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December 9, 2024
Do you find yourself tempted by the easiness of promoting your Facebook post with one click on the “boost” button? One of the questions social media managers are often asked is “Is the boost button a good way to get more audience for my page?”. In this article, we will attempt to clarify the confusion around the “Boost Post” button and explain how to promote Facebook posts once and for all.
If you manage a Facebook page for your business, you’re probably wondering how to get more exposure for your content and reach a broader audience. Organic reach for business pages has decreased dramatically in the last years. It’s common to find yourself producing great content but still seeing very low engagement rates. Facebook presents an easy solution in the form of a blue button that says “Boost Post”. The company also advocates it to page owners: You’ve probably also seen ads from Facebook itself promoting the use of the button with predictions of engagement you can get if you use it.
Once you click on the Boost Page button you enter a simple menu with everything pre-set for you to start paying Facebook for more exposure. If you want, you can choose your audience, adjust your budget and the duration of your ads run. Seemingly, this is a very quick and easy way to advertise on Facebook. However, advertising professionals never use the Boost Button and always work through Facebook’s Ads Manager system
You may have heard before that experts advise against boosting Facebook posts and recommend using Ads manager instead. But do you really understand why boosting is bad for your business?
Here are the advantages of Facebook Ads over boosting a post according to Facebook themselves:
Creative Control: In the Ads Manager you can create ads in a variety of layouts instead of using your published posts as the ad. In one ad-set you can have multiple ads targeted at your audience and A/B test them to find out. Plus you can still use your post through the engagement objective
Advanced Targeting Capabilities: when boosting a post you can choose the age, gender, and location of the people you want to target. You can also target by interest, thus harnessing the power of Facebook’s in-depth knowledge of its users. But you don’t get access to valuable tools like creating lookalike audiences and other advanced audience types.
Determining Placement: The only choice you get when boosting your post is whether you want to show it on Instagram in addition to the Facebook Feed. In Ads Manager you can choose placements in Facebook News Feed side ads, Messenger ads, Instagram Stories, instant articles, and Audience Network. These “less lucrative” placements are often less costly for advertisers so in many cases it makes sense to at least experiment with putting your ads there.
Ads Objectives: The biggest disadvantage of the Facebook Boost Button is that there are currently only 2 possible objectives: more engagement or more messages. Facebook Ads allow you to use objectives that are at the core of the marketing strategy for many businesses like video views, store traffic, conversions, or lead generation. It’s important to understand that predetermining your objective means that Facebook will optimize your campaign for this goal. Don’t expect do get website visits from an ad promoted for more objective, even if your website address is part of the copy.
In addition to all this, the report you will get on your ad’s performance is partial and has fewer details, so you are less able to learn and optimize performance.
The problem with Facebook Ads Manager is that is a relatively complex system with lots and lots of options and an unfriendly interface. We suspect the Boost Button was invented to give access to Facebook Advertising for people who find Ads Manager too confusing or simply don’t have time to use it. And in some cases, boosting can be a viable option. Here are the terms in which it is OK to boost:
Predetermine a marketing strategy and set a clear objective for your Facebook Advertising. Enlist the help of someone who knows his way around the Ads Manager Interface. We believe that most businesses can benefit from employing a Facebook Advertising expert. But if you don’t have the budget, make the use of resources like digital courses to learn how to use Ads Manager.
Let us know how we can help you!
