When it comes to ads, the platform matters. Every social media site has strengths and weaknesses so it’s important to diversify where your ads are being seen. Utilising Instagram ad campaigns can help you reach a new targeted audience and achieve your business goals - whether it's generating leads, increasing website traffic, or driving sales!If you’ve clicked on this blog you’re probably at the stage where you’ve learned a bit about how Facebook ads work, you’ve created some content, you’ve probably even posted a few ads, but they’re not getting as much traction as you would have liked.

If you’re not at that stage yet but want to learn how to get started with Facebook ads for your business, check out our comprehensive guide on how to create the perfect Facebook marketing campaign.

Anyway, back to your initial concern, why aren’t your ads working? The reason might be that you’re posting at the wrong time.

The Best Time To Post Is…

Your first instinct of when the best time to post might be after work hours and on the weekends. People have more time on their hands for scrolling on social media at that time right? Your instinct is wrong.

We’ve all been guilty of checking out Facebook when we’re supposed to be working, and this is no different for your potential customers. The busiest time for Facebook is generally between 9 am and 3 pm during the work week.

Many online sources will all give you a different day of the week that is overall the best to post on. Instead of confusing you further with another conflicting time, we suggest that the most accurate way to find out the best time to post for your business is to use your own data. Facebook Insights allows you to analyse previous ads to find out when your customers are online and when has been the most effective time to post in the past.

How Do I Use Facebook Insights?

On your business’ Facebook page look at the top of the page and click “Insights”. From there you’ll reach the Insights dashboard and on the left-hand side, you should see the “Posts” tab.

This tab will show you when your customers are the most active and allow you to analyse previous posts to gauge which times have been the most successful in the past. Pay attention to whether the posts have been Boosted or Sponsored because that will skew your results and provide misleading data.

If your data is inconclusive, take the opportunity to experiment a little and test different times to find what works best. The results may surprise you!

How Do I Stand Out?

Facebook has become a hyper-saturated ad space and with the algorithm also prioritising friends and family posts over ads, it can feel like engaging your key audience is next to impossible – even if you do find the perfect time to post!

Standing out is a challenge but there are some things that can help. A successful Facebook ad needs to be built on a solid foundation. A solid foundation begins with carefully researching your audience, targeting them effectively, creating content that they want to engage with, and ensuring that the website they land on is high-quality.

If managing your own Facebook ads sounds like a hassle, let us handle it. We can guarantee that your ads are as effective as possible. Have a chat with Drum Digital today!

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Here's our step-by-step guide on how to set up an Instagram ad campaign.

1. Set up a business account on Instagram

If you don't already have a business or creator account on Instagram, you'll need to set one up. To do this, go to your profile settings, then click the “Account” tab, scroll to the bottom and then select "Switch to Professional Account''. Because Facebook and Instagram have merged, all your ads can be managed using the Facebook Business Manager, and here you’ll also need to merge your Instagram account with your existing Facebook Business Page. 

2. Determine your campaign objective

The first step in creating an Instagram ad campaign is to determine your campaign objective. This will help you decide what type of ad to create and how to measure the success of your campaign. 

The end goal of almost all social media ad campaigns is to attract more leads to your website, so to find out more ways to generate leads for your side beyond Instagram, read our complete guide below.

3. Choose your target audience

Next, you'll need to choose your target audience for the ad campaign. You can target your ads based on factors such as location, age, gender, and interests. You can also use Instagram's "Lookalike Audience" feature to reach users who have similar interests to your existing followers. 

4. Create your ad

Once you've determined your campaign objective and target audience, it's time to create your ad. Instagram offers a variety of ad formats, including photo ads, video ads, carousel ads, and stories ads. Choose the ad format that best fits your campaign objective and target audience and if you have trouble figuring this out, read our blog “What Type of Marketing Content Should I Create?”

5. Set your budget and schedule

Next, you'll need to set your budget and schedule for the ad campaign. You can choose to set a daily budget or a lifetime budget for the campaign. You can also set a start and end date for the campaign, or choose to run it indefinitely.

6. Choose your placements

Instagram offers a variety of placements for ads, including the Instagram feed, Instagram Stories, and the Explore page. Choose the placements that best fit your campaign objective and target audience.

7. Review, publish, and promote

From here you have two choices on how you can proceed, you can either create your ad within the Instagram app or use Facebook Business Manager. 

Within the Instagram app to turn any of your existing posts into an ad, simply click the Promote button and select your audience, location, budget, and duration. 

If you’re using Facebook Business manager - which we recommend for the sake of continuity and increased customisation - once you've created your ad, review it to make sure it looks and sounds the way you want it to. Then, click "Publish" to launch your ad campaign!

8. Monitor and optimise

This step is often the most underappreciated. Once your ad campaign is live, it's essential that you monitor and optimise it to ensure that it's performing well. You can do this by analysing the campaign's performance using Instagram's analytics tools. If you notice that the campaign isn't performing as well as you'd like, make adjustments to the ad or target audience to try to improve its performance.

From start to end you should now know how to create your very own Instagram ad campaign.  If you have any more questions, feel free to reach out to one of Sydney’s leading social media agencies Drum Digital today and receive trustworthy advice. 

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