Online marketers can make use of a large number of social media platforms for advertising and marketing purposes. In fact, the biggest tools that you can make use of are Facebook ads and Google ads also known as Google AdWords. Given that both are marketed as the perfect tools for advertisers, it can be very difficult to pick one over the other.
Seasoned marketers have developed their own preferences regarding the kind of program they want to make use of but their preference largely hinges on the kind of results they are looking for. Many people have a more money-oriented approach where they want to garner more profits whereas others can have an approach grounded in raising visibility, building a community and focusing on brand awareness
In light of this, it can be rather difficult to pick on online marketing program over the other. To understand which one is better for you and your business, you need to look at Google AdWords and Facebook ads as separate entities and draw a comparison.
To make things easier for you, we’re going to do just that. Let’s start off by taking a closer look at them here:
What is Google AdWords?
Google AdWords is the most popular and the largest platform for paid advertising, namely Pay per Click -PPC advertising campaigns. While it can support organic campaigns as well, AdWords is largely used for PPC campaigns. In fact, when one is considering making use of paid advertising, Google AdWords is usually considered.
This is because Google search is the biggest search engine and the one that is the widely used. With Google AdWords, marketers and advertisers can bid and for the use of certain keywords, phrases and terms that are commonly used by users. This enhances their chances of showing up in the search results, increasing their visibility, driving more traffic to their websites and increasing their chances of making sales successfully.
Notable Features
Google AdWords has plenty of different features for marketers but some of them really stand out due to how popular they are. The following are some of the most notable features regarding the use of Google AdWords and why it is preferred:
- Overall Reach – Google AdWords stands out because it can easily reach out to an audience of 2.8 billion users per month. The kind of keywords you use can make a significant impact because on a monthly basis, a total of 180 billion searches are conducted through Google. Using Google AdWords also has the possibility of allowing your content to reach almost 90% of all the users on the internet.
- Options for Targeting – Google AdWords allows you to make use of different options for targeting. This enhances the overall ability and performance of your campaign. In targeting, you can make use of the following features:
- Location based targeting – This allows you to target your customers based on the region, area or country they are residing in when they are searching for something.
- Demographics based targeting – This feature allows you to target customers based on their age, their gender and their marital status.
- Language based targeting – This feature focuses on enhancing visibility by focusing on language preferences of a user.
- Keyword-based targeting – Similar to SEO, this feature makes use of relevant keywords to improve visibility in search results.
- Negative keyword based targeting – This feature allows you to sharpen your reach by excluding keywords, ensuring more accuracy.
- Device based targeting – This feature ensures that your target ads will be more likely to show up on the mobile device, such as a laptop, a smartphone or a tablet, of your customers.
- Advertising on Mobile Platforms – For mobile advertising, Google AdWords offers various different features including optimization of text-based ads for Android and iOS devices. In fact, Google AdWords also offers this feature for WAP enabled devices as well. You also get to enjoy more flexibility in budgeting ratios for tablets and mobiles.
- ROI – Return on Interest – Google AdWords offers marketers the best return on interest. The following are a few of them:
- Average Cost Per Click – CPC – $0.35 to $5
- Cost per Thousand Impressions – $2.75
- Click Through Rate – CTR – 2%
- Conversion Rate – 2.35%
- Average Cost Per Conversion – CPA – This rate varies based on bidding and the average cost you set. However, Google says that for every $1 spent, advertisers can make $2 with ease.
Seeing all these features, it is clear to see what makes Google AdWords stand out as the number one choice for many advertisers.
What is Facebook Ads?
Facebook Ads focuses on advertising on a social media platform. It works organically too but marketers can experience bigger benefits if they opt for paid social marketing. Given the fact that Facebook is one of the biggest social media platforms and has incorporated other social media platforms including Instagram and Whatsapp, it has a wide reach and a big impact.
With businesses becoming commonplace on social media, Facebook Ads has slowly but surely grown in usability. While comparisons are drawn in Facebook Ads and Google AdWords, there is a lot of difference in the results it garners. Nonetheless, when considering social media marketing, Facebook Ads does manage to make sure that it is among the first choice for marketers.
Notable Features
Facebook Ads has plenty of different features for marketers but some of them really stand out due to how popular they are and the kinds of results they deliver. The following are some of the most notable features regarding the use of Facebook Ads and why it is preferred:
- Overall Reach – Facebook Ads can provide a page with over a trillion views per month. Moreover, Facebook’s active users per month come up to a total of 1.28 billion and, based on the kind of keywords you’re using, your ad has the possibility to reach almost 43.8% of all the users on the internet.
- Options for Targeting – Facebook Ads allows you to make use of different options for targeting. This enhances the overall ability and performance of your campaign. In targeting, you can make use of the following features:
- Location-based targeting – This allows you to target your customers based on the region, area or country they are residing in when they are searching for something.
- Demographics based targeting – This feature allows you to target customers based on their age, their gender and their marital status.
- Lookalike targeting – This feature allows you to target users based on their tastes. Similarities can be used to offer them business advertisements based on their preferences.
- Behaviour-based targeting – This feature studies the likes and reactions of the target audience. Their likes and dislikes can then be used to offer them better-targeted ads that bring a positive response.
- Interest-based targeting – Personal information for hobbies, pages liked and who they follow on Facebook can be used to target audiences that could benefit from your business.
- Custom audience bouncing – This feature ensures that your target audience can be driven from other platforms to your social media pages.
- Advertising on Mobile Platforms – For mobile platform advertising, Facebook Ads does fall behind Google Adwords as they tend to only offer optimization for iOS and Android devices only. There is speculation that this aspect is still in development and that Facebook will be enhancing this area soon.
- ROI – Return on Interest – Facebook Ads offers marketers plenty of benefits and good return on interest as well. The following are a few of them:
- Average Cost Per Click – CPC – $0.45
- Cost per Thousand Impressions – $0.80 to $1.00 per 1000
- Click Through Rate – CTR – 0.27% to 0.919%
- Conversion Rate – 1% to 2%
- Average Cost Per Conversion – CPA – This rate varies based on industry. The food and beverage industry manages $0.34 whereas the telecommunications industry manages $1.57.
For many businesses that are just starting out with online marketing, Facebook Ads can appear more lucrative.
Which One is Better?
The important thing to realize here is that you can’t pit Google AdWords against Facebook Ads. While Google AdWords may offer you a higher return on interest as well as a better cost per conversion, there are still certain areas where Facebook Ads outperform Google AdWords.
The biggest example of this is that Facebook Ads can allow you to focus more on building your brand. Facebook offers you visibility, increasing brand awareness and successfully helping in lead generation. On the other hand, Google AdWords focus more on immediate sales.
However, if one isn’t aware of your brand, they are less likely to make a purchase with a business. This is a major reason why businesses make use of both mechanisms for their online marketing strategy. Used in conjunction with each other, you can easily create a marketing strategy that amplifies the strengths of both platforms and minimizes the weaknesses in both of them.
Work with Professionals
To take out a lot of the confusion, you can also opt to work with a good social media marketing agency. If you are searching for a good social media marketing agency, get in touch with Stop the Scroll. Comprising of a team of experts who have over 10 years of experience in handling social media marketing as well as digital marketing, we can help to highlight your brand and market your target audience with ease. Having worked with renowned brands such as HP, Blackberry, Microsoft and Polo, you can expect to get quality in everything we do.
For more information regarding our services, please get in touch with us by calling on +1226 338 5265 or dropping us a line at hello@stopthescrollnow.com. You can also send us more details regarding your project by filling in our online form and we will get in touch with you.
