Facebook won an election. It can grow your business too.
In a recent 60 Minutes interview, Brad Parscale, digital director for the Trump campaign, discussed that Facebook played a major role in the president’s win last November. Let’s take a look at a couple factors on how he did it and apply it to our own businesses as manufacturers and dealers.
Social advertising vs. traditional
“Facebook now lets you get to places and places possibly that you would never go with TV ads. Now, I can find, you know, 15 people in the Florida Panhandle that I would never buy a TV commercial for,” said Parscale. In today’s world, consumers spend over 50 percent of their time consuming digital media, yet dealers spend less than 20 percent of their budgets on digital media. Why? We are stuck in our old-school ways of thinking, all the way down to our co-op programs. Because of the lower cost, Parscale was able to reach an audience and get them to get out and vote. These are things that changed the election and can change your business. Parscale said Trump asked him what he was working on one day and pointed at the TV and says, “This is what I believe wins a campaign” and Trump continued “I don’t believe in this mumbo-jumbo digital stuff” However Trump did change his view around once he saw the power of digital advertising.
Targeted advertising
During the election, Parscale changed his target audience based off of how well his digital advertising was performing. How? As he and the Trump team forecasted the states they would win easily, like Ohio, they quit advertising in Ohio and took the entire budget and shifted it to Michigan, a critical swing state for the Republican Party. In our own advertising, Facebook gives you the ability to hyper focus on your targeted buyers and run multiple campaigns, driving leads directly into your CRM. You can understand what is working and what doesn’t convert. You can create ads for your entry level Runabout boats and market them to those with an income between $50,000 and $125,000 and advertise your yachts to those with incomes over $500,000 a year. This is just one example of the power of Facebook’s data and ability to target.
Today, consumers spend over one hour a day on Facebook. Is your budget geared to where your prospects spend the majority of their time? As you prepare your 2018 marketing budget, are you allocating your funds to win more buyers? There is a multitude of ways to advertise and reach people, but Facebook gives you the opportunity to market to them where they spend their time in a way that connects to them via targeted advertisements. The recent Trump campaign illustrated how powerful Facebook advertising can be with targeting and winning custom audiences. Are you ready to leverage Facebook advertising to reach your ideal customers and gain more qualified buyers to improve your revenue?
Stahl, Lesley. “Facebook ‘Embeds,” Russia and the Trump Campaign’s Secret Weapon.” CBS News, CBS Interactive, Oct. 9 2017, www.cbsnews.com/news/facebook-embeds-russia-and-the-trump-campaigns-secret-weapon.
Jim Jabaay is the vice president of LotVantage, a digital marketing company for dealerships and original equipment manufacturers. LotVantage specializes in posting dealer inventory to Craigslist, eBay and driving engagement on social media on behalf of their customers. Visit lotvantage.com or call 1-888-569-3865
