How To Run Lead Generation Ads on Facebook: Expert Tips to Get You Started

So you want to learn how to run lead generation ads on Facebook?

Facebook is one of the best advertisement platforms for B2B and B2C companies. The social media giant is doing everything it can to help more business owners and organizations promote their offers successfully on the platform.

As a result, Facebook has made the process as simple as possible for anyone to create and launch their first ad.

In this guide:

You’ll learn everything you need to know about how to run lead generation ads on Facebook. We’ll also share with you unique marketing tips to get your ads noticed and generate more business opportunities at a lower cost.

Let’s get to it.

What Is Lead Generation?

Lead generation is a digital marketing term that refers to the practice of attracting new prospects to your business. It starts with identifying ideal buyers, then engaging them with relevant messaging to push them to convert.

Facebook Advertising is one of the most popular lead generation platforms for businesses. It gives you the chance to connect with targeted prospects all over the world and introduce them to your best offers.

The way Facebook lead generation works is simple… You’ll run an ad on the platform to attract people to a landing page. Once they’re on your website, you’ll capture their contact information so you can reach out to them later.

What Are the Benefits of Facebook Ads for Lead Generation?

There are a lot of platforms, tools, and techniques for companies to generate leads online. So this multitude of options might leave you crippled trying to identify which lead generation strategy is best for you.

So:

What makes Facebook Ads a good option for your company?

1. Low Costs

Forget about spending thousands of dollars on failing lead generation strategies…

Facebook advertising is a cost-effective option as it guarantees that your money is well-spent on a targeted audience. You’ll only be paying for leads that match your ideal customer profile and who have a high chance of converting.

Also:

Facebook offers one of the lowest advertising costs online compared to other advertising websites. You can spend as low as 10$ and still reach thousands of people within your target market.

However…

You should keep in mind that Facebook Ads is a bidding platform — which means that if you want quality leads, you might have to keep up with your competition when setting your budget.

Want to hear the best part?

You actually get full control over your budget spending for each day or for your overall ad campaign. This allows you to forecast your expenses upfront and set up your budget accordingly to avoid unexpected costs.

2. Quicker Results

Here’s a shocker:

You can get an ad up and running on Facebook within hours from its launch. So with the right targeting and a good ad copy, you’ll start attracting potential prospects to your business in only a few days.

Now:

What also makes Facebook Ads an attractive option is how quickly you can optimize your ad strategy. For instance, you don’t have to spend a quarter of your budget to notice that things aren’t working with your lead generation strategy.

Within days of launching a new ad, you’ll have enough Facebook Ads data to analyze your results and evaluate your progress. This enables you to make all the necessary changes you need.

3. Increased Reach

This is an obvious one!

Facebook is one of the largest social platforms today with more than 2.9 billion active users each month. So no matter how specific or small your target market is, there is always a large-size audience for your business to reach on Facebook.

Here’s the deal:

What makes Facebook Ads so brilliant is how well they blend in with the rest of the content on the platform. For example, Facebook feed ads are sponsored posts that are quite similar to the content your target leads are consuming every day.

This is essential for getting potential leads interested in interacting with you without making them annoyed. So if you choose the right ad type for your offers, you can easily get your message in front of the right people and attract them to your business.

4. Lead Quality

Increased reach for your offers is essential. But, if you’re not targeting the right prospective clients, you’ll waste a lot of money and time chasing a dead end.

Thankfully:

Facebook advertising allows you to focus on the best leads for your business using advanced targeting tools. To give you an example, you can build a new audience based on age, gender, location, interests, and other profile information that matches your target leads.

But here’s the cool part!

You can set up a Meta pixel to help the algorithms track visitor activity on your website. This gives Facebook enough data about your target clients so that it can show your ad to similar audiences on the platform.

What Are the Different Types of Lead Generation Ads on Facebook?

Different ad formats can help you lower your budget spend and convert more leads faster. But it all depends on your lead generation objectives and prospect targeting.

