The number of Facebook users continues to rise every day. With over 2.96 billion active individuals every month, it has become a convenient platform to place your ads. However, not all ads perform equally and drive customer traffic the same way.
That's where Facebook Ads audit comes in. It ensures your money, time, and effort translate to effective branding and campaigns.In this guide, we'll teach you how to audit Facebook Ads, so you'll know whether it's time to upgrade your campaign strategies. Otherwise, you'll only see diminishing returns for your company.
What is a Facebook Ads audit?
A Facebook Ads audit is an analysis of the current performance of your Facebook Ads. It shows business owners and PR strategists the strengths and weaknesses of their advertisements and campaigns.
In a typical ads audit, you would typically look into several parameters — your advertising strategies, audience reach, and of course, your ads tools. Aside from that, you must also check possible trends and patterns based on your audience's demographics and location.
Since companies use Facebook Ads to target customers and clients, releasing effective ads gives your organization more presence online. And because of the impact of these Facebook ads, performing a Facebook Ads audit can be a major game changer for your company.
So when do businesses audit Facebook Ads?Usually, businesses can perform a Facebook Ads audit during the following:
- Regular intervals;
- When undertaking new clients or customers;
- When there's underperformance in their ads;
- When they want to improve their campaigns; and
- When testing their new strategies out.
Here's a more in-depth look at these scenarios:
Done at regular intervals
Successful companies audit Facebook Ads frequently. Some conduct it weekly, while others do a complete analysis of their ads monthly. The only important factor to consider is the consistency of your routine so you can ensure that your advertisements are on track.
Done whenever you have new clients or customers
Apart from performing a regular Facebook Ads audit, you can also conduct one whenever you have new customers and clients. This way, you can make more data-driven strategies for future advertisements.
Done whenever you observe lapses in your existing ads
If you're wondering why you're experiencing low engagement and traffic, it may be due to the performance of your Facebook Ads. Some releases may not be performing well as your other campaigns. But by running a Facebook Ads audit, you'll know the strengths and weaknesses of your ads.
Done whenever you want to modify your campaigns
You can also audit Facebook Ads whenever you want to modify and improve your campaigns. This process lets you optimize your ads better and helps you gain more customer traffic.
Done after testing out new campaign strategies
Finally, it's also a good practice to conduct a Facebook Ads audit every time you launch a new ads campaign. This way, you can see how your strategies perform compared to your competitors or other Facebook Ads.
Why you need to review your Facebook Ads
Effective Facebook Ads auditing is critical for advertising success since it can improve customer engagement and traffic. It also prevents you from wasting your time, effort, and resources on ineffective paid campaigns.
There are many other reasons why you need to review your Facebook Ads. These range from developing effective campaigns to lowering your overall expenses. But ultimately, a Facebook Ads audit will give your brand a lasting impression on potential customers and clients.Some of these goals are:
- Uncovering areas for improvement;
- Optimizing advertising spending;
- Conducting in-depth reviews of your campaigns; and
- Creating robust and more impactful campaigns.
Here's a more in-depth look at the goals of a Facebook Ads audit:
1. Uncovering areas for improvement
A Facebook Ads audit can help uncover weak areas in your existing advertising strategies. It allows you to see how well they're performing and how you could improve them better.
2. Optimizing advertising spending
Since a Facebook Ads audit tells you what strategies you could improve, you'll become more assured that your paid ads aren't going to waste. Because of this, you can allocate your money to better releases instead.
3. Conducting in-depth reviews of your campaigns
Performing an audit allows you to break down your advertising strategies in terms of your account structure, tracking, target, and reports. By doing this, you can analyze your ads more effectively and evaluate the possible outcomes of your campaigns.
4. Creating robust and more impactful campaigns
Finally, Facebook Ads audit helps you develop strong campaigns regardless of whether you need them for the short-term or long-term. Because of this, you can ensure a lasting and successful brand reputation among your target customers and clients.
What to look for in a Facebook Ads audit
It's frightening to audit Facebook Ads, especially if it's your first time. You could get overwhelmed with the endless metrics and aspects you need to consider. But doing this process shouldn't be as complicated as you think.
