It’s the secret sauce for savvy marketers.
And yet, the impact of Facebook advertising may be underestimated by businesses, according to data released today by Social5 Research and Development.
Why? Because businesses that invest in advertising aren’t just seeing an increase in ad-related traffic. New research shows that they are also seeing an increase in free traffic. That means more people are visiting their pages, seeing their content and interacting with their brand — without ever seeing an ad — than their non-advertising counterparts.
The results come as part of a comparative analysis of 900 Facebook business pages, which found that businesses that invest as little as $100 a month in paid advertising see 18% more organic, or non-paid, traffic on their Facebook pages than those who don’t.
It’s a hard truth for businesses that have long viewed Facebook as a free forum. Although that’s technically true — Facebook doesn’t charge businesses to create a social footprint — the gap between advertisers and non-advertisers is becoming increasingly wide. To compete, businesses must think seriously about a marketing budget that includes some form of Facebook promotion.
Here’s what social marketers have known for years about Facebook advertising. It makes fans grow faster. It enables content to reach further. It causes engagement to rise higher.
Those Facebook fundamentals are solid. Social5 Research and Development found all three elements reflected in its analysis. Consider these findings:
- Fan Growth: Businesses that invested in Facebook advertising gained fans 5 times faster than those that didn’t.
- Content Viewership: Businesses that invested approximately $100 a month into advertising reported 563% more views than non-advertisers.
- Fan Engagement: For every fan that engaged with a non-advertiser’s post through a like, click, comment or share, 7 engaged with an advertiser’s brand.
But what’s eye-opening for socially savvy entrepreneurs is how much traffic came outside the ad. Not only did Facebook produce the expected “billboard effect” — more visibility, more eyeballs — but pages with advertising saw significantly more natural, everyday, organic views.
The average advertiser saw an 18% increase in non-paid traffic, receiving 8,357 more views during a 90-day period than their non-advertising counterparts.
If the numbers were sliced and diced further, there would be a number of contributing factors, ranging from behavior (businesses that advertise tend to be more engaged with social media) to technology (Facebook gives more weight, and hence more visibility, to posts and pages that receive higher levels of engagement.)
But overall, the increase has much to do with this simple marketing principle: Advertising creates opportunity. An opportunity for people to see your brand. An opportunity for people to engage with your content. An opportunity to connect with new audiences through a like, comment or share.
Jeremiah Stettler is the Chief Content Officer and Vice President of Product Development at Social5. With a background that includes 15 years of political and investigative journalism for publications such as The Salt Lake Tribune, he now oversees content production and social media strategy for more than 6,000 businesses in 11 countries.
