Mastering Facebook Pay Per Click (PPC) Ads For Your Real Estate Business Part 4

May 23, 2011

One of Facebook’s most popular innovations is the Like button.  A Like button is a way for people to support someone or something.  For instance, your website could have a Like button on it and you could ask your site visitors to click this button.  Let’s say John Smith saw your Facebook ad, clicked it, was brought to your website and clicked the Like button on your landing page.  If John Smith had 500 friends on his Facebook account (not an uncommon number nowadays) then your site would be visible to all of John’s 500 friends on their Facebook News Feed page.  It’s like a virtual referral from John Smith to his entire friend network. 

If John’s 500 friends see he likes a particular real estate professional’s services, they’re a lot more likely to take an interest than if they saw the ad in an impersonal place such as a billboard or newspaper.  John’s 500 friends know John to some extent and presumably trust him, so having just a few people with big networks of friends click the ‘Like’ button on your site and drive scores of people to your website.

Facebook ads have developed a reputation for generating better converting traffic.  People spend a lot more time on Facebook than with most sites, and there’s a genuine feeling of camaraderie and good will when people communicate with friends and family on there.  This has lent itself to people being more receptive to ads than if the context is less favorable (think spam email).

Facebook’s Advantages Over Other PPC Systems

Some of you may have tried pay-per-click advertising with Google’s AdWords system, but using AdWords has become problematic.  It’s so popular that for popular keywords it’s becoming more and more expensive per click to get your ads high ranking in search results.  Google has actually banned over 15,000 advertisers from using AdWords in favor of giving better positioning to large corporations with deep pockets (sounds like anti-competitive behavior).  Google currently has 20 times more ads than Facebook.  Some marketing experts say that Facebook is today’s Google Adwords from about five years ago.

The time to get in on the Facebook advertising platform is now while the pricing is low and the competition is not as fierce as with Google AdWords. It won’t be long before others discover the potential Facebook has to offer. Once attention is turned in this direction, the competitive nature of the site is likely to go up along with the advertising costs.

Filed under: Marketing Tips

Tags: facebook, marketing, online advertising, online marketing, Pay Per Click, PPC, prospect, prospecting, randing, real estate educators, real estate internet marketing, real estate internet marketing tips, real estate internet training, real estate search engine ranking, social media, Social Media Advertising