You must understand that there is no one-size-fits-all strategy for conducting a successful Facebook ads audit. Instead, you would need to weigh your priorities and preferences first.
But regardless of your needs, there are five general aspects to look out for in a Facebook ads audit. These are:
- Account overview and organization;
- Facebook ad campaign structure;
- Audience targeting and optimization;
- Landing pages: and
- Ad creatives.
Below, we'll take a closer look at the key aspects of Facebook advertising so you can perform a successful ads audit:
1. Account overview and organization
Many business owners think a structured Facebook Ad account audit isn't important. But in reality, it can make or break your campaigns and advertisements.
PR strategists consider an organized Facebook Ad account audit the cornerstone of your ads audit. It helps you identify campaigns easily, including their objectives and goals once launched.
On the other hand, a messy account overview and organization would usually cause you to lose track of all your campaigns, ads, and metrics. In addition, vague campaign names and undefined objectives will make it more difficult for you to run and optimize ads regularly and consistently.
To ensure the structure and organization of your Facebook ad account audit, you must master how to label your campaigns effectively. You can start by naming them with clear and actionable objectives.For instance, you can label campaigns as "Customer Traffic on Website" or "Conversion Rate for Sales." These naming conventions tell you your goals and let you manage your budget and results more effectively.
Don't know where you can manage them?Simply visit your Facebook Business Manager tool. Here, you can organize all your Facebook accounts, manage user permissions, and view the overall look of your campaigns, ad sets, and ads on Facebook.
2. Facebook ad campaign structure
Your Facebook ad campaign structure can affect the maximum reach of your ads. It can influence the number of people who can see and engage with them.
But to manage your Facebook ad campaign structure effectively, you need a complete understanding of your objectives and how Facebook works.
Every time you start a new campaign on Facebook, you'll see a prompt asking about its objectives and goals. Facebook uses such information to optimize your campaign and reach your intended audience.
There are several ways to ensure your Facebook ad campaign structure. The easiest way to determine how to do it properly is by asking yourself these questions:
- Are your campaigns labeled?
- Are your campaigns targeted to the right target market?
- Are your ad sets competing with each other?
- Do you conduct A/B tests?
A proven way to maintain your Facebook Ads campaign structure is to label all your campaigns appropriately and descriptively. Be sure to look out for this factor because many marketers neglect its importance.
Besides this, you can also check whether your campaigns reach the right target market. Otherwise, your efforts and resources will only go to waste.
On top of this, ad sets shouldn't be too many because there's a big chance they would compete only with each other. And lastly, A/B testing can help ensure your ad campaigns' organization and structure. This way, you can optimize your future ads.
3. Audience targeting and optimization
After figuring out your account overview and Facebook Ad campaign structure, the next thing to look out for is your audience targeting and optimization. In fact, many PR strategists consider this aspect as the most critical parameter for an ads audit.
No matter how creative and well-designed your campaigns are, they become worthless if they aren't targeting the right audience. You'll only waste your time, effort, and resources creating these advertisements.
But if you've mastered Facebook's targeting parameters, you'd know how to optimize your ads better. As a result, you'll find more potential customers and clients and lose the risk of having minimal returns on investment.
If you're targeting and optimizing your audience, you must understand the purpose of the following parameters:
- Audience type;
- Audience size;
- Audience exclusion.
It's important to label your audience type and update it regularly between one to three months. You can also exclude particular audiences from seeing your ads. This way, you can ensure the quality of your target market without going overboard with your overall costs.
Besides these parameters, it's also vital to look into your audience size. You must learn how to balance your target market with your targeting parameters. Remember that having more targeting options could limit your audience and result in diminishing returns.
Finally, your Facebook Ads account also has a built-in feature that shows your audience's age range. So it can show you whether your ads and campaigns are reaching enough people, as well as your intended individuals.
4. Landing pages
If you've targeted your intended audience correctly, there's a big chance they'll visit your pages and accounts to check your services. But if they see your landing page is messy, they'll probably leave your website instead.
