Social media marketing wouldn’t feel complete without using paid ads or meta ads to optimize the effect of great content. Among all social media, Facebook still ranks first as the most popular media social worldwide, according to Statista. The Facebook-acquired social media, Instagram, also gained a high spot in the ranking.
Based on the ranking alone, it is understandable that both Facebook ads and Instagram ads are highly-seek paid ads for the majority of brands. In terms of Instagram ads itself, there are two important things to highlight before diving head first to advertise content directly on the platform.
First and foremost, there are two different ad types that can promote content on Instagram, namely Meta ads (formerly referred to as Facebook ads) and Instagram ads, commonly called Boost Post. They function similarly, yet with striking differences that will be talked about later in this article.
Lastly, determining ad objectives will greatly affect the placement, budget, audience, and message for each ad campaign. It would be wise to understand what each ad is trying to achieve, lest the budget will go down the drain without clear results and improvement.
What is Boost Post?
Boost Post, or Instagram ads, is a simpler way to promote content on Instagram. Unlike Meta Ads that need to be done on Facebook, Boost Post can be promoted directly on Instagram without needing to open up another browser. It is basically paying for your already posted content to reach more people with similar characteristics to your established audience without further detailed customization available.
Instagram Boost allows you to grow your account more easily by optimizing likes, comments, and follows. The nature of the ads that focus on account growth makes it suitable for overall branding awareness increase. To add more to this, Instagram Boost Post also works best to gain more traffic to your account, making it excel in the awareness funnel marketing.
Instagram Boost Post’s main advantage is the profile visit objective, while also becoming one of the biggest differences to Meta Ads, since not all Meta Ad Account can have the profile visit objective. It directs the audience straight to the brand’s profile, without the unnecessary loading to jump to the browser first before redirecting to the Instagram profile via an external browser. This process really takes a lot of the users’ time.
What is Meta Ads?
Simply put, Meta Ads are the content advertisement settings that are managed directly on Meta’s advertising platform (or Facebook). It is a far more comprehensive system than Boost Post, requiring more detailed audience targeting and ad campaign settings. It also offers an advanced tracking system that includes ad modification history and automatic CTR results.
Being a more comprehensive social media advertising system, Meta Ads is able to dive deep into the consideration and conversion funnel with its optimization of shop orders, app installs, and web clicks. This creates endless opportunities for different brands to utilize Meta Ads, regardless of products and objectives.
Another important note about Meta is that it’s the main advertising platform for Meta, meaning it can launch and optimize ads across Meta’s ecosystem, including Instagram. That being said, an ad created by Meta (or Facebook Ads) can appear on both Facebook and Instagram, and even connected to WhatsApp and Threads.
Which One to Choose?
Now onto the main question, how to know which one to choose between Instagram Boost Post and Meta Ads (Facebook Ads)? Here’s the short answer: new brand uses Boost Post, established brand uses Meta Ads.
To explain further, new brands are still struggling to survive in the awareness marketing funnel, and for this, Boost Post is the best way to generate rapid account growth. The simple ad settings on Boost Post also help new business owners execute their marketing strategy quickly.
For the brands that have started going into consideration and conversion funnel marketing, you might need advanced ad settings with Meta. Here’s why Meta Ads might be the perfect answer to drive more interest, leads, and even sales:
- Comprehensive Ad Campaign Goals
When you decide on an ad goal, Meta would need to act on a specific algorithm to optimize your ad. For example, if your brand aims for more conversion through WhatsApp, Meta offers the Leads objective to connect your ads with WhatsApp to attract people to your contact. Unlike Boost Post which uses ‘1 ad 1 visual’, Meta allows you to use different graphic visuals for the same Ad Campaign/Objectives for further customization.
- Ad Customization Available
Being the parent company, Meta offers more varieties of ad placement, including both Facebook and Instagram. This enables business owners to have more freedom while also optimizing their ad performance. The ad customization also allows ad adjustment within the ad duration itself, such as graphic and caption changes, budget, and even audience.
- Precise Audience Targeting & Retargeting
Boost Post has enough audience targeting for simpler ad settings with age, gender, location, and basic interest categories, but Meta will be able to reach your preferred target market with broader interest options, detailed demographic, behavior, and spending.
Even more amazing, Meta has the most desirable ad setting for all digital marketers; retargeting. It can target the audiences that have interacted with your brand through website clicks or email subscribers, actively increasing more potential for said audience to make purchases.
- Advanced Tracking & Analytics
For the brands that heavily use websites, Meta offers a special feature known as The Facebook Pixel. It allows the Meta Ad Manager to track all the resulting leads from your ad, up to the website interactions and purchases. All these data are compiled automatically to optimize your next conversion ad.
Rely on An Expert in the Field
Optimizing social media is crucial for brands, either to increase brand awareness or even drive more purchases. For that, Facebook Ads and Instagram Ads are your best friends. It might look intimidating with all the advanced settings and money involvement, but it’s worth all the struggle when you see the followers increase on your account. Lacking time and/or energy to think about all the complicated ad stuff? Avond Studio will be happy to do all the the ads you want.
