In a previous post, we discussed how it’s important to think of Facebook as a community builder.

When you are ready to test the waters with facebook advertising, you can easily do so by clicking on the ‘Advertising‘ link and choosing the ‘create an ad‘ button.

After you create a catchy headline and image with some body text you’re ready to target your ad and you can do so by choosing geography, age, gender, education and a few other dimensions. Their targeting system is quite powerful.

Next you’ll select what basis you will be billed on (impressions or clicks) and enter your bid. It’s that fast and that simple!

Now here are a few notes on facebook advertising from our experience:

• Target your ads really well (psychographic segmentation is best).
• Run a few trial ads, monitor their performance and optimize your marketing message.
• Try both the PPC (pay per click) and CPM (pay for impressions).
• Be ready to create a new ad every few days (reasons below)

It’s been our experience that a facebook ad can get served to it’s full potential (preset cpm or ppc limits) very quickly depending on your targeting. If this is an avenue you wish to explore, be prepared to make ad updates and create new ads every few days to maintain visibility.

- Ernest.