That's why excellent advertising doesn't stop at creating and releasing effective ads and campaigns for your target market.
In reality, excellent advertising also focuses on developing a sleek and user-friendly landing page. It also needs to load fast to ensure your conversions are consistent and high.
Because of this, using a conversion tracking tool with your Facebook Ads audit process can give your business some leverage over your competitors. Both strategies allow you to determine the ads that attract or drive away new customers or drive.
So how can you ensure your landing page is effective?You must review your landing page before launching a new ad or campaign on Facebook. It needs to link your audience to the most relevant pages creatively.
For instance, adding a product photo to your ad should bring customers to your product page. But listing all your services on your ad should drive your target market to your services page instead.
In both cases, refrain from linking your clients to your home page because they might not know where to go next.
5. Ad creatives
On top of audience targeting and optimization, ad creatives are also important aspects of a Facebook Ads audit. This is because they can create robust and impactful campaigns on Facebook.
But what are Facebook Ad creatives?Facebook ad creatives involve all your headlines, body copies, images, and video releases. These are the ads you release on your page or website.
In essence, the more creative you are with your ad elements, the better your return on investment. This result goes hand-in-hand with the logic that creative ads are worth sharing more on Facebook than overrated or mainstream campaigns. This is because they can attract new customers better.
To create robust ad creatives, you must consider the consistency of your messaging and branding. That means reviewing your headlines, texts, photos, and videos across all your campaigns and landing pages.
Consistency is important because people will be more inclined to trust you. Otherwise, inconsistent messaging and branding could confuse people and result in poor conversion rates.
Besides this, you can also perform A/B testing to evaluate your ad creatives. First, you must compare your ads and determine which ones performed well for a minimal cost. After that, you can modify your ads to your target market's liking.
But what are the factors you should look out for when conducting A/B testing?When performing A/B testing, you must look into three key metrics — your quality ranking, engagement rate, and conversion rate. This way, you can implement strategies that drive high engagement and conversion.
Although some business owners begin their Facebook Ads audit with their ad creatives, you must understand that a successful and insightful audit will only happen if you also look into the previous aspects we discussed. So the next time you begin your ads audit, review your account overview and organization first.
Facebook Ads audit template examples
There are many excellent Facebook Ads audit templates and checklists available online. They help you audit your Facebook Ads effectively and successfully.
But the best thing about them is that you can readily access them on the internet free of charge.
- Conversion Lift;
- WordStream;
- Karola Karlson; and
- Dan Siepen.
If you want to conduct a Facebook ads audit on your own, here are some examples of popular websites where you can get free and excellent ads audit templates:
Conversion Lift
Conversion Lift features an impressive DIY Facebook Ads audit that lets you measure the performance of your campaigns within 15 minutes. This free resource contains more than 50+ action items on its checklist and lets you view your account metrics, underperforming campaigns, ad sets, and ads, and the safety of your Facebook Ads account.
WordStream
WordStream, on the other hand, provides a long-form article covering seven simple steps to Facebook Ads auditing. Unlike Conversion Lift, it tells you how to start the process, what to do in each step, and how to maintain a remarkable Facebook Ads account.
Karola Karlson
Karola Karlson is another blog-style post covering how to perform a Facebook Ads audit in under 30 minutes. It asks ten important questions focusing on the ad campaign, ad set, and ad levels. You can reflect on each question and see how you can change your strategies firsthand.
Dan Siepen
Dan Siepen has a 40-point Facebook Ads audit and optimization checklist that outlines the key things to consider when doing an audit. Here, you'll see questions about tracking and analytics, strategy and objectives, targeting (segments and data), performance optimizations, external optimizations, and testing and experimentation.
Wrapping it up
Since there are many active Facebook users, performing a Facebook Ads audit can add some leverage to companies. It can give you the metrics and overview of the performance of your campaigns and ads on Facebook.
This way, you can make more strategic decisions for your business. You also won't waste your resources on ineffective ads.Reporting Ninja's Facebook Ads reporting services can help you simplify this process in under a few minutes. With this tool, you'll be able to monitor your ads, see their results, and track conversions and costs.
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