9 Ways to Make Facebook & Google Work Better Together
Google and Facebook might seem separate entities regarding who owns the platforms, but for you as a brand, they can be used as a synergy. So if you are making up a digital marketing strategy, it would be beneficial to your brand to use these platforms differently to achieve the same goal.
The goal is to create brand awareness and increase conversions. This combination is not new, as some marketers have realized that Google and Facebook ad services account for over 50% of all advertising revenue worldwide. This is no surprise since the platforms house around 2 billion users each and can be considered two of the most effective platforms present in the digital space today.
Some people might pit these giants against each other and compare results to see which will work best for a brand or business. Still, only veteran marketers know that they provide different results to give you overall success on various fronts. For example, Facebook ads are excellent at gathering new leads and satisfying the needs of existing customers. While Google ads focus on consumers searching for the kind of products and services you are selling, it targets them directly.
To link Facebook with Google can be challenging. These two functions must be used simultaneously for a brand to see fast results and profitable returns. The art is to master how Facebook and Google ads work together. Follow this blog to explore how you can utilize these effective platforms for your brand’s success and achieve your desired marketing goals.
The nine ways to use Facebook and Google together are:
1. Initiate Searches = Google And Execute Conversions = Facebook
When you start a campaign and run ads on Facebook, having these ads targeting the right audience can lead to profitable results. You can reach not only more consumers but also cold audiences. If you achieve this feat, the number of users searching for your brand can increase; therefore, the number of brand searches on Google will also improve.
Since most consumers use Google as an initial form of research about a brand, you will find consumers trying to find contact and product information. This is when Facebook comes into play, where you can direct users to the brand’s page and interact with consumers directly. Through conversations on Facebook, you can take this opportunity to give them valuable information in response to their inquiries and push for a conversion. You can also make this happen by running Facebook ads on various platforms.
Most of the time, consumers will see Facebook ads about a brand, go to Google to do their research and then go back to Facebook to engage in a conversation with a business. This usually happens before the consumer even clicks on the ad since we all know that clicking on ads gives more data to brands about your online behavior. So a cautionary measure is to research before giving a brand consumer data. Some marketers observed that Facebook has led to an increase in brand searches on Google by 34%.
As a brand, you need to use the business’s name as the keyword in search campaigns and link the messaging to the Facebook ad. This will ensure consumers can find your brand on Google. This coordination gives consumers a sense of trust and solidifies the marketing message you are trying to put out there.
If you have been running Facebook ads and are ranked high on the SERP, this practice will still benefit you. You can test your messaging concerning CTR and conversions by targeting your brand name as the keyword. This can work in tandem with what ad copy is being used in your Facebook ads.
Below is an example of the Facebook ads that consumers might see, followed by the Google search result that works with the ad.
2. Optimize Retargeting
Retargeting is one of the most reliable features linking Facebook and Google together. Facebook can be included in marketing strategies as an effective way to retarget potential customers for a brand if they have seen a search or display ads. When consumers visit brand websites after searching for them on Google, then advertisers can use cross-platform retargeting through Facebook. This can work either way when brands are found on Facebook and are retargeted through Google.
Remember to ensure you are using customized landing pages for search ads and only send some traffic to one landing page. Segment audiences on Facebook and make different landing pages accordingly. Similarly, you can also omit consumers that have already filled in surveys or customer forms. This way, you will not annoy customers with numerous ads and lose their interest.
An excellent practice to initiate is creating Lookalike Audiences. This feature is only available on Facebook and not on Google Ads. These audiences help advertisers target consumers with the highest chances of appealing to your ad. This is done by creating an audience list based on your top customers and their interests. This targets other consumers with similar behaviors and interests, which would result in finding other potential customers.
You can also create a lookalike audience group based on parameters like consumers who visited your website through a Google campaign. This is how you can use the data collected on Google to complement your audience list on Facebook. Finally, be sure not to run both platforms’ ads simultaneously to avoid overcrowding. As we mentioned before, a consumer seeing your ads on two platforms constantly might create discontent for the brand and burn through your marketing budget by double targeting.
3. Tracking Conversions On Both Platforms
Conversions can come in many variations, such as signups, forms filled out, a sale or message interactions with a consumer. So keeping track of these kinds of consumer activities is vital to measure the effectiveness of an online marketing campaign. This data tells you not only how many consumers clicked on your website link but also how many consumers decided to make an effort to share their information.
On Facebook, tools like Facebook Pixel are a segment of code that tells the platform when consumers visit your website and what page they clicked or navigated to. It also tracks the activity they performed on your page, such as purchasing a product, filling out a survey/form or including a product in their online shopping cart.
Similarly, Google has multiple ways to track these kinds of conversions. This requires a segment of code as well, through Google Ads. It can either be Google Tag Manager or Google Analytics. The data you gather from both platforms can be used to audit your campaigns. You can also figure out what works for your brand on both platforms since they need synergy.
4. The Rule Of Seven
If this is the first time you have heard this rule, do not worry. The rule is that a brand needs to interact with a consumer seven times before taking any action from the user’s side. This translates to a brand marketing message being spread on multiple platforms. In this case, it would be over Facebook and Google. The logic behind this technique is that if users see the same ad repeatedly on one platform, either Google or Facebook, they will eventually ignore your content.
