When a business approaches Mark Thomas Media for help with their marketing and advertising, the biggest question is always “how much is this gonna cost me?”. Fair question, and one that we take very seriously. For the social media budget, we take these things into consideration:

What is the End Goal?

Is your business interested in obtaining leads or is it branding and awareness? Are you trying to get as much website traffic as possible or only really high-quality web traffic? A brand-new business such as a restaurant just opening its doors may want to start with a broad, high-reaching branding campaign with a goal of high visibility and building its Facebook page following (page likes). An established insurance agent may ask for a targeted lead-generation campaign in order to talk to many potential customers. Most businesses need a mixture of several types of campaigns.

What is the Geography?

Are you only selling your product or services in a small town or is your market area an entire state? Geography will play a large factor in the amount that you will spend on social media advertising. We have clients whose budget is constrained to Wilmington, NC, while other clients spend worldwide. Their business types are very different and the campaigns that we crafted for them reflected that difference.

What is the Overall Advertising Budget?

We take into account your overall advertising spend when crafting the social media budget. For some clients, it makes sense to spend more on social media than on paid search or traditional media, and the opposite is also true. We also wouldn’t recommend a client with a small budget spend a large amount on social media advertising unless there was a great chance of recouping that advertising spend, such as a client whose product can be bought online and is greatly desired by many people.

What Do the Projected Numbers Look Like?

Though not always 100% accurate, we can get a really good idea of how far your Facebook advertising spend will go utilizing Facebook’s Advertising platform and inputting a few estimates. Building these estimates can give us an idea of the reach, impressions, website clicks, number of leads, or other metrics based on the geographical spread, demographics, and interest targeting we manipulate. At Mark Thomas Media we have done a few tests with building out these estimates and then comparing the data to what actually happened; and we have a team with years of experience running a variety of campaigns.

Are You Using Third Party Data Sources?

Years ago, Facebook incorporated numerous third-party data sources into the interest targeting of their ad platform. As privacy issues arose, those data sources were excluded. Then, as concerns grew over discrimination, businesses in the housing, credit, or employment sectors saw their targeting options shrink even more. However, advertisers can now purchase that third-party data and use it to run Facebook campaigns, even with businesses whose targeting options are restricted. That cost is typically passed on to the business.

Facebook Advertising with Mark Thomas Media

Basically, there is no silver bullet when it comes to advertising. There is a lot of hard work, research, trial and error, and experience. Our team will put in the time it takes to mold your Facebook campaigns into a great avenue to market your business. Give us a call today to learn more.