You need to ensure that the type of ads you’re creating will generate the most interest in your offers and drive more people to your landing page.

So:

To help you decide on which format works best for your business, let’s go over the most popular ad formats you can use.

Here are the different types of lead generation ads on Facebook:

Image Ads

Image ads are a widely popular ad format on Facebook due to how easy and efficient they are to create. They contain a single image with an ad copy and an external link or button to take leads to your landing page.

If you use Facebook regularly, you’ve probably seen tens of thousands of these throughout the years.

Look:

It’s important to use high-quality images and take into consideration aspect ratios for different ad placements. Your photos must also be visually appealing and relevant to your offer to make a solid first impression. It seems like a lot of pressure, especially if you are not skilled in graphic design, but you can speed up the process of editing images with free online tools created for marketers on the go.

Video Ads

Facebook video ads contain a single video that appears in the News Feed, similar to any other unsponsored video a Facebook user might watch.

The advantage of video ads is straightforward…

You’ll have a better chance of capturing attention and driving higher engagements on your ads. Videos are easier to consume and understand. So that explains they have always been a more engaging content format when it comes to online sales and marketing.

Moreover:

Video ads allow you to talk freely about your services or explain any complex product features that the prospect should know about. You wouldn’t have to write long guides and force potential leads to read them.

Most importantly:

Since 98% of Facebook users are on mobile, you’ll guarantee that you’re not missing any lead generation opportunities with video content.

Carousel Ads

Carousel ads are like image and video ads, but with multiple elements shown at once. With a small paragraph at the top, you can add up to 10 photos or videos — each with a unique headling, description, and a button leading to an external page of your choosing.

How is this better than single image/video ads?

Well…

This format is best used for describing relevant products or services in the same ad. It’s also a great way to familiarize your leads with a new topic or explain a step-by-step process.

You can use carousel ads to your advantage and tell a story about your brand or promote the special offers you have for your target customers.

Story Ads

In addition to your ads appearing in the News Feed, you’re also able to advertise on Facebook Stories and increase lead conversions.

To launch a story ad, you can use both image and video to create a vertical, fullscreen ad for your campaign. For creating appealing content you can use some tools such as AI image editing. Be sure to use the right specs to make your ad fit with the rest of the content on the platform.

This format is excellent for lead generation because it ensures that whenever a prospect sees your ad, they’ll be fully concentrated on your marketing message.

Messenger Ads

According to Facebook, there are 1.3 billion monthly users on Messenger.

Messenger ads give you the opportunity to edge out the competition and stand out with relevant offers targeting potential leads. You can easily connect with your audience using ads appearing in between their chat tabs.

Or…

You may send highly-targeted messages and strike up private conversations with your prospects any time you want. This is one of the most efficient ways to generate interest in your offers before converting your leads.

How To Create a Lead Generation Ad Campaign on Facebook?

Let’s jump now into the nitty-gritty of Facebook advertisements and how to create an ad that gets results:

1. Define Your Facebook Ad Campaign Goals

An effective lead generation campaign starts with setting precise objectives for your ad. This step makes the rest of the process easy as it helps you answer most of the questions later on.

You have to identify which leads you’re going to target and the budget you need to achieve your goals. You must also choose better ad placements and pick the best offers that match your target prospects’ needs.

When creating a new campaign, you can see that there are three types of ad campaigns: awareness, consideration, and conversions.

You can choose to increase page likes, boost engagements on a specific post, drive traffic to a landing page, or simply boost awareness around your brand.

2. Set up an Ad Account

If you’ve never advertised on Facebook before, you need to create an ad account before you can run a campaign. All you need is a Facebook account and a business page that you’re an admin on.

Once created, be sure to add a payment method to pay for your advertisements. You should also give permission to any team members to control your Facebook ads and have access to your business insights.

3. Set Your Advertising Budget

The next step is to set up an advertising budget for your campaign. This is essential because you need to tell Facebook how much you’re willing to spend so that the algorithms don’t exceed your budget limits.

