what is the facebook pixel?
What is the facebook pixel, it is also known informally as the Facebook retargeting pixel, is a snippet of code you can insert into the back end of your website. Like other tags, it helps drive and decode key performance metrics generated by a particular platform. Specifically, the Facebook Pixel helps businesses with a Facebook page determine and improve the ROI from the world’s biggest social network. Here’s how…
the capabilities of the facebook pixel
The Facebook Pixel can track and boost ROI for businesses on the platform, but so can a lot of tools. Before going into more detail, let’s nail down exactly what the Facebook Pixel can do:
use the pixel to build custom audiences
This is one of Facebook’s most powerful targeting capabilities. Instead of building your audience with the social network’s self-serve ad tool, you have the option to let the Facebook Pixel do it for you. It makes the whole process faster, easier. But even better, it adds to the effectiveness of your advertising campaigns too.
These audiences aren’t defined by demographics or interests; they’re created from people who have engaged with the page that your pixel is on:
As a result, they’re more relevant than anything you could build from a general group of Facebook users. They’re people who have already shown an interest in your business.
use the pixel to build lookalike audiences
Custom audiences are great — tailored and relevant. But what about when you want to expand your reach beyond the ones visiting your website?
That’s what Lookalike Audiences are for. By installing the Facebook retargeting pixel, you can use your custom audiences as a starting point for new audiences that Facebook will automatically generate to be similar to the original.
That means instead of making an educated guess to create a new targeting group, you can reach ideal prospects like the ones in your custom audience, and you can do it faster than ever.
use the pixel to track and improve conversions
If there’s one fundamental reason that all Facebook advertisers should use a Facebook pixel, it’s to track conversions. Installing one on key landing pages will inform you of who’s converting, which pages they’re visiting, and how much ROI your campaigns are delivering.
That way, you’ll have data to inform next steps for improvement, like a hypothesis for A/B testing. At the test’s conclusion, you’ll have a better idea of which tactics are working and which aren’t.
use the Facebook pixel for remarketing
The Facebook Pixel is versatile. It can:
- Enhance relevance by serving ads to custom audiences made up of visitors to your website.
- Boost ad reach by creating audiences from a custom audience of website visitors.
- Track key performance metrics that matter to your business.
- Improve conversions on key landing pages.
Looking at all those together with the eyes of an advertiser, you’re probably thinking, “the Facebook Pixel is one of the most powerful retargeting tools on the internet.” And you’re right.
a quick retargeting refresher
Chances are you know the idea behind retargeting, but there’s no harm in a refresher…
When prospects arrive at your website for the first time, they’re probably not going to buy what you’re selling. Heck, they might not even download an ebook or claim a consultation even if it’s free.
What they’ll do is probably abandon your page and do some more research, maybe wait around for a better offer from somewhere else…
And at some point they might return to your website of their own accord. Or maybe they won’t.
But as an advertiser you don’t want to leave that decision to chance. In a time when people are busier than ever, you want to stay top-of-mind with an ad that says “Hey, remember that course you were thinking about purchasing? Come check it out again.”
That’s retargeting, also known as remarketing. With the Facebook retargeting pixel, you can serve dynamic ads to audiences who take actions that indicate they’re interested in your products and services. It works like this:
how the facebook retargeting pixel works
For the Facebook retargeting pixel to work, it needs to be installed on the back-end of all the relevant pages you want to track, create audiences, and remarket with. If you’re using Facebook ads to drive visitors to a click-through landing page where you sell a course, you might want to install it on that page, the following checkout page, and the “thank you” page after that. Here’s why:
Generally, you’ll have three different groups of people to track in this campaign:
- Group 1: People who click through to your landing page but don’t progress to the sales page. These people will click on your ad, evaluate your landing page, and decide they’re not ready to buy. The Facebook Pixel on that page will add them to an audience that you can target with a tailored Facebook ad that attempts to draw them back to that landing page.
- Group 2: People who click through the landing page to the sales page but don’t submit a payment. These are people who liked the idea of your course but got spooked by the credit card field on the next page. The Facebook pixel on the checkout page will add these people to an audience as well. You can target them with a dynamic Facebook ad that attempts to draw them back to the checkout page. You know these people are further down in the funnel, so maybe a small discount or one-time-offer will push them over the edge to your “thank you” page.
- Group 3: People who make it all the way through the checkout process to your “thank you” page. The Facebook pixel on your “thank you” page will add its visitors to another list, which you can exclude from your other targeting groups to ensure you’re not reaching people with Facebook ads for an offer they’ve already claimed. You can also create an entirely new campaign to cross-sell them on another course or add-on, or even use this group to create a lookalike audience of your ideal customer to find more people likely to purchase your product or service.
And maybe the best part about it all is that it’s done automatically. Once you’ve implanted the Facebook retargeting pixel on your relevant landing pages, audiences will be continuously updated as people visit different pages.
An audience will be targeted with ads to return to your checkout page until they proceed past the checkout page to the “thank you” page. Once they’ve done that, they’ll be added to a new group of people receiving ads for add-ons and other offers.
all this from one pixel?
If you’ve been an advertiser on Facebook for an extended period of time, you’ll remember the days when you needed two different pixels to do all this. There was the conversion pixel, and the custom audience pixel and each had its own job:
how to install your pixel?
You need to go to your Facebook advertising dashboard and there is detailed steps and videos. Got no time? Get us to do it for you. Contact us today for online lead generations.
