Growth BY LAURA DRUMMOND GET THE MOST OUT OF PAID SOCIAL ADS


> Are you getting the most out of your advertising dollars? With so many ad- vertising options, it can be difficult to determine where your marketing money is best spent. One of the biggest bangs for your buck might be the paid ad space on social media, an inexpensive option compared to search engine ads, says Megan Gerace, who specializes in e-commerce and digital marketing at the floral marketing and website design agency GravityFree. While TikTok and Pinterest are


effective platforms for brand awareness, they’re not the strongest for sales con- version, she says. The best return on investment is on Meta’s social platforms — Facebook and Instagram. Gerace and a florist who regularly


uses paid ads shared their best tips for executing a successful ad campaign.


Capitalize on What Works On which platform do your posts typ- ically perform better? Do you have an established audience on a particular


platform? That’s the place to invest your advertising dollars, says Gerace. Not sure? Still building your audi-


ence? Instead of focusing on paid ads, post with the intention of engaging followers to accrue likes and comments or allocate a small budget specifically to boost posts to reach a larger audience, Gerace says. A traffic campaign is another worthy


endeavor to drive visitors to your site, Gerace says. She recommends first installing a Meta Pixel on your business’s website if you haven’t already. This tracking code helps Facebook pinpoint the appropriate audience for your paid ads based on the data collected on past visitors to your site. (There are provisions in place to ensure Facebook is not track- ing personal information such as name, email address, home address, etc.).


Go Small and Steady If you already have a strong following on social media, your paid ads will reach more users.


That’s also true if you’ve paid for


ads in the past, says Gerace, who says she sees greater success with florists who consistently do paid social. “It’s all cumulative, so it’s more effective to space out your dollars across multiple campaigns than to put all your advertis- ing dollars into one campaign.”


Don’t Set It and Forget It Testing is crucial. Erin Davidson, direc- tor of marketing at McNamara Florist in Indianapolis, Indiana, recommends launching two different types of ads on the same platform and continuing to invest in the one that performs better. You can also simultaneously run the


same ad on Facebook and Instagram with the same budget if your accounts are linked. “If more users are clicking through your ad on Facebook than they are on Instagram, then Meta will pull back on Instagram and start showing it more to Facebook because that’s where the audience is engaging with it more,” says Gerace.


Follow the Trends Check out TikTok, recommends Gerace, as that’s where most trends are origi- nating from before making their way to Instagram and Facebook. Try to incorpo- rate popular audio or a highly circulated meme when it feels right. Product ads perform well because


customers can see exactly what they would be ordering. “A lot of people are ordering through social media now without even clicking to the website,” Davidson says. Videos are winning out over still


images, especially on Instagram. Davidson recommends using videos in your ads and then posting those same videos to your feed, so there’s continuity if someone clicks through the ad. In terms of captions, pay attention to


what kind of language people are using, says Gerace. Social ads tend to perform well when they’re informal, approach- able, and fun.


Laura Drummond is a contributing writer for the Society of American Florists.


18 FLORAL MANAGEMENT | July/August 2023 | WWW.SAFNOW.ORG


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