Note: I'm going through Ryan Deiss' Facebook Ad Power training, as well as doing my own advertising.

To get all the nitty-gritty content I recommend Ryan's course. He and his team have done extensive advertising and experimenting. I can tell you from AdWords experience, that it's a lot cheaper to get expert guidance than to do all that learning from trial and error with your own advertising.

How Facebook targeting is different than AdWords (search)

The main thing to keep in mind with Facebook, verses AdWords, is that people aren't finding you from searches

Well, I should clarify that:

It's not like targeting Google Search, in AdWords.

But it is like Content Targeting (i.e. on the Content Network).

With Facebook it's about targeting people, rather than searches.

You can target keywords, but it's still matches those against what users have on their profiles.

You can target groups they belong to.

And demographics.

Content Targeting allows you to specify demographics. But it's dependent on specific sites having demographic info on visitors (which is hit-and-miss).

Conversely, Facebook has that information built-in. It's about capturing who people are and what they're interested in.

So you want to really dive in to doing that kind of targeting.

Engagement vs "Look at What We Got"

The mindset you need to get into is that you Engage the reader.

You want something that grabs the reader (like in AdWords), but you need to really interest them and engage them.

Do Not do an in-your-face salesy ad!

You can get away with that in Adwords. In fact sometimes in Adwords you'll find that a bold "we have what you need" ad is what does the best.

But Facebook you have to intrigue and start a relationship. 

Now you can still make sales fairly quickly, after you stoke up that interest, and get them to take action.

But like in dating, you want to build interest first. Get the person knowing you a little, and liking what the see/hear.

In the dating world, how well do you do if you start out shouting:
"you gotta like me, I'm perfect for you … maybe we can get serious right away and then get married!"

I've never tried that, but I don't expect it would work out well.

I know a lot of sales stuff talks about relationship building. But with Facebook, it's really true. 

Relationship first. Then you can let them know "what ya got"

This works well with the internet marketing technique of giving great free content up-front (getting them to know you, and get rapport with you).

Getting them on your email list, and then promoting to them.

But you just need to know there are gotchas with how to best do that on Facebook …

(stay tuned for more info on that)

Special "Mad Scientist" deal:

These notes are my insights and ideas, as I go through the training.

That will put you ahead of everyone else who's getting this information!

It came out at the end of 2007, and is still very relevant.

The main them is about “New Marketing”. Not just social media, but email, Adwords and other New School options.

And he really plays up a newer attitude and approach that some are using to great effect (such as Zappos) vs others who are just flailing to put these new options on top of their existing business.  That’s what inspires his term “Meatball Sundae” – how traditional companies (selling “meatballs”) are putting the new marketing “whip cream” on top … to make a meatball sundae.

Though he does give cases where traditional companies have intelligently applied the new marketing. For example, to use email marketing to connect with customers more frequently … and much more cheaply … than traditional mail.

AdWords:

He does a good rundown of how Adwords is part of this “New Marketing”, and compares it to the Yellow Pages. (funny that he puts the Yellow Pages in the past tense, as if they’re already dead!)

Here’s some of what he says, with a little paraphrasing:

“The Yellow Pages charged based on the size of the ad, and you paid regardless of whether the ads worked or not.

“For Adwords, on the other hand, Google charges by the click.”

“The advertiser determines what it’s worth to get a visit from an interested, qualified, and motivated consumer and pays exactly that.”

Anyway, it’s cool seeing Adwords put in the context of the “new marketing that works”.

He gives a lot of other great insights too.

And it’s really an advanced continuation of his theme of doing “Permission” marketing rather than the old-school “Interruption Marketing”

This is part of his Guru Blueprint program that he is launching.

You can check out the entire video, for free:
Turn Your Information into High-Ticket Products

Q:
Why do some info products sell for high prices?
Why is it some don’t sell at all?

why do some coaches have tons of clients, while most don’t?

exercise:
Why is a $100 bill worth 100 times that of a $1 bill?
They look identical.
What’s different is the message.

What’s the difference between an information product that sells for $5000 vs one that sells for $50?

What’s the difference between a coach that charges $25 per hour vs one that charges $2,500 per hour?

How to get higher prices for your information:

You determine the valuable content you want to put in your product.
Then translate that value into terms your prospect can understand.

What is content?

Printed books, articles, interviews, video, newsletters, membership site, podcast, etc

The most Valuable content is advice and training

… get the rest from his Video

I think I should emphasize that this is about advice and training … i.e. Knowledge

Knowledge that you have learned, or that you’ve gotten from others.

