There are several ways to achieve dropshipping success, one of them is using Facebook Ads for marketing.
Facebook’s over 2 billion monthly active users make it the number one social media network. From “hi” to “buy”, FB has been able to bridge the gap between social and commerce.
And speaking of commerce, dropshipping is one e-commerce business (among others) that has benefited from Facebook. Now,
What is Dropshipping?
Dropshipping allows you to sell other people’s products at a profit without investing any of your money buying stock or keeping inventory.
Here’s How Dropshipping Works
Dropshipper A creates an online store, say on Shopify (which hosts over 500,000 stores), lists or displays Seller B’s products at a markup.
Customer C buys from Dropshipper A who takes out his profit and forwards C’s order to Seller B who packs, ships and delivers to Customer C.
The dropshipping triangle below depicts dropshipping in three easy steps viz:
Dropshipping in the Last 5 Years
The Google Trends chart below shows how interest in dropshipping in the US has grown since 2013 by over 75%.
This shows that more and more people like you and I are showing interest in dropshipping.
One of the reasons for this is it’s extremely low entry barrier requiring little to absolutely no startup capital.
The Dropshipping-Facebook Connection
As a dropshipper you have the products, Facebook has the platform. Product plus platform equal to perfect marketplace.
Thanks to tools like Facebook Ads and other Facebook for Business packages, dropshippers can now place their products in front of nearly 2 billion people.
If you’re looking for proven tips to maximize Facebook Ads for your dropshipping business and avoid wasting money on FB Ads like many others, here are 6 you can use right away.
But first, let’s look at
3 Factors to Consider Before Launching Facebook Ads for Your Dropshipping Business
Facebook advertising works best for your dropshipping business when you:
Niche
Instead of selling everything that you know little or nothing about why not sell one thing you know everything about?
How about eco-friendly kitchen appliances instead of all kitchen appliances?
Sell Branded/Officially Licensed Merchandise
You could sell well if you know how to customize your Facebook Ads for branded or officially licensed merch.
These are already well known and have active communities or vast fan bases you can sell to.
Drive Store Traffic
Focusing your Facebook Ads on single products may result in only single sales. They simply click, buy and bounce.
Ads with storewide reach, on the other hand, can lead customers to your entire storefront, buy you more “buy time” and AOV (average order value) or average basket size.
Now here are
6 Ways To Maximize Facebook Ads For Dropshipping
To ace Facebook Ads for dropshipping do the following:
1. Tweak Your Target Audience
Facebook allows you to target specific demographics or sets of people to see your ads.
Know who’s interested in your products, their age, average income, purchase history, gender and other KYC details that will help you better target them.
You don’t want your cool ice pack ads cooling off in an Icelandic man’s Facebook feed.
2. Monitor Your Ad Placements
Facebook Ads can appear in the top right column on desktop, in newsfeed of both desktop and mobile, Instagram feed, stories, Facebook Messenger, etc.
Ad placements in the right places ensure maximum visibility and could make the difference between success and failure.
The best performing ads are usually found in newsfeed of both mobile and desktop. They’re visible and less intrusive or disruptive of user experience.
3. Call-to-Action
Each ad or ad set comes with the option to select from almost 13 or more call to action (CTA) buttons.
Popular ones include
- Learn More: which takes people to your site for details,
- Shop Now: which takes them on a store tour,
- Contact Us: which takes them to your contact page,
- Call Now: shows your daytime telephone number,
- Like Us, etc,
The latter brings in more likes/followers to your page but it’s up to you to engage them and make them like you enough to buy.
If you sell informational products ‘Learn More’ is perhaps one of your best CTA button buddies.
4. Create Multiple Ads
Create multiple ads to see which performs best. A/B Testing is your best bet to figure out which ads perform better at a cheaper price.
This will help you optimize future ads for greater opt-ins, purchases or whatever your advertising goals are.
Try different colors, wordings, placements, images, tone, etc until you strike gold.
5. Text (Copy)
Your entire copy can be a powerful CTA if well written. Combined with the right graphics or images, your Facebook Ad becomes a powerful dragnet.
A good copy states the pain points and product benefits plus incentives buyers stand to gain. A good copy can even convince people to try a new bad product.
Sadly, a bad copy might darken the chances of a really good new product. Write good copy or hire professional copywriters to help.
6. Images and Video
A (good) picture is worth a thousand words, a (great) video, even more. The best Facebook Ads combine great copy, imagery and video to deliver truly successful campaigns.
Here’s what statistics have to say:
- 83% of those using video think it gives them a good ROI; 82% think it’s a key part of their strategy,
- 73% of those not using video have bought a product after watching one,
- 97% of businesses using explainer videos say it helps users understand their business better,
- 94% of businesses see video as an effective tool,
- Among those surveyed, 81% saw an increase in sales and 53% said support calls were reduced.
You can add unique product images or how to videos to boost the impact of your future Facebook Ads.
Conclusion
Dropshipping marketing like all of digital marketing (and unlike in-person marketing) heavily relies on text, images and video to convince buyers.
Facebook Ads can let you do this, these tips will help you ace it to boost your dropshipping sales.
Author Bio:
Amos Onwukwe is an AWAI trained Business/E-commerce B2B/B2C Copywriter, featured in scores of blogs including Huffington Post, Dumb Little Man, E-commerce Nation, eCommerce Insights, Understanding E-commerce, Result First, Floship, SmallBusinessBonfire, SmallBizClub, Successful Startup 101, Business Partner Magazine, RabidOfficeMonkey, etc. He’s available for hire.
Twitter: @amos_onwukwe
