3 Keys to Choosing the Right Facebook Ad for YouTube
You might be saying, “Use your Facebook ads? That’s obvious!” or “I tried that but it didn’t work for me!”, and that’s because you can’t use any ad; it has to be the right ad.
- Is it a video ad? Sorry, but I have to ask. This is a video streaming platform, and even your best image ads will fail on YouTube.
- Is the ad hitting your CPA? We want to start with a successful ad, and a good marker of this is your cost per acquisition.
- Are you running the ad at a high sales volume? We don’t want a campaign that you just turned on, even if it’s hitting your CPA. High sales volume indicates that your ad is resonating with a large audience — this completes the package.
STEP 2: OPTIMIZE YOUR AD CREATIVE FOR YOUTUBE
When I’m deciding which Facebook ads to use and how to optimize them, I focus on these creative elements that are working on YouTube right now:
1. The video has to do all the work.
Unlike Facebook, YouTube ads don’t have text above them, so everything from your hook to your call to action must be represented visually.
To optimize your Facebook video, take the information in the copy and include it in the video as text overlays. (And make sure your video has a strong CTA!
2. Nail the first 5 seconds.
On Facebook feeds, people can scroll right past your ad if they want to. But on YouTube, viewers have to watch 5 seconds of your ad before they can skip ahead to their cat video.
Use this time wisely! Start “high” with something exciting that will grab their attention.
3. Speak Directly to Your Ideal Customer
It’s not enough to get people’s attention — it has to be the right people.
On Facebook you pay for any impression no matter how brief, but on YouTube you only pay if someone watches for 30 seconds. (That’s right! More on this in the next section.)
That gives you time to connect with your ideal customers, filter out everyone else and lower your CPC.
STEP 3: CHOOSING THE RIGHT AD TYPE & AUDIENCE TYPE
These are in-stream ads that appear before and during videos, and here are 2 great things about them:
- People must watch 5 seconds of the ad before they can skip to their video. That gives you a chance to hook them so they watch the rest.
- You only pay for an impression if someone watches 30 seconds of your ad. (Yep, you read that right.)
STEP 4: MEASURE FOR SUCCESS
Here are some of the metrics you need to look at:
View Rate: The percentage of people served your ad who actually watch your ad. Over 30% is good, and signifies a good message-to-market match; under 20% is bad, and means you either need to change your audience or change your creative.
Average Cost Per Click (CPC): Ideally, this is at or below your non-brand search CPCs, so it’s important that you know your conversion rates. If your CPC is really high, it means not a lot of people are clicking through.
Organic Search: This isn’t something you need to monitor, necessarily, but it’s fun to. YouTube ads will often boost your organic search results, and advertisers will often see around 8% more search conversions, a 3% higher search conversion rate, and a 4% decrease in search CPA.