Here’s what you need to understand:

Facebook is going to charge you based on lead quality, which is determined by demographics, location, industry, ad type, advertising objectives, etc.

You can set a daily budget to spend the same amount consistently and maintain your results. Or, you can choose a lifetime budget and leave it for the algorithm to handle.

Also…

Advertising on Facebook is auction-based, so you’ll be competing for attention with other businesses in your industry. The system will prioritize the highest bidders and give them the best targeting and ad placements.

Why is this important?

You don’t want to start with a small budget and bid too low. Because that only leaves you with low-quality leads that are impossible to convert. On the flip side, if you bid too high and increase prices unreasonably, you’ll lose a lot of money and compete with yourself for easy leads.

4. Customize Your Target Audience

Who are you trying to reach with this ad campaign?

Facebook is one of the largest social platforms with billions of monthly active users. So to increase conversion on the platform, you need to narrow down your audience and remain laser-focused on highly-targeted prospects.

The good news is:

You’ve already laid out your objectives for this ad campaign and identified your ideal buyers. So at this point, it’s just a matter of telling Facebook who you should see your ad.

There are three types of audiences you can target on Facebook:

Core Audiences — is any audience you target based on location, interests, or demographics
Custom Audiences — targets the prospects who have already interacted with your brand
Lookalike Audiences — includes any leads on the platform who are similar to an exciting audience

Core and lookalike audiences offer you a huge opportunity to reach new people and convince them of your offers. The algorithms will do all the work and try to find you quality leads based on your criteria. This is an excellent way to save your budget by only spending on leads that are worth your time.

5. Choose Your Ad Placement

Facebook allows marketers to show ads in various locations on its website. For example, a target lead can see your marketing message in the News Feed, in the right column, in Messenger, between stories, etc.

Your campaign results will be significantly different depending on your offer and where you place it.

Let’s face it:

For most ads, the best ad placement on Facebook is the News Feed. You can use it to target any lead, for any offer, and with any ad type. However, it’s important to experiment with different ad spaces to make sure that your campaign is fully optimized.

Is Automatic Placement good for Facebook ads?

Automatic Placement leaves everything to Facebook systems to decide where your ads should appear.

If you don’t have any data or preferences as to where you want to put your offers, it might be a good option to get you started. Once you have enough data about your ad performance, you can switch to Manual placement to enhance your results and get more conversions.

6. Create a Brilliant Ad Copy

So far:

You’ve nailed your audience targeting
You set the right budget and duration
You choose the perfect ad placement for your offer

But this is only the beginning of your lead generation campaign on Facebook. Because even when thousands of potential customers see your advertisement, they’re only going to pay attention if your offer is actually captivating.

To create a perfect Facebook Ad:

You first need to choose an appropriate format that matches your offer. There’s no universal rule for whether you should use images or videos, so feel free to experiment with different ads and compare your results.

You must write an engaging ad copy with a headline that grabs attention and keeps prospective clients interested. You should craft a few short paragraphs in a simple, easy-to-understand language. Make people relate to the solution you’re offering, and always talk about benefits instead of features.

Most importantly:

Upload a high-quality image or video to stop prospects from scrolling past your ad. The more visually appealing the format, the higher your chances of standing out in the News Feed and getting the engagements you deserve.

7. Monitor Your Ad Campaign Results

Congratulations!

Your ad is now up and running. So it’s time to celebrate — right?

Wrong…

Launching your first ad is just the beginning of a long journey of trial and error. This doesn’t mean you’ll have to spend weeks before getting any results. In fact, you might start generating new leads from day one. However. there’s always a way to improve your lead generation on Facebook.

How do you do that?

By testing, tracking, learning, and optimizing.

One of the best things about Facebook Ads is how easy it is to track and analyze performance. You can launch hundreds of ads and break them down into ad sets to see which ad copies, audiences, or offers are working best.