You can avoid this through omnichannel marketing, which is marketing across platforms. The perk of implementing this into your digital marketing strategy is that it will speed up user interactions between the brand and consumers. So, focusing on just Google will take the average user a long time to encounter your ad seven times. This goes for just using Facebook ads as well.
But by coordinating between both platforms and using the ads services provided by both, you reach the seven-point ad marker a lot quicker and thus achieve a consumer decision over a short period. You also reduce the overall cost of marketing by advertising on two well-established platforms since they have such a large consumer base. The platforms also have various cost-effective methods to use their ad tools and target consumers more effectively than other marketing mediums, such as radio or television.
5. Optimizing Google Ads With Facebook Data
Some marketers consider Facebook to have better detailed demographic information than its counterpart Google. Sifting through all that data and exacting what you need for Google ads is ideal for reaching a large audience and will save your budget. On the other hand, the data will help you stretch the campaign over time. Creating a specialized URL using UTM parameters would be best to achieve this activity. This is another segment of code you add to your URL, intended to be used in brand ads. The UTM links can be found on UTM builders, and the final URL would look like this:
https://www.example.com/page?utm_content=buffercf3b2&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer
All the code after the question mark is the UTM parameter. Once you have created this customized URL, you can use it in your Facebook ad campaign, and once it starts tracking, you will see data appearing in your Google Analytics tab. Using this data, you can create audience lists with Google Analytics Audience Builder.
To access this tab:
- Go to Admin and then to Property view.
- Click on Audience Definitions (as seen in the image below) and then Audiences to build the audience list.
- Import the audience into Google Ads, and you are ready to go.
6. The Appeal Of Google And Facebook Ads
It can be assumed that these two platforms have ads that give off a different feel to consumers when they first come across them. Google ads are logical, while Facebook ads are considered to be more emotional. This is because social media is all about user emotions, either through images or videos posted on a platform.
By evoking the feeling of emotion in consumers through a Facebook ad, you can nudge a train of thought about a product or service they didn’t think they needed or wanted, but now they do. This is how users discover brands when they search for them on Google and come across an aesthetically pleasing website, and then consumer conversions can occur.
Google search ads are designed to target a user with exactly what they are looking for, and at the specific time they are looking for them. This is very direct, gives consumers the gift of convenience, and puts their minds at ease when looking for a product or service. This happens as soon as a consumer enters a keyword into the Google search bar, and it triggers the ad to pop up. Consumers can click on the ad and go straight to the landing page of the brand website. Again, this is where your website copy will wow consumers and accomplish a conversion. So, it can safely be said that you need to work these ads together to appeal to different customers, one being the consumer attracted by emotion and the other through convenience.
7. Use Facebook Custom Audiences and Gmail Promotions Together
Marketers are convinced consumers still check their Gmail daily and scroll through Facebook to connect on social media. This is why Gmail-sponsored promotions are still used, with the data from customer match targeting. Facebook ads are also powered by custom audiences based on the data collected. These two activities go hand in hand.
The way you can incorporate both methods is by using the ad set for consumers who are Gmail users. This needs to be done because the Gmail Sponsored Promotion (GSP) might have been avoided, but the consumer might be close to a purchase. By setting GSP targeting on the mailing list and creating a Facebook custom audience using the same mailing list that was used on the Google Adwords customer match audience, you achieve synergy between the platforms.
You can then create another ad set on Facebook. This would exclude Gmail users and drop the bid on this ad set because the audience has not rejected the GSP. This way, both platforms share data and reach consumers who typically avoid ads from both platforms separately. Ensure to cap the list size so it stays high after the exclusions.
8. Facebook Store Visit Ads To Boost Search Campaigns
Google Adwords gives advertisers the option of targeting consumers based on their location and also gives you the ability to add location extensions for search ads. While Facebook gave rise to an ad format that attracts users through store visit ads, these are aimed at clicking a CTA to get the direction to a specific store in the locality.
This feature is impactful because a user might be looking for a product/ service. Still, the option of an outlet for a product they might desire can be shown to them and having an offer attached to it is a bonus.
9. The Power Of Facebook And Youtube Video Combined
Most people know that Google owns Youtube, so it comes under the same umbrella when Facebook and Google use the same strategy. That said, the video features on these platforms are detrimental to persuading a consumer to convert. These platforms reach consumers at different stages of the customer journey. Video content on Facebook usually appeals to consumers who want entertainment on social media. In comparison, content on Youtube is deemed entertaining and informative.
An advertiser can use these outlets and their impact differences to attract consumers to the brand. As a strategy, Facebook users could be attracted through brand-centric videos on Facebook to spark their interest and emotions and then directed to the brand’s Youtube page, where product/service-based video content is present to be more informative. This continuous flow of video content from one platform to the other guides the consumer through the customer journey, eventually leading to a conversion.
It can be safely assumed that this synergy between these two successful platforms will bring a brand to a position where conversions will be easier to achieve. Using only one platform might sound beneficial initially, but combining the efforts on two platforms will bring beneficial business returns. So be prepared to link Facebook to Google.
Some of these tips might be challenging to achieve, and you might ask yourself, how do I improve my Facebook and Google ads? The simple answer is you can hire a digital marketing agency like SV Digital to provide your business with social media marketing services to assist you.
