Facebook Ads for Authors: A Step-by-Step Guide to Selling More Books
Every author wants to sell more books.
And as the variety of social media networks grows, self published authors find more and more sites on which to disseminate information about their books. Ultimately with the goal of selling more books. Just what role does social media play in building an author’s brand? And if the monster of all social networks is Facebook, then how can an author leverage Facebook to sell more books?
The ultimate of all social networks is Facebook. It’s the behemoth of social media platforms, and covers nearly half the souls on the planet. And it is exactly Facebook’s size that makes it attractive to authors looking for advertising vehicles and ways to build readership. However it also its size that makes Facebook advertising challenging.
Advertising on the Facebook platform has become a core component of most successful authors’ marketing plans. During the second quarter, advertisers spent more than $9 billion on advertising on Facebook. This resulted in pushing it to one of the highest grossing advertising platforms in the world. To demonstrate the phenomenal growth in Facebook advertising, that $9 BILLION is almost 50% greater than the same period just one year earlier - an increase of $3 BILLION.
Why Advertise on Facebook?
Because it’s where your readers are… And its user base continues to grow dramatically.
As of March, Facebook was on track to have two billion active users. TWO BILLION. And over 66% of those users return on a DAILY basis. That’s 1.3 BILLION users. And to make it more attractive to authors, “daily users” are users who are highly engaged with the content posted on Facebook. On top of those statistics, 1.16 BILLION users access Facebook every day from a mobile devices - an increase of 25%.
Now bigger isn’t always better, especially when it comes to marketing your self published book. But Facebook has you covered in their Facebook advertising system. An author can target Facebook Ads to exactly the audience who might want to read the book.
HOW to Advertise on Facebook
By letting us do it for you.
Dog Ear manages the details of targeting Facebook ads for your book. The important piece to keep in mind when evaluating Facebook as an advertising tool is that Facebook’s massive user base is segmented and targeted in many ways. Using the right metrics, authors can reach potential reader by demographics, location, interests, and behaviors. This allows us to discover and expose books to the exact readers who may be most inclined to make a purchase.
The process, when combined with Dog Ear Publishing’s Facebook Advertising expertise, is simple and very effective.
Here are the criteria we develop when building an advertising campaign for our authors:
- Choose the objective
- Target the correct audience
- Set an advertising budget and schedule
- Create Facebook ads based upon the specific book, genre, and target audience
Dog Ear constantly reviews and adheres to industry best-practices for Facebook advertising so your ads will get seen and clicked.
Here is what is involved in creating a Facebook Ads campaign for your book.
Create an Author or Book Page on Facebook
The core component to advertising your book on Facebook is the creation of a “Page.” The Page is where the details of the author and the book reside. It is the place where authors can post about their books, awards, promotions, and author appearances.
Define Your Advertising Goals
Facebook advertising offers a variety of methods for getting an author’s book in front of readers. You can choose from “boost your posts,” “promote your page,” or “send people to your website.”
Find your EXACT Audience
One of the greatest features of Facebook advertising is that it lets authors very narrowly identify the demographics for their ads. Location, age, gender, and language are all some of the basic options. Specific interests and behaviors are more powerful options. An author can target an ad toward Facebook users whose interests include a specific book or even television show. Even specific behavior interests such as camping or wine can be identified.
Set a Realistic Budget
Users set a budget, and Facebook will manage the ad spending for the author. Facebook has an excellent video that addresses how to set a budget
Build Facebook Ads
The final step is the creation of the actual ad, including writing copy. To make ads more effective, concise and effective language as well as attractive graphics must be used.
To help authors build a Facebook platform and explore Facebook Advertising, Dog Ear Publishing is pleased to offer a Facebook Advertising Program.
Facebook AdVERTISING Development Program -$399 (plus Advertising Budget*)
Writing is hard.
We crafted the Facebook Advertising Development program to help authors’ online presence get off the ground and get a running start.
Our program crafts specific advertisements for an author’s Facebook page, and curate content that is catchy, original, and unique to his or her style. We can help authors not only increase engagement on their pages, and traffic to their websites, but we can also help grow a much larger, dedicated audience driven to buy books.
The Facebook Advertising Development Program includes the following services:
- Advertising Account Setup
- Creation of author / book Page on Facebook
- Develop and produce advertising creative
- Develop and setup advertising campaign
- Collate and return to author a results summary after the initial 30 days
Additional Requirements:
*Dog Ear requires an advertising budget of $150 for the initial 30 day period. This fee will be paid directly to Facebook.
Looking for MORE sophisticated social media / Facebook management? Already have a basic campaign in place and want to discover how to fully use the power of Facebook to sell your books? Check out our FULLY MANAGED Facebook / Social Media service HERE.