How To Make Facebook Tell You How to Sell Your Product or Service

If you are an entrepreneur, a solopreneur or a professional service provider, then by default you are a marketer.

We often times get in the common mindset that we are our job title but you are not… You, my dear reader, are in the business of marketing your product and services.

This is a subtle shift in mindset that many people have trouble adopting, but once they do, their whole world changes.

Many of our clients are amazing professionals but they lack the skills and beliefs to be great marketers. Marketing to many is this mysterious voodoo reserved for people with marketing degrees.

Nothing could be farther from the truth.

Marketing is quite simple.

People have a need or a problem and your job as a “marketer” is to show them why you are the best person to solve their problem or meet their needs out of everyone else that says they do what you do.

There are basically three components to marketing:

1.) message = (Unique Selling Proposition) + (offer). We usually can test these via our headline

2.) market = target market + ideal client + niche

3.) media = is where you place your ad (newspaper, direct mail, radio)

Once you have those 3 components dialed in, you virtually have a license to print money.

But how do you know when you have the mix correct?

Small business owners tend to have a limited marketing budget and it scares the hee bee gee bees out of them that it’s possible that they are going to spend a bunch of money on a marketing campaign… and have it NOT WORK.

So what do they do? NOTHING!

Sound familiar?

So today I’m going to share with you a simple and inexpensive way to test 2 (message and market) of those criterion.

Your message is the way you position yourself or your product to the prospect. Some times it’s referred to as a ‘hook’ or an unique selling proposition (USP), plus the offer (what they are going get for giving you their money)

For example:

Messaging – Do you say you are the most experienced? Do you have specialized expertise? Is your product the most effective? Is it tied to a charity? Does it have the most features?

All of these are potential ways you can present your message. Some messages appeal more to certain people.

Target Market – The group or groups of people you target.

Ideal client – A subset of your target market that you love working with. The perfect client for you – what are their attributes? Under 30, single, college graduate, makes $100k+ per year, loves cats, has psoriasis, author …

Niche – is what you specialize in. For example our niche is group presentations. Maybe yours is designing sales funnels or closing 401k loans.

Testing

Different messages resonate with different markets. The fastest way I know of testing message to market is by using Facebook Ads.

The components we want to test is the Market and the message and using Facebook ads both are tested easily.

Step 1.) Market: Select the market you want to test. Facebook Ads allow you to target your audience pretty precisely. You can choose age, sex, occupations, likes, groups ect.

Step 2.) Messaging: Next we want to set up some messaging. How we do this is by coming up with some different headlines that have different appeals. Examples of appeals are: Money, Health, Youth, Recognition, Save time ect

Then create ad copy promising a result (what do they really want). Or promising to solve a specific problem (niche). The great thing about Facebook is you can create virtually unlimited ads.

When setting up ads they will ask you for a destination page. It can either be your facebook fan page or it can be another landing page. For sake of time, let’s just use your fan page.

So when you are finished, you will have something like this:

Ad A – Message 1 with Market 1

Ad B – Message 2 with Market 2

Ad C – Message 1 with Market 2

Ad D – Message 2 with Market 1

For example, let’s say I a sell golf balls and I want to test some message to market, here’s what it would look like:

Ad A – Gain 30 yards off the tee (message) + Retirees (55+ and live in AZ = Target Market 1)

Ad B – Lower your handicap with new patent pending technology (message) + (under 55 + like golf magazine, member of facebook group golfers = Target Market 2)

Ad C – Gain 30 yards off the tee (message) + (under 55 + like golf magazine, member of facebook group golfers = Target Market 2)

Ad D – Lower your handicap with new patent pending technology (message) + Retirees (55+ and live in AZ = Target Market 1)

Step 3.) Measure: Let your ad run for a couple of days and then look at the results which message resonated best which target market? The key metric you want to look for is the campaign that had the highest click through rate (CTR).

By using this simple and cost effective strategy you can begin to really dial in which message is most effective for which market. Then when you go to buy other media channels you will at least have more confidence in your message and can make smarter marketing decisions.

Loving, Living, Giving Large,

Jeff