The data in Ads Manager reports will offer you valuable insights into your target prospects and help you develop more solid offers. Once you specify your worst-performing ads, you can turn them off with one click and spend the rest of your budget on winning ads.

5 Tips for Running Successful Facebook Lead Generation Ad Campaigns

Aside from the basic steps of creating a Facebook Ad to generate leads, there are many tips you can apply to boost your results. With a bit more research and optimization, you can lower your ad costs significantly and beat your competition.

How do you do that?

Here are five tricks to get better lead generation results with Facebook ads:

1. Build a Strong Landing Page

The landing page will make or break your lead generation efforts.

A weak landing page can send qualified prospects away and sabotage your whole sales process. So to boost your Facebook advertising lead generation results, you need to build a powerful page following the best practices.

Here’s the thing:

When a new lead lands on your website, they expect to get a relevant solution to solve their problem. They’ve already shown interest by clicking on your link, so it will only take a bit more convincing before they take action.

How do you encourage them to convert?

Write a strong copy to support your main offer
Include positive feedback and testimonials all over the page
Promote your most relevant case studies to highlight past accomplishments
Maintain the same design style in your ad and landing page
Use explainer videos and images to improve the user experience
Enhance your website design to load fast and support mobile devices
Check out Facebook advertising policies to ensure that you’re not breaking any guidelines
Create and test multiple landing pages for different ad copies then compare your results

2. Enhance Your Branding

Branding has always been a top priority for the largest organizations around the world. That’s because a unique brand style can transform any company into a leading authority and foster trust with its’ target buyers.

Any element in your ad or your web page is going to affect how a prospect feels about your business. Your company logo, colors, fonts, images, videos, and writing tone are all things that have a huge effect on potential clients.

So how do you take your branding to the next level?

You need to develop a visually appealing brand identity that reflects competence and professionalism. A captivating design style can push anyone who sees your Facebook ad to visit your website and browse your offers.

Your content and writing style should also improve to ensure an optimal reading experience. A weak, unclear language can be a solid reason for many qualified leads to reject your message.

3. Write Killer CTAs

A call-to-action is a word, sentence, or paragraph that encourages people to take a desired action. It often comes at the end in the form of a text or a button. And it orders the visitor to do something on the web page.

Listen:

Whether you’re creating an ad copy, landing page, or a follow-up email, always include a call-to-action (CTA). A simple nudge at the end of your message can urge a lot of potential leads to convert and enter your sales funnel.

On the contrary…

Without strong CTAs, leads will have a hard time guessing what they should do next. Many will leave the page without converting — which can hurt your lead generation campaign results.

Here’s how to use brilliant CTAs in lead generation:

Write a direct, concise call to action at the end of your marketing message. Start with a small action, and make it as easy as possible for your visitors to do. Most importantly, explain why taking the action is important and how it’s beneficial to the prospect.

4. Give Algorithms Time to Understand Your Audience

Don’t pause your ads too early…

This is a common mistake that many sales and marketing teams make when getting started with Facebook lead generation. If you pause any ad after one day of launching it, you’ll have only wasted that budget on nothing.

Instead:

You have to give Facebook algorithms time to understand your campaign objectives and target customers. Most of the time, your initial investment will pay off once more relevant leads start seeing your ad and visiting your website to learn more.

5. Leverage the Power Of Facebook Pixel

Facebook pixel is a short code that you add to your website to track your visitors. It helps the algorithms learn more about your target leads, then find lookalike audiences on the platform.

Using Facebook pixel for lead generation will improve your ad campaign results by a large margin. You’ll be able to only focus on the most relevant prospects who have a high chance of converting. As a result, your ad spend will be lower and your marketing ROI will increase significantly. Understanding how to measure ROI on Facebook ads is pivotal for evaluating campaign effectiveness and optimizing strategies. As a result, your ad spend will be lower and your marketing ROI will increase significantly.

On top of that:

This feature enables you to retarget visitors who already landed on your site but didn’t convert. You’ll meet them with highly relevant offers to lure them into your sales funnel.