Social Media Ad Primer

Paying to promote your content and content business on social media platforms can expand your reach or encourage existing audiences to do more. But you don’t need to pay to promote posts and advertise everywhere. In fact, you really shouldn’t.

Pick the one objective that best fits your business goals and stage. That clearly defined campaign goal will set your ads up for success. With the business goal in mind, you are ready to pick the social media platform on which to advertise. I don’t recommend spreading your available budget across multiple platforms. Focus on a single platform. That requires knowing where your target audience is and what content they expect to find on that platform.

LinkedIn advertising

Before you pay to advertise on LinkedIn, ensure you’ve maximized your free presence – personal profile, business page, regular posting, and possibly a newsletter. All that helps your paid advertising work better because potential audience members can easily check and see that you’re legit.

Audience: Since LinkedIn is a platform for people in business, you can segment your target audience by job title, company size and industry, skills and experience, education, or location. You also can target people outside the platform with the LinkedIn Audience Network.

Formats: LinkedIn sells multiple ad formats based on objective and audience. Among the most popular:

• Sponsored content – Similar to organic posts, these images, videos, or carousel content appear in the audience’s feeds. These can work well to promote your content and grow awareness of your brand.
• Direct message ads – You can send personalized messages directly to individuals. These work better when the recipient knows your brand and purpose.
• Text ads – A more affordable option, these ads appear adjacent to organic search results. They simply identify your company name, a headline, and a description.
• Dynamic ads – More personalized but less direct ads showcase your content products based on the target audience member’s profile, web activity, and other data identified by LinkedIn.

Budget and metrics: Like most platforms, LinkedIn asks for your budget. You can set it per click or acquisition. It allows you to establish daily or lifetime budgets with specific start and end dates for the campaign. LinkedIn’s metrics track impressions, clicks, conversions, and cost per click.

Get started: Log into your LinkedIn account, click the Business icon at the top, then pick the Advertise option. You’ll need to set up a campaign manager account if you haven't yet. And remember, create multiple ads within the same campaign to attract your audience and understand which helps you achieve your objective the best.

Helpful Resources:

• ​LinkedIn Ads for Beginners
• ​A Complete Guide to Making the Most of LinkedIn Advertising
• ​How to Advertise on LinkedIn in 6 Simple Steps

Facebook and Instagram advertising

Meta sets up its advertising so you can promote on either or both social platforms, Facebook and Instagram.

Audience: Meta provides a laundry list of target audience options, from the usual demographics and interests to their online behavior and life events. You also can target people who have visited your website or interacted with you through your Facebook Page or Instagram account.

Plus, you can pick lookalike audiences – people similar to your customers or website visitors and connections – friends of people who liked your page or interacted with your business.

Format: Meta offers a long list of ad formats. You’re likely familiar with the image ads. They could be a single, static image showcasing your brand or content product or a carousel of up to 10 images or videos linked to landing pages. In the video realm, you can pick from in-feed videos, Stories and Reels ads, live videos to connect in real time, and video polls.

You also can buy ads to be sent to individuals through Messenger, playable ads to let users interact with games directly in the ad, and lead ads to capture audience contact information with gated content.

Budget and metrics: Meta also uses a bidding model for advertising. You set the budget for each ad set. It also requires you to select manual or automated bidding. Manual requires setting a maximum price per click or impression. Automated bidding allows Meta to optimize your bids based on your campaign goals. Meta also lets you pick daily and/or lifetime maximums. You can optimize your ad budget for reach, impressions, clicks, or conversions.

Get started: To connect your account to Meta Business Suite, visit this page and click Get Started in the upper right. You will need to link your existing Facebook page or Instagram profile to this account.

Helpful Resources:

• ​Meta for Business
• ​Facebook Ads Guide
• ​Instagram for Business​
• ​Instagram Help Center​

Advertising on social media platforms isn’t a simple puzzle. After you publish your first campaign on the platform and give it time to catch on, monitor the analytics closely. What’s working? What’s doing poorly? Does one message, image, or video resonate better than others? Adjust your investment to do more of that. By analyzing and adjusting your ad program regularly, you will better position your advertising to deliver what will attract the audience you seek and get them to do what you want.

– Ann Gynn

Interested in search advertising? The Tilt’s Primer on Google Ads​

---

Supported by

​

StreamYard is the easiest way to create content right in your browser. You can multistream to your social media platforms, host a weekly show with special guests, create webinars, record podcasts with local recordings, create videos, and more.

StreamYard’s a popular tool amongst livestreamers, video creators, YouTubers, and podcasters – with features like live streaming, webinars, local recordings, screen sharing, and more, StreamYard makes it simple to get professional and polished content every time.

​SIGN UP TO GET A FREE TRIAL AND LIFETIME DISCOUNT​

---

Entrepreneur: Georgi Todorov

Tilt: Helping people make money online

Scene: Thrivemyway (founder), LinkedIn (9K), Create & Grow (launching soon)

Snack Bites:

• Georgi grew his side hustle into a full-fledged content business, the Thrivemyway blog.
• In eight months, the site had 100K monthly visitors, and within two years, it grew to 200K a month.
• The entrepreneur diversified his revenue streams with sponsored content, display ads, and affiliate marketing.
• In 2023 – two years after operating the site – he told it for six figures.
• Georgi’s next endeavor, Create & Grow, will teach people how he did it.

Why We Stan: Georgi advocates for planning to sell your content business from day one – something we wholeheartedly think you should do, too. You operate your business differently and usually more successfully when you do.

– Ann Gynn

​Read Georgi Todorov’s story.​

Know a content creator who’s going full tilt? DM us. Or email tilt@thetilt.com.

---

---

​

• ​4 Critical Questions That Drive Your Content Business (Content Inc.)
• ​Will Gemini Be Google's Search Savior? (This Old Marketing)
• Join Tilters Michelle Peterson Clark and Ann Gynn at 12 p.m. EST Tuesday for Tilt Your Business: A Weekly Mastermind for Content Entrepreneurs.
• We are starting to announce speakers for CEX 2024. Be sure to register today to save your seat.​

​

---