Facebook Ads

The ads appear while people are browsing, between posts from friends and the accounts they follow. The audience is chosen by location, age, interests and behaviour, and over time the network learns on its own who is worth showing them to, based on who has responded so far.

One practical consequence follows: in its first days a campaign needs to gather data. Drawing conclusions about success after three days is like reading a thermometer before it has settled — there is a number, but it means nothing.

The second consequence is that content decides more here than it does with Google Ads. In search, the buyer is already looking and the ad copy matters less. Here it is an image or a video that stops them, so a poor photograph can burn through a budget without a single enquiry, however well the targeting is set up.

These campaigns work best for brands sold on how they look — hospitality, cosmetics, furniture, fashion, services with a visible result — and for companies building name recognition rather than chasing urgent enquiries. A client who understands that doesn't measure success by the first week.

Content decides more here than it does in search, so we work best with clients who have decent material or are willing to produce it. A good photograph and a short video are worth more than any amount of audience tuning.

If you sell a service people only look for when they urgently need it — repairs, servicing, call-outs — we will tell you to put the money into Google rather than here. We sell what works for you, not what suits us.

As with Google, the cost has two parts. The ad spend goes directly to the network and buys impressions and clicks. The management fee covers account setup, audience selection, ad preparation, monitoring and optimisation.

The basic package is €300 a month and covers account setup, audience research and budget management. Standard is €450 a month, with more advanced targeting and side-by-side testing of several ad versions. The Premium package is €650 a month and adds detailed analysis and retargeting of people who have already visited your site. The one-off setup of the account, pixel and conversion tracking is €150. Extra work outside the agreed scope is billed at €50 an hour.

The same budget rule applies as with Google: too small an amount doesn't give the network enough data to learn who to show the ads to, so the money goes on a learning phase that never finishes. We tell you what amount makes sense in your case before anything starts.

The difference is in the buyer's intent. On Google a person is searching and knows what they want — there you catch existing demand. On Facebook and Instagram they are looking for nothing, so demand is created. Neither is better; they solve a different problem.

If you sell a service people look for when they need it — repairs, servicing, emergency call-outs — Google is the first choice. If you sell something bought once it is seen, or you are building name recognition, Facebook and Instagram work better.

For most companies it makes sense to start with one, measure, then add the other. Launching both at once on a small budget usually means neither gets enough to show what it can do.