People choose self-storage to address an immediate demand. Self storage marketing is about convincing consumers to select your facility over others!
Learning Facebook marketing will provide you new tools. Unlike other Facebook ad posts, we must adopt a deliberate approach to acquire a competitive edge. We must select and apply the correct tools in the self storage business since it varies from normal marketplaces.
Let’s start with why you’d employ Facebook Marketing. Is Facebook still relevant?
Facebook has over 3 billion active users, its advertisements convert better than Google ads, and its ROI per click is greater, however it varies widely. Facebook’s reliable user data lets you target your ads to the most relevant individuals. We’ll explore that eventually.
It seems like a good investment, but what’s the catch? Facebook marketing seems more successful than Google Ads. When you study the numbers, you see that Facebook has a high conversion rate but a lower reach than Google. Although Facebook has over 3 billion users, Google has everyone.
Google shows your adverts to storage unit seekers.
Given the strength of word-of-mouth marketing in our sector, you may ask if Facebook marketing is suited for you.
In summary, Facebook marketing is an advanced stage after checking all your other boxes:
- Website and Google Business Profile optimization
- Effectively running Google advertisements
- Starting a Referral Campaign
- Offering excellent customer service to boost word-of-mouth marketing
But suppose you’ve done all that and are seeing results. Your marketing approach is working well, and you want more. You’re ready for Facebook marketing, and we can target your advertisements to the appropriate individuals when done right.
Facebook ad campaigns—how do they work? Does it take long or cost much? What are these buttons?!
Our Facebook Ads Crash Course is ready to begin if you’re feeling daring and want to grow your business with a valuable tool. Retargeting with Facebook’s Ads Manager is the purpose of this two-part blog article. We must start with the basics and grow from there to get there.
The procedure requires a few preliminary steps that are less interesting than generating new leads. These three actions will set the stage for your ad campaign and provide direction.
Get Started
Choose your ad campaign aim. Leads or conversions are the easiest indicators of success. Consider that greater facility awareness may be a helpful approach. If they need storage units later, they may remember you as their best alternative.
Meta Business Suite lets you create a Facebook page. This is easy and a natural landing spot for Facebook visitors.
Meta Business Suite requires a legitimate payment method for your business’s Facebook account. No worries—we’ll explain how to create payment limitations so you only spend what you agree to on adverts.
After setup, meet Facebook Ads Manager, our new partner.
Facebook Ads Manager
Click Ad Center on the left of your company Facebook page. Select All Ads from the dropdown. Then you want Ads Manager. This is your command center for creating and running advertising.
Note that our phone can also perform all of the following actions! Download the Meta Ads Manager app, connect in with your company account, and complete the same processes as on a PC.
To learn the layout, click around the Ads Manager. Facebook may give you a quick tour—take whatever you’re comfortable with.
Take your next step and learn how to build an ad.
Create an Ad Step-by-Step
Click the green Create button below the search box to continue. This guide can use an ad you wish to send out or a sample you don’t launch.
Facebook will ask you for a purchase type and campaign goal.
Purchase Type and Smart Spending
Purchase, auction or reservation: While the labels may be confusing, it all boils down to how you use and pay for page ads.
Auctions:
- Bid-based pricing
- Instant launch
- More placement and budget flexibility
- More accurate aiming
Reservations
- A set price
- Booked ahead, debut later
- Ensured location and visibility
- Much broader targeting
Consider which is ideal for your marketing campaign, and note that many tenants pick based on distance from home, making Auctions an appealing alternative for our sector due to their local reach.
Campaign Objectives With Intention
We must choose again for your campaign goal.
Remember when we chose our ad campaign goal? That choice will inform our analysis. Your choice of one of six goals will help Facebook package your ad.
Facebook will show your ad to those most likely to remember your facility location or services if your goal is to raise awareness.
Traffic: This goal mimics internet advertisements. Clicks that lead to your website are the aim. Traffic is a good objective if you want more tenants or think your website will convert.
Engage: Get people talking to you. Engagement goals mean you want messages and queries.
Leads: A Leads goal involves gathering consumer data. Calls or forms work best here.
App Promotion: This option encourages app downloads and use. You can probably cross this off.
Sales: Facebook will show your ad to buyers if Sales is your target. It’s easy to select this as an aim, but remember that completing a sale is just one part of converting leads. Sometimes it’s the appropriate decision, but if you focus on sales but not the other goals, you may notice lower results.
Again, self storage market statistics may clash with traditional marketing data. While a bigger marketing effort with engagement and awareness works well in other industries, it’s less crucial in the needs-based self storage industry. We want traffic or sales.
Name and Ad Category: Simplifying
Name your campaign after making your selections. Facebook then asks for an ad category. Don’t click any of those boxes! Housing and political advertisements have tax-specific categories. Self-storage ads are universal, so leave this step blank.
Long-term A/B Testing Data
Our next choice is A/B testing. Toggling this setting lets you run two ads with alternate placement, pictures, text, or audiences. A/B testing can help you determine if your ad is effective and what kind to run next. More data helps you make better marketing budget selections, but if you’re starting out, leave this function off. Turning it on will prompt more prompts later.
Advanced Campaign Optimization: On/Off?
Advance to Advantage+. Only auction buyers will see this function, which utilizes AI to discover the optimal price per audience to automatically disperse ad placement cash. Advantage+ automates spending for efficiency and reach but reduces control. Since self-storage markets function differently from other markets, you may know something AI doesn’t. First-time users should note that Advantage+ works best with many adverts active.