If you have valuable guidance that people are willing to pay for, then put it out there!

I'm going through Ryan Deiss' Facebook Ad Power training.

It's great stuff so far

So many people to target (400 million Facebook users!).

So many interests and groups you can target.

As Ryan was going through this, and the ways to target, I was wide-eyed.

Three important things in combination:

Basically I'm saying if you have skills in Adwords at all (and you should if you've been reading this blog) then Facebook is a wide-open opportunity!

And even with no skills in AdWords, there's great opportunity, after you know the secrets.

For example: my friend Andrew, wanted to start advertising online and just went straight to Facebook. He's getting great clients out of it! He skipped past AdWords. But I can help him do well with Adwords too.

Though one important distinctions to keep in mind:

But since Facebook is all about people talking about themselves, making connections, and joining groups, you can Laser Target where your ads show.

Personal information is just one part of someone's profile. People tend to put ALL their favorites and interests in their profile

For example, for demographic information:

About the training itself:

Ryan does a great job of presenting the information in a video format. It's like a power-point presentation, with his voice-over and highlighting (with a virtual red pen) the slides. Showing great examples and key tips along the way.

It's like he's right there with you walking it through it all. Great!

Oh, and at least check out Ryan's video. He slams Google more than I like. But he's got great information about Facebook advertising, just in his free presentation.

These notes are my insights and ideas, as I go through the training.

That will put you ahead of everyone else who's getting this information!

StomperMobile training starts on March 30th, so no one can give a true review of the program yet!

But I should give fair warning:

This is kind of an "Advanced Class" training for mobile marketing (i.e. text messaging)

And I'm not saying that's strictly a good thing

I mean that if you're still working on finding a "niche" or getting some basic email campaigns going, this is probably not for you.

It's different than email marketing, of course. But a lot of the concepts are the same. Permission marketing, and then doing a "drip campaign" and convert people to sales. 

As my good deed/tip for the day: if you're unsure of what niche you'll attack with Mobile Marketing then don't signup for StomperMobile yet. Training like this will be much more effective if you're putting it in the context of a specific campaign you're working on.

If you haven't been doing that in at least some way, with email marketing, then you should hold off on StomperMobile

Okay, having said that:

The good thing about StomperMobile is that it gets you going on the "wide open frontier" of mobile marketing.

And it's something that's going to get bigger over time.

Case in point: I'm working with a JV partner who almost never responds to email. But he's a slave to text messaging! You can get people more immediately, and in a way they can't ignore.

It's great to get on that bandwagon before everyone starts doing it!

Kind of like AdWords when it first got going. The people that got in early had some great easy pickings!

And they have a Free Test Drive – a pre-launch webinar they put out. Get it before they take it away …

The gist of it is that you can do all the keywords research in the world, before getting anything out there.

But it's when you actually get your "Hands Dirty" … say with actual AdWords ads … that you get some real market data.

Just using the keyword analysis tools is like being stuck in a laboratory environment (I should know!). At some point you need to get in the real world … and the sooner the better.

The crazy part of my scheme is that you're spending money to go to someone else's site – and not get paid for it!

Even I'd been resistant to doing that. But when you start getting real data, it makes a huge difference. Which then informs how you'll proceed for your real niche (if evaluating a new niche) and real campaigns.

Check out the details on my Crazy Keyword Research

As you may (or may not) know, Google allows you to set position preferences for your ads. You do that in campaign settings. 

Under "Targeting", within  Networks, devices, and extensions

Then for specific keywords you can set a position range

Say you want to be in the top 4 (like shown above).

Or you want to "hug" the bottom few slots.

Or you want positions 2 to 5.

When bidding you'll find yourself often wanting to be in certain areas. (Unless you're the type to just bid a large amount to be number 1)

The idea is that you set your preferences and have Google keep your ads (for that keyword) where you want.

Sounds great, huh?

I tend to not do this kind of thing, wanting to manage it myself.

But I have used in on different occasions. 

And so far it hasn't really done anything for me. I've had cases where it seems to ignore my preferences.

And in fact my most recent attempt seemed to have a detrimental effect!

In that experiment, I decided to try being within position 2 to 4. They were mostly showing in that range anyway.  The idea being to allow higher bids, without paying the premium of being at slot number 1.  And I increased the bid a bit, to ensure they'd be in that range. I thought it would be a cool experiment.

But then my clicks for those 3 days went way down for the 3 keywords I did it on. But here's the thing: they were already showing in those positions. I was really just ensuring (so I thought) that they'd stay up there, without being number 1. If the ad would be number one (based on quality and bid) then it goes to number 2, with a lower bid and lower CPC.

