Facebook provides a way to demographically target users with adverts. These adverts gets displayed on various parts of Facebook as users go about their daily sheep throwing and wall writing.
Why is this interesting? Well, because you can produce and target adverts delivered to Facebook users across the United States. You also get to review the impact that your advert is having. Read on to find out how..
As an example, consider the two ad campaigns I currently have running. One reads "Have you voted yet?", with the sub caption "If you don't vote, you don't get to moan about the result" - and one reading "Don't ban Gay Marriage" with a subcaption "Vote no on proposition 8".
You can also add a small picture to these adverts (and I recommend that you do). My first campaign has a picture of Bush & McCain hugging, while my second one is the standard noonprop8.com banners.
To get started, go to http://www.facebook.com/... (assuming you're logged into you Facebook account), and follow the pretty straight forward instructions.
Some hints:
- Target your adverts. If you want to raise awareness that a NO vote on Proposition 8 is the way to support gay marriage, target people who live in California! Likewise, aim for the battleground states in GOTV campaigns.
- Choose CPM instead of CPC payment type. You care about getting a large number of views - clicks are less interesting (and typically you get more bang for your buck with CPM with a well designed advert)
- Set a daily budget (you can do this inside Facebook Ads as part of the setup). Mine is currently $100 a day, that buys me 200.000 views of my two campaigns (and > 200 clicks!)
- Run your campaign from now until Nov 4th. It sucks to forget to turn it off and get charged for useless adverts.
And BE CREATIVE! This is an awesome way to reach the demographic you think can make this election the decider we want it to be!
If you want more practical advice, please comment with questions and I'll answer as we go.