The Best Methods To Collect Leads with Facebook and Instagram Ads
I’ve been spending the last couple of weeks planning out some travel for the rest of th eyear.
Some of the destinations I plan to visit this year include Cabo, Phoenix, Austin, Seattle, Toronto, and possibly the Philippines. If you live in any of these places, hit “reply” and let me know some of your favorite places that you'd recommend visiting while I'm in your city.
As I’ve been planning all this travel though, I’ve spent hours comparing different flights and airline options.
In some cases, like when I’m flying a longer distance, I find that I definitely value paying more for a nicer airlines or upgraded seat for the comfort and convenience that comes with it.
But in other cases, like when I’m going to Phoenix (less than an hour from San Diego) I’m cool with going with a cheaper option – even if that means a little less comfort or legroom. I am only 5’2 after all 😂
What I realized though is that the decision-making process with airlines is surprisingly similar to choosing the best method to collect leads through your Meta ads.
Just like with travel, where the choice of an airline can impact what your journey will be like, the method you choose for lead generation can also greatly impact the success of your campaign.
So while I'm on this metaphor, let’s dive more into the 3 main 'airlines' of lead generation with ads and explore the pros and cons of using each.
Method 1️⃣ - Collecting Leads Through Your Website or Landing Page (Delta or Jet Blue)
This is my preferred, tried and true method for collecting leads through ads. Similar to a Delta or Jet Blue flight, you can't go wrong with this method.
Pros:
First-Class Experience: Your landing page offers a premium, branded experience. You control every aspect, ensuring a tailored journey for your audience.
Higher-Quality Leads: Anyone who takes the time to click away from Facebook or Instagram to visit your website and fill out a form is clearly an interested lead. We usually find that website leads open your emails at a higher rate, are more likely to engage with your brand, and convert at a higher rate on the back-end.
Cons:
Higher Cost: Similar to booking a first-class ticket, generating website leads can come at a higher cost in terms of resources and the cost per lead you’ll pay. If you don’t already have a website or the ability to design a landing page for your business, then this may not be the best option for you.
Less Accurate Reporting: Because of Apple iOS 14 and the privacy updates over the last few years, we’re unable to track every lead that comes through our website 100% perfectly within the ads manager. Fortunately there are ways around this by creating separate landing pages for ads versus organic and then tracking the data on the backend, but it does take a bit more work.
Method 2️⃣ - Lead Forms Directly Through Facebook (Spirit or Frontier Airlines)
If you don’t have a landing page or website, you can use lead forms built directly within Facebook or Instagram to gather leads. Personally, this isn’t my favorite method but it can work better for some businesses than others, especially if you have less resources/a lower budget. Hence why I compared it to a Spirit or Frontier flight, IYKYK.
Pros:
Easy To Create and Set Up: Because these forms are built directly into Facebook, they are easy to build and you don’t need any tech or software (besides an email marketing system or Zapier) to set them up.
Cheaper Leads: These forms don’t require your audience to leave the platform and autofill their information such as name, email, and phone number so this often results in higher conversions and cheaper lead costs.
Cons:
Limited Experience: The trade-off for ease and efficiency is less room for customization and branding on the form.
Lower Quality Leads: Because it’s so easy for people to complete these forms, often times the lead quality is lower – resulting in lower email open rates, engagement and conversion rates.
Method 3️⃣ - Through DM’s (Southwest Airlines)
This is another great method that you can use to generate leads that has become a lot more popular amongst my clients in the last year. Instead of driving traffic to your website or utilizing lead forms on Facebook, with this strategy you can collect email addresses directly through your DM’s and start conversations directly with your prospects. I compared it to a Southwest flight because although they're nice, sometimes you just don't need the 2 free checked bags or other perks.
Pros:
Higher Touch Interaction: Engaging through Messenger is akin to booking a non-stop flight. It offers a direct, personal line to your audience, allowing for better communication and more direct follow-up.
High Conversions & Quality: With this method, your audience doesn’t have the leave the platform but they still have to enter in their name & email to get your offer so you still get a higher quality lead while also achieving a high conversion rate from your ad.
Cons:
Requires More Manual Follow-Up: Because your leads now have direct access to your inbox, you will have to respond to more questions in the DM’s and spend more time following-up manually with your leads.
Required Tech: In order to execute on this strategy you will need to setup a tool like ManyChat to automate a lot of the process, in addition to your email marketing platform.
As you consider which method is right for your business, remember that each 'airline' offers a unique journey with its own set of advantages and challenges. The key is to select the one that aligns best with your business, goals, and time/resources available.
WANT MORE SUPPORT? WHEN YOU’RE READY, HERE ARE THE WAYS THAT I CAN HELP YOU GROW YOUR BUSINESS:
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2. Want help creating your strategy or getting your most pressing marketing questions answered? Book a 1:1 consulting session with me.
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