single penny you spend on ads needs to be putting an impression in front of somebody who is highly likely to be interested".

I really like what John says.

I like that his approach focuses on the best prospects. I like that he removes people from an audience if they are not likely to be interested.

John says "the goal is to get as targeted as possible".

This is as important when running retargeting ads as when driving cold traffic to ads. In retargeting, there are two ways to shape your audiences.

  1. You can INCLUDE people by actions they DO take.
  2. You can EXCLUDE people by actions they DO NOT take.

When retargeting people who DO take specific actions,
you can target ads to people who:

  • DO visit a specific page for X seconds
  • DO visit a specific page and scroll half-way (or more)
  • DO click an item (e.g. Add to Cart button)
  • DO click to download a PDF
  • DO complete a search/contact form on your site

When retargeting people who DO NOT take specific actions,
you can target ads to people who:

  • exclude people who DO NOT stay at least X seconds
  • exclude people who DO NOT scroll at least X% of your page

That means you can be sure every cent you spend retargeting your Facebook Ads puts an impression in front of somebody who is HIGHLY likely to be interested.

Wherever you're reading this, tell me your views. Leave a comment below.