facebook marketing with adverts

[cambridgegadgetguru]

hi , i got a sales call from a companycalled m****marketing.co.uk who got my number from a local newspaper i advertised ini guess and theyre offering to advertise my business which is computer lessons and help in the cambridge uk area, for £129+vat a month they say they can target people within say 15-20miles of me thats 125,000 facebook users, theyll guarantee 2-5k impressions then in a 2nd follow up call they said 7500 impressions. do they mean thats clicks on my ad or do they mean itll be seen by 7500 people ? they also said theres 31,000 who will see the ad..im confussed by their different figures which i wrote down as i listened to their salesmen, ive decided to try them for 1 month though and i can cancel at anythime with in the 1st 29days otherwise it rolls over into a monthly contract, ill let you know how it goes once the months up. The advert can contain up to 135 characters they say. They said if i did this myself it would be payperclick ppc and cost me 73p-£1.40 per click. they claimed 60% of all ad spending in the Uk is now done on Facebook is that true ?
i wonder how theyll find all the people in my area ? today i added my location to my facebook profile but in the past ive not bothered to display it..so how can they hunt down only the people within say 15miles of me ? by ip address or what ? if you can answer any of my questions or provide help please do thanks

 

[ScottBaxter]

Hi Mate,

What was the company called? Matchmaker Marketing??

I use to work for a company who did the same thing - to tell you the truth you are probably better to find a more trusted company in the social media network, thats if you can't do the work your self.

They will find people within the 15mile radius by there location / area.

Make sure you get confirmation of them showing you what setting they have applied for your ad as sometimes they will only set it to a low radius so they get more out of the money you have paid to them!!

Hope this helps you a little...

 

[cambridgegadgetguru]

hi well i dont wish to promote the company yet ! after a month ill let you all know who they are and if it works or not they do start with letter M and last part of name is marketing..its not the name you said if that was a genuine name ! yes but how do they find people by their area ? are they going to sit at a PC and find them 1 by 1 ? or do they have software to automate finding people in a certain area ? how exactly do they do it ? for £129 i doubt theyll put in more than 4-5 hours of work if that.
i dont mind about a low radius as i dont want to be driving too far for jobs with petrol at £1.40 a litre and by subaru impreza being as thirsty as an alcoholic on friday night.
i just saw the advert they made for me and the photo was just some bog standard picture of a single laptop i guess copied from any old website and the wording looked like theyd spent 2minutes on it...it looked rubbish im not impressed so far, ive had to find a good image and reword it myself, they say the ad will go live within 48hours of their 1st call to me so its due to be used by 6april so fingers crossed i gain some paying customers from it cheers david

 

[ScottBaxter]

Hello,

Facebook will do it all by it's self it will automatically place the ad on there page if there region / location is within the 15mile radius set on the ad.

Make sure you get a report from them and also make sure it's from facebook not a report they have just chucked together

 

[cambridgegadgetguru]

cheers ill ask them to see a report from facebook as you say..ill know how effective it is anyway as if i get phone calls wanting my services ill ask how they heard about my computer help business, so ill be able to tell what income the ads generate..this company has 1 month to make me money or im cancelling, there will be no 2nd month it has to work or im not paying any more money, cheers david

 

[wecandobiz]

This is something you can do yourself pretty easily. Take a look at Facebook's Advertising pages.

I don't believe their figure about 60% of advertising being done on Facebook at all.

And if you're confused about their figures and promises walk away. There are plenty of people out there who know how Facebook advertising works to be able to make it clear for you. Your lack of knowledge on this is only ever likely to cost you money if someone exploits it.

Take a read of my 5 Minute Guide to Facebook for Business -- it may help you.

 

[truesilver]

Ian is right, you can do this pretty easily yourself and not have the commitment.

I'd question whether someone looking for computer lessons would be on Facebook though - surely if they are using online media they would already be pretty IT literate?

Just a thought.

 

[Simply Clicks]

I've seen different experiences. B2C may work. But not as well as PPC. I've yet to see any evidence of Facebook delivering anything like positive ROE on a B2B marketing campaign.

 

[cambridgegadgetguru]

thanks wecandobiz ive bookmarked your link and tweeted it on twitter for you, im @chained on twitter.com , i may well do it myself in the 2nd month if it works in the first month, i do websites, twitter marketing, pc repair, software installs, lessons etc..so just because someone can use facebook certainly doesnt make someone IT literate !, that has nothing to do with securing a computer from viruses, hackers, etc, any muppet can click a few buttons, im my experience ive found an alarming number of people using out of date or no antivirus, most people can barely do a thing with a firewall so their pc is used by hackers as a botnet...to attack business websites with denial of service attacks or to send spam, i think people should have to pass a test to be allowed to use the internet as the people with poor knowledge/skills pass on loads of problems to everyone else.

