Hi there!

My name is Noah Matthews, the Marketing Coordinator at CBDC Blue Water. I have been working with CBDC for about a year now. Over this last year, I have been helping entrepreneurs grow their small business with digital marketing. I provide one on one training and consulting sessions with our clients.  A question I continue to be asked as I help entrepreneurs understand digital marketing is “What’s the difference between a Facebook ad and a boosted post?.” If you are new to advertising your business on Facebook, continue reading to find out!

Boosted Posts:

Boosting a post is relatively simple and quite frankly the easiest way to reach new customers on Facebook. There are a few things to be considered before you begin boosting. 

When you boost a post on your page, you are applying money to a post that was already created and shared by you. Applying money to that post, will allow you to target a specific audience. The demographics, behaviours, interests, and geographical area that you program will determine the individuals who see it. 

It is also key to know the goal of boosting your post, as you can program different ad-objectives. Selections are far more limited than an advertisement, but you can still select between website clicks and increased engagement.  

After selecting your audience and goal, it is time to determine your budget and the length of time you want the post available for. There is an approval period that can take upwards of 24-hours to complete. After your boosted post has been approved, your account will start accruing expenses as your target audience begins to act.  

Depending on your goals and expertise, boosting a post may be the most logical option for you. However, Facebook ads are something I will always recommend to clients over simply boosting a post.  There are some additional targeting and reporting features you will miss when you boost a post over programming a Facebook ad. 

Facebook Ads: 

To begin, Facebook ads are built from scratch within the Facebooks Ads Manager. Here, you are given full control to design your advertisement. This freedom means you can determine the best set-up for your business goals. You can select between a single photo, carousel, or a video ad, and apply a call-to-action (CTA) button enticing your audience to act. The CTA button is important to align with the goal of your campaign because Facebook will make you choose between their pre-determined selections such as Learn More, Contact Us or, Sign Up. 

Although you can target specific audiences when boosting a post, there are more possibilities when targeting within the Ads Manager. After creating Facebook audiences based off your email lists, prior engagement, and any other market research, you can create lookalike audiences. Lookalike audiences will allow you to reach people who are like an audience you have already created, but not the same.  

Another benefit of a Facebook Ad is your ability to select where the advertisement will be displayed. A boosted post will only show up in your target audiences newsfeed on Facebook and if you select it, Instagram. Whereas a Facebook ad will also give you the ability to display your ad in Facebook’s Messenger App, Instagram Stories, etc. 

The final benefit that an ad will provide over a boosted post is the implementation of custom conversion tracking. Custom conversion tracking gives you the ability to customize pixels by combining events with specific URLs. Giving you far more detailed analytics and the ability to target even more accurately. 

Conclusion: 

Boosting a post gives inexperienced Facebook advertisers the ability to reach new audiences online. It is beneficial for quick engagement on a post or, basic traffic on your page. However, if you are really looking to step your Facebook advertising game up, I recommend becoming familiar with Facebook Ads Manager. The tools available will help you more accurately reach your target audience and have that audience take a specific action. Facebook ads may appear to be confusing and complicated at first but, once you understand how it works, it becomes a powerful tool at your disposal.