Facebook will also let you restrict your performance target (it will match the name you set before). First-time users should skip this step, but we can review it later. In short, picking your performance objective answers “what,” then narrowing it down answers “how.” This setting lets you target more precise metrics and is more trial and error—perfect for expert users who want to tweak and maximize.
A budget and schedule
Next, budget and schedule your ads. Pay attention to this tool—your ad budget! Facebook restricts your donations to avoid taking more than you contribute. You won’t go over your limitations, and you may use a daily or lifetime budget.
Daily: This option sets the ad’s daily expenditure limit till its last day. The ad will run at the appropriate moment for your settings. If the funding runs out, the ad will stop for the day.
Lifetime: The ad will draw from a lump payment over its allotted duration and stop airing if it runs out. Facebook tracks ad effectiveness and optimizes when it runs to maximize ROI.
You may be asking which is best. Daily budgets are easier to maintain for fluctuating budgets. For those who want to sit it out, the lifetime budget automates the long game.
Who Watches You?
We also need to customize your audience. Facebook helps us target by geography, age, and language, while self-storage relies on proximity. If someone in a specified age group is over an hour away, our ad is useless. Location should be your main goal, followed by age and language.
We may leverage Gen Z’s frequent Instagram use to choose Ad Format as Gen Z and older leads use Facebook less.
Advantage+ can automate some audience settings if you want to let the AI handle it, however AI is a top-down marketing technique, and self-storage is a distinct industry.
There’s a better way. Even if you chose a specific area inside a certain radius of your storage facility, you’ll send advertising to non-self storage customers, squandering money. When you create an actual ad to spend money on, we’ll use a Custom
Audience for Retargeting. We’ll finish creating an ad and discuss retargeting in our Meta Pixel and Retargeting Guide later.
Ad placement: How people see your ad
After establishing our audience, we’ll position ads. Advantage+ can automate this setup, but if you want manual control, you may choose what Facebook content plays your ad:
- Feeds
- Tales and Reels
- In-stream
- Overlay reels
- Results of search
- Messages
- Sites and apps
Why not click all of them? First, various ad placements have varied pricing and format requirements, so strategic thinking is important. Second, extra variables make it harder to evaluate data when tracking ad performance over time. If you just run ads in feeds, you can test them in search results.
Connect social media
Next, select which social profiles to link this ad to. The obvious choice is your business Facebook Page.
Good news if this feels tech-heavy! By intentionally picking these parameters, you’re past novice level, and now for the fun part: the ad.
Select Format
Ad Setup lets you pick an ad format and create your ad. You have several choices:
- One photo or video
- Multiple-image or video carousel
- A selection of items that will appear as full-screen mobile ads.
Format can effect placement options and vice versa, which indirectly affects pricing.
Call to Action, Media, Text
Ad Creative lets you submit media for your ad, including music for applicable media types. You should add text with images and videos. A CTA is crucial here. Review your campaign goals to determine your CTA. What do you want ad viewers to accomplish? Call out subscriptions, website visits, form fills, and rentals!
Final Steps and Publishing
Destination is the final feature to focus on. Clicking the ad leads someone here. Facebook recommends Instant Experience, a landing page customized for Facebook that stays on their platform, but you may route people to your website or email. Like CTAs, aligning with your goals will help you direct individuals.
Similar to your website, bringing them to your Rates or Home page is excellent. Send individuals who click on your adverts to a rental page.
Review everything once, twice, or more. When finished, hit the publish button (bottom right of screen) (many buttons today). Facebook must check your ad to ensure it meets their rules and regulations before launching it, but you’ll receive a confirmation email within a day.
Congratulations on your Facebook ad launch! As you send out more advertisements, you’ll become more acquainted with the tools and empowered to test out sophisticated features to find what works best for your business.
As noted, introducing advertisements is not our main purpose. The first stage was learning how the Ads Manager works and how to construct an ad. Our sophisticated tools and the next two steps in our two-part course will let you use the Meta Pixel to run a Retargeting ad campaign.
The Meta Pixel
Advanced users can make two successful plays with the Meta Pixel, their closest buddy. This small piece of code enters into your website code to gather statistics on site visitors and report back to you.
The Meta Pixel automatically collected that data, which you can use to target adverts. Using a Meta Pixel requires a Facebook Page for your business, but it’s worth it to reach our Facebook Marketing goal: Retargeting.
Wondering how to set up and use the Meta Pixel? Deepen your Facebook marketing knowledge with part two of the Meta Pixel and Retargeting Guide!
Retargeting
After you’ve created and posted Facebook advertisements, we may use the Meta Pixel to target specific users. The pixel can identify individuals who visited your website but did not buy, making them ideal for targeted marketing. The magical marketing Rule of Seven requires potential leads to view your brand seven times before buying. Retargeting distributes Facebook advertising to individuals you’ve engaged with before, focusing your ad budget and helping a lead convert.
We offer an in-depth Retargeting Guide to help you set up Facebook retargeted advertisements for website visitors!
Conclusion
Facebook marketing may work in self storage if you target potential clients, not just anybody. While Facebook advertisements might be effective, you should first use your Google Business Profile and Google ads before diving into them.
You don’t want to put out a swarm of Facebook advertisements right now unless you want to waste money. Setting up the Meta Pixel and perfecting Retargeting are for niche companies like self storage. offering your advertising to customers who have visited your website and expressed interest in renting is a better investment than offering them to those who don’t want to store.