 

[wecandobiz]

thanks wecandobiz ive bookmarked your link and tweeted it on twitter for you, im @chained on twitter.com , i may well do it myself in the 2nd month if it works in the first month, i do websites, twitter marketing, pc repair, software installs, lessons etc..so just because someone can use facebook certainly doesnt make someone IT literate !, that has nothing to do with securing a computer from viruses, hackers, etc, any muppet can click a few buttons, im my experience ive found an alarming number of people using out of date or no antivirus, most people can barely do a thing with a firewall so their pc is used by hackers as a botnet...to attack business websites with denial of service attacks or to send spam, i think people should have to pass a test to be allowed to use the internet as the people with poor knowledge/skills pass on loads of problems to everyone else.

Hmm, Twitter marketing, eh? Take a look at the video on my profile for our Twitter Sales Leads tool. You might find it interesting.

I have a 5 Minute Guide to Twitter for Business too but that probably won't teach you anything you don't already know.

 

[garyk]

hi , i got a sales call from a companycalled m****marketing.co.uk who got my number from a local newspaper i advertised ini guess and theyre offering to advertise my business which is computer lessons and help in the cambridge uk area, for £129+vat a month they say they can target people within say 15-20miles of me thats 125,000 facebook users, theyll guarantee 2-5k impressions then in a 2nd follow up call they said 7500 impressions. do they mean thats clicks on my ad or do they mean itll be seen by 7500 people ? they also said theres 31,000 who will see the ad..im confussed by their different figures which i wrote down as i listened to their salesmen, ive decided to try them for 1 month though and i can cancel at anythime with in the 1st 29days otherwise it rolls over into a monthly contract, ill let you know how it goes once the months up. The advert can contain up to 135 characters they say. They said if i did this myself it would be payperclick ppc and cost me 73p-£1.40 per click. they claimed 60% of all ad spending in the Uk is now done on Facebook is that true ?
i wonder how theyll find all the people in my area ? today i added my location to my facebook profile but in the past ive not bothered to display it..so how can they hunt down only the people within say 15miles of me ? by ip address or what ? if you can answer any of my questions or provide help please do thanks

125,000 in your radius, thats probably *everyone* so not at all targeted in any way.I'm with Ian I'd say that 60% figure is optimistic and not even sure where they got that number from anyway. In terms of finding them, easy, when you setup the ad you can simply select a town and then set a radius around it, like you can in Google adwords. As simply clicks says FB ads have yet to prove themselves in B2B marketing simply because your ads are shown to people who probably have no desire to buy what you're offering.

Good luck anyway!

 

[TheSocialPeeps]

In my opinion, spending money on Facebook adverts is a bit of a waste really, especially if your a small business with a very limited marketing budget. You spend a lot on advertising and you get very little ROI.

I work with Facebook and designing pages for businesses who want a professional welcome page that engages their audience from the start. I know I seem very biased indeed, but this is what you should do. The get your existing customers to join your page and then maybe offer them a discount if they recommend your page to their friends on Facebook. This is a good way of getting people to join and if you give good, regular, relevant and interesting updates then if people want any of the services you offer, then you'll be one of, if not, the first person they think about.

If you would like a page designed, then please contact me and I'd be really happy to work with you and help you with this.

 

[wecandobiz]

hi , i got a sales call from a companycalled m****marketing.co.uk...

...they claimed 60% of all ad spending in the Uk is now done on Facebook is that true ?

I've worked it out and they are talking rubbish.

The UK advertising market is worth £16 billion and online accounts for £4bn (source: Internet Advertsting Bureau).

Facebook's advertising revenue last year was US$1.86bn (source: AdAge January 2011). If we assume they averaged 500 million users last year, that equates to less than US$4 per user.

The UK Facebook population is 28.9 million (source: iCrossing April 2011). Roll up the advertising average and you get about US$108 million advertising contribution from the UK. That's about £66 million at today's exchange rate.

So, as you can see, that is WAY OFF 70% -- it's 4%.

If they are lying about that, what else are they making up?