3 days with a LOT lower clicks. The first day I thought it was just an off day. And increased the bids to further ensure ads would show.

Then 2 more days of "ghost town" traffic.  While other campaigns are having normal traffic.

So it pretty much must be something with those position preferences.

Maybe there's a nuance I missing. Or a bad assumption. Or whatever.

Maybe it's what I call a "defusing a bomb" situation. You have to know the right combination and sequence of (seemingly random) things, to have success.  You cut the yellow wire after the red wire (or vice-versa) and them "boom" it sucks to be you!

Anyway, so far I haven't been able to properly "defuse the bomb" of Position Preferences. Or get value out of it.

Good idea. But something is wrong.

So for now I'm turning off those preferences.

And I welcome any feedback.

Maybe there's someone (who I haven't yet talked to) who is using those and will say "oh my god Mad Scientist, I couldn't live without those position preferences!" or "my position on position preferences is that they rock!"

But for now I'll take a snarky stance on them until someone convinces me they're getting value from them

And I'd say this is the leading cause of people losing money on AdWords – especially for beginners.

What I'm thinking is "overly" broad keywords.

I was recently talking to someone who has helps people with overcoming anxiety. So I'll use that niche as an example …

So, it's one thing to have the keyword like 'anxiety attack help' and have it as a broad match (which is the default match type).

It's another thing to have 'anxiety' and think that is a great keyword for your audience.

There are 2 tendencies that cause this problem:

1) You want to get broader to get bigger traffic

2) You usually don't realize how broad a keyword actually is.

That 2nd part is what is really insidious. You tend to think of a keyword from your perspective.

So you're thinking 'anxiety' and you're thinking "oh, everyone with anxiety in their search is looking for my solution". 

But for a broad keyword, especially one word, you have to realize that can be a lot of people – coming from a lot of different perspectives.

I just did a search for 'anxiety' and saw a top link referencing a celebrity getting treatment for anxiety. Do you want to pay for a bunch of clicks for such curiosity seekers?

What if a big book or movie comes out called "Anxiety", or with "anxiety" in the title? Then you get a huge spike in clicks – again from non-qualified people who happen to click your ad.

Wow, just thinking about that gives me anxiety!

Anyway, when first starting with a niche, try to find that sweet spot of "generality". Where you're getting broad for your target audience … not so broad you'll get a bunch of "random" people.

You'll get a feel for it. And of course tracking will help a lot – to see what keywords are working (you need to do that anyway).

But when going with broadness that doesn't speak to what you're selling, be very careful … or at least take your daily budget low, to reduce your risk.

Now that's what I call a good treatment for "AdWords Anxiety"!

He’s outrageously strong against Google (a bit too much) but I agree with his overall point:

That Facebook is a largely untapped market, for PPC advertising.

It’s like Adwords was a few years ago, before Google restricted things … and before competition really drove clicks costs up.

Find out why Facebook is the only competitor that Google truly fears.

Because

1. Facebook has a ton of traffic. Over 39 billion page views a month. With 400 Million members!

2. You can target ads to the exact audience you want.

3. Facebook is simple to use and fast. You’ll get great traffic right away

4. Facebook clicks tend to be less than half the cost of Adwords clicks

5. Facebook loves affiliates and all the other advertisers (Google keeps restricting affiliate ads)

Ryan jumped into Facebook ads last year, and found what works … and the traps to watch out for.

Start getting some of the Facebook ad secrets he found

Oh course I’m not saying to abandon Adwords, like he did!
As I’ve been saying in this blog, there are certainly ways to do well with Adwords.

But you can’t ignore Facebook, either.

Since my goal is to help you get better traffic and better profits, overall … I need to also let you
know about the different options out there.

At the very least give Facebook a try. Such as with a small budget and a very targeted audience.
You may just find a nice “oil well” there that brings you a nice stream of new customers and profits.

Ryan will be taking this away within a few days. See it before it goes away.

If you do affiliate marketing, you especially need to hear what he has to say.
It’s like going back a few years ago when you could make great money with “direct linking”
(aka the Google Cash method).

When you create a new adgroup, the Quality Score for your keywords will show as “5″.
(assuming you’re showing Quality Score as a column – which you really should be doing)

If you make any changes to the bids it will then calculate Quality Score. So then your 5 becomes a 7 … or whatever.

I’ve gotten used to it. But figured a number of people may not have realized. They may think the quality scores are really 5!