Whilst the majority of my work as a Facebook ads strategist is focused on online course launches, I do serve a handful of e-commerce clients as well and their ads strategy and approach is somewhat different from online course providers.

Every so often I get questions about e-commerce ads and whether List Building is a good strategy for them in terms of Facebook ads.

Whilst I think list building is a good strategy for any business, sometimes e-commerce businesses can skip the list building step and use Facebook ads to sell their product straight away.

In this post I’m going to address the 3 Steps to getting started with Facebook ads in your e-commerce business.

1: Install your Facebook pixel

One of the first recommendations I would make is to install your Facebook pixel on your website, making sure it tracks your homepage but also ‘add to cart’ and ‘purchases’.

Most e-commerce websites offer instructions on how to install your pixel so that it tracks all of these things.

Here are some instructions for:

• Shopify
• Woocommerce
• Bigcommerce
• Neto

2: Have a product that converts

To get the most out of Facebook ads you need to have a product that already sells.

If your product is new and you haven’t sold anything yet you can still use Facebook ads but you may not get the results you want. The first time you run Facebook ads you will get a whole lot of marketing research data that you can use to optimise your business and make improvements so that your product will convert.

Often the first round, or first few rounds, of Facebook advertising need to be considered a marketing research exercise and I urge you not to expect too much from the results but rather learn from the data that Facebook gives you.

Once your product converts, you can get more innovative and put money towards selling more.

There’s one thing I want you to remember here. If your product doesn’t yet convert, Facebook ads isn’t going to fix this. You’ll need to find out why people aren’t buying first and fix that issue before spending money on Facebook ads.

3: Amplify sales with Facebook Ads

Once you have  product that people are already buying, even without Facebook ads, you can amplify your sales by putting your offer in front of more people.

Facebook ads can amplify your sales, it can’t fix conversion rates so it’s extremely important that you have done the conversion work first. Your product needs to sell already, otherwise you’ll be met with disappointing results and you’ll have wasted money.

So, where do I start?

The first step really is to install your pixel, even if you don’t plan to advertise yet. This pixel is going to ‘track’ everyone who visits your site and thanks to Facebook’s elaborate data you can use this pixel tracking in the future by asking Facebook to find more people who are already viewing your website or buying your products. The pixel is definitely the most important first step.

If you’re not sure what a pixel is and why you need it, refer back to my Facebook ads pixel series for more information.

The next steps depend on where you are at in your business. Are you new or have you already sold your product through your online store?

Remember, Facebook ads can amplify your sales but it can’t fix a sales problem.

If you do have a sales problem, I recommend working with a marketing expert to identify what the issue is and how you can fix it. Once it’s fixed you can go back to Facebook ads and amplify your sales.

At the moment I service a small number of e-commerce clients through advertising management and have some openings coming up soon. If you want to know how I can help your e-commerce business with Facebook ads, please get in touch.