 

[cambridgegadgetguru]

i knew their 60% of online ads are on facebook was rubbish when they said it, i hate facebook anyway..i use twitter its way better, thanks for your stats i love proper facts. My ad went live on 5april by 430pm 9april its got me zero phone calls so far , also how do we get the £2k i heard david cameron promising entrepreneurs a few weeks ago to help small businesses etc get off the ground ? i heard him say it at some press conference and then ive heard nothing about it since

 

[Paul21st]

I use Facebook ads all the time, very easy to set up and I have had some great ROI, even better than Google adwords.....I found it works better if you offer potential clients something for free or at a discount? (I.E a CTA -Call To Action)

 

[cambridgegadgetguru]

hi paul21st well i hope ill get a good return on my investment but since 5th april to 12th my £92 or so has generated 0 calls ! the package was £129+vat but i got a discount down to £79+vat as i was very sceptical of their claims.
my ad offers free software (all software i install is legally free eg avira antivirus is free compared to say norton which pcworld etc charge £50-60 a year for) and does exactly the same thing so i save my clients loads of money..thats my offer of something free, as i said if i dont make money from this 1st month with the company i chose ill be cancelling and may just do a leaflet drop instead.

 

[Paul21st]

Hi
I would cancel the package and ask for a refund - then run the ad yourself on Facebook - You then have control on demographics, target range and cost per click ETC.

I am more than willing to give you some free advice with the Facebook ad as I have run some very successful campaigns (and I hate to see any business get ripped off by bogus online marketers)

 

[Mike W]

I hate to see any business get ripped off by bogus online marketers

Why do you assume they are bogus? What's bogus about doing things for people that they can't do themselves?

 

[wecandobiz]

Why do you assume they are bogus? What's bogus about doing things for people that they can't do themselves?

Making up facts in order try and support their sales pitch places anyone in contention for being "bogus".

 

[cambridgegadgetguru]

thanks today the 13th april i emailed the company which is called mediamarketing.co.uk ( i think thats what i wrote down as i listened to their cold call ) to cancel my account as its generated 0 clicks since 5th april for the price of £79+vat for 1 month ( usual price is £129+vat) they promised 2-5000 impressions a month then 7500, they claim bolton wanderers use their service, they promised id get 31clicks within 7 days.they claimed 60% of ad sales are on facebook which is bull****
they are also called first-point.co.uk who created the ad ( although i had to redo the photo and wording..and i made a spelling mistake which they didnt correct proving they dont even proof read ads) answerit-group.com is the portal we login to to see our account info etc, how mediamarketing.co.uk saw my advert in a cambridge uk newspaper i dont know..as they must have got my number from my ad in a local paper ad i placed. im open to any help so i can do facebook ads myself if i choose to do it in future, however im more likely to try a leaflet drop in my area first.
i just found this about this company http://www.facebook.com/pages/FirstPoint-Intelligent-Marketing/129645853735407?v=info and http://www.answerit-group.com/index.html

 

[wecandobiz]

Only 25 likes for the FirstPoint Facebook page and 14 for AnswerIt. What does that say to you?

It would be good to hear from them through this thread. If they on top of what they do then they'll see they got a mention online and be over to do something about it.

 

[garyk]

As said above you are probably better off running the ads on your own, it is quite easy to setup. Ive tested quite alot of different niches and free offers work much better than paid.

Heres what I would typically do;

get demographics on the item you are selling. If you go to http://www.quantcast.com/avira.com this shows the demographics for people visiting the avira free anti-virus site. OK thats for USA but it will give you a good indication that you should be targetting a specific age range.

Then split test your ad by age, so same ad but say do one for 48-50 one for 51-53 and one for 54-56 so you can hone in on your best demographic and this also helps get your cost per click down.

Cross *my* palm with silver and then I'll give you some more help!

Good luck!

Gary

 

[MD-by-Default]

Just so you know, theres another Thread bubbling about rogue Marketing companies from Manchester way, they too offered me Facebook Advertising as well as Google Ads Advertising. Google them, and do you homework on them, even a company check, to make sure they're legit. The other thread is here;
wwwukbusinessforums.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=185632
(Replace the dot between www and uk...

 

[cambridgegadgetguru]

today they responded to an email i sent wednesday asking to cancel and get a refund, they say i cant get a refund as ive agreed to a contract etc, im told ive had 8834 views of my ad and 47clicks in the 10 days since the ad went live, from that i have had zero phone calls so ive made £0 so far ! im told the media marketing name may be a reseller of their services but the company im using is called first-point.co.uk who are a name of a company called answer IT, i explained the crazy 60% of online ads are on facebook and he agreed thats crazy..how ever thats what a salesman of theirs told me, they refused to refund me so if by the end of my 1st month with them it generates me no sales im cancelling my contract with them as i cant afford the £129+vat a month package if it gets me no sales ! cheers everyone who reads this thread and offers help/advice ps i said if i dont get a refund ill warn others on forums of there lies and he said that would be slander etc so i replied but id be telling the truth your salesman lied to me to get my money..ive already learn an important business lesson, do not agree to anything without fact checking claims a company makes.