The Question

I’m about to put an ad on Facebook targeting men 25 to 50 years old in the Chicago area to download my eBook. What is your advice on creating the ad itself? What type of copy is best? What type of image is best? Any framework you could provide? I would greatly appreciate it.

My Answer

Maybe you could give me some context, tell me what the guide is about? When we talked at Maximum Lawyer, you were talking about collaborative divorce and divorce with dignity. 

If you could give me the topic of your cheat sheet, then I could probably give you a better ad. But let’s say it’s on that topic. If you want to put out a guide that teaches Fathers — you said “targeting men 25 to 50 years old in Chicago.” 

How An Ad Is Put Together

At the top of the ad, the first thing you always want to do is to call out the demographics and the types of people that you’re targeting. So, if you can picture an ad, what you would have is the very top line of the ad. You have the picture or the video or whatever it is. 

Above that, you have all the website copy. And the first line of the website copy is one of the most important parts and basically a headline. So with that headline, you want to call out the types of people that you’re targeting and you want to address. 

How To Start Your Ads

Either include the problem or the solution that you’re offering. So my stuff always starts with “Hey lawyers, are you tired of not getting clients from social media?” or “Hey lawyers, have you tried social media marketing in the past and it hasn’t worked?”

So you can use, “Hey fathers, here’s how…” So if it’s a child custody thing, you can say, “Hey Fathers, here’s how you can achieve this goal.” For example, “Hey Fathers, here’s how you can ensure that you get as much time with your kids as you want without having a battle with your ex.” 

Or, “Here’s how Fathers all over Chicago are spending more time with their kids and fighting less with their ex-spouses.” You just call out what they want — and I love how-to-without statements. 

I’m like a broken record with these how-to-without statements, but the how-to-without statement is always how to — insert the thing they want, without — insert the thing they fear. That’s the first thing that I would do. 

About The Image

So I’ll do that and then I’ll have an image. Make sure it’s a highly contrasting image. If you want, you can take a picture, or you can even use stock photos. You can take a picture of the guide, you can take a picture of a father and a son, or a father and a daughter. 

Just get creative with the pictures. Upload the photo into Canva and make sure that it’s really contrasty. Then boost the contrast, boost the saturation, and drop the blur. And those are just settings. You’ll be able to click it just on the top of Canva. That will make your image really vivid and really pop. Then export it and use that picture.

And then in the headline, you do the same type of thing. You want to call out the people and a benefit or a solution to a problem. That’s one of the best ways, one of the best formats to do it. 

How To Find The Best Versions Of The Ad

And then I always run 9 or 10 different ads and I test combinations. So, I test the exact same ad, that is the same picture, the same headline, but a different first line in that copy. 

I’ll do like three different first lines in the copy. And then I’ll test the same copy and the same headline and I’ll do three different pictures. And then I’ll test the same copy and the same picture, and then I’ll test three different headlines at the bottom. 

And then you can even go as far as testing different buttons because you can do “Download” or “Learn More” or “Sign Up” or different things like that. 

Actually, if you use a picture, you can get rid of the button and you can have a bigger headline as well. So, there’s so much different stuff you can test with a Facebook ad, but the format is pretty similar. 

Basically, call the people out and call out the desire or the problem that they have. That’s one of the most important things you can do, and the free guide should be the answer to or the solution to the problem that they’re having.

So, hopefully, that helps. And once you have set your ad up, if you want, throw it in the group and I’ll critique it for you.