151: Marketing Automation on a Budget: Crush It with Ads for Less than $10 a Day

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Welcome to the Course Creators MBA podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Destiny Kopp, and I help business owners increase the revenue with digital products and evergreen sales funnels. In this podcast, we go deep into product and marketing strategies for digital product creators. We cover everything from digital product creation, how to market and sell your digital products, and just as important, how to find your ideal customer. Let's jump right into our show.

And my special guest today is Amy Crane. Amy is a Facebook ads expert and has managed over 50 million in ad spend for clients and operates a six figure membership called Amplify. And she loves helping course creators get seen and get paid using Facebook ads. And I am, Amy, I am so excited to chat with you. Today we're going to be talking about how to use ads to automate your marketing on less than $10 a day. And that I can tell you right now that fits in with my budget. And I'm sure it fits into the budget with a lot of people who are listening. But before we get into all of the questions I have for you, can you tell the audience just a little bit more about you and how you help people?

Yeah. So like you said, I love helping people learn how to use Facebook ads, but in a way that's simple and doable and also to let people know that you can do this on a budget. When I started running Facebook ads for my own business, I started with $5 a day and it just like completely changed the trajectory of my business. Now Facebook ads have changed a little bit, so it's more like $10 a day. But I love helping and teach, have our Amplify membership where we also help and teach people how to get started with Facebook ads, really simple campaigns. It just, it doesn't have to be as complicated. I always say all these magic formulas are kind of a magic way to like, waste a lot of your money when it comes to Facebook ads. So it's really about keeping it simple and focusing on a few key, like, campaigns and strategies. And really anyone can do it to start growing their list and selling more of their digital courses and programs with ads.

And I think that's where we all are. We want to keep it simple and, you know, you know, easy to do. Because I think a lot of us, you know, even me included, and I used to be a Facebook ads manager, we think about, oh, it can, you know, it just seems complicated every time I go in there, like they've changed something, you know, and I'm like, where did that go? Right?

They're moving things right and one of the things I love to tell people when you go, and you probably know this too, since you ran ads, is when you go into Ads Managers, there's just like, all these buttons and columns and just things to push and click. But the truth is, like, 80% of it you don't need. Right? Like, there's only 20% of the features in Ads Manager do you actually really use and do you need to pay attention to? And most of it you can just ignore. So I think when you know, going in that, like, these are the things I need to pay attention to. These are the buttons I actually need to click, and I can ignore the rest. And it gets to be a lot easier, too.

Okay, so let's say we have somebody new to Facebook ads. They never started, they are on a budget. What would you say to them? What's the best place for them to get started?

Yeah, start building your list. I'm a big fan of building your list with Facebook ads because to me, it's an easy way to make sure you're getting your ads in front of the right people. Because we can control who we're targeting with our ads so we can make sure that they're being seen by the right people. And when you're growing your list and you're investing and growing your list, to me, that's really one of the number one assets in your business because, like, we don't own Facebook followers, we don't own Instagram followers, We don't own Facebook groups. And the algorithm can change and the rules can change, but when you have a list of people that you can build a relationship with, that's really the foundation of your business. And just starting with $10 a day, you know, you could add five people a day to your list, and by the end of the month, you've got. Oh, God, I'm going to have to do the math on that. Was that like 180 people on your list? Did I do that right?

Well, it's a lot. We know it's a lot. Yeah, it adds up.

Right? So when you go to sell your course or program, like, you actually have people to sell it to. Right.

And I will just say amen to that. I completely agree with you, Amy. You know, running the Facebook ads to grow your list is one of the best places to start.

So.

So what would you say? What should people do or think about or make sure they already have set up in their business before they start running those ads?

So I think the number one thing is you've got to be really clear on who your audience is and who you're talking to and who you're speaking to, because that's going to impact everything from your targeting to your messaging and what your actual offer is that you're promoting. So as long as you're clear on those pieces, you can start to grow your list. I started to grow my list. I was, I knew I was going to offer ads management services, but I was like, still trying to figure it out. But growing my list gave me the chance to get to know what people wanted and what they were looking for. And then I was able to create my offers around that. But like, I wasn't going straight for the sale. Right. I was getting people on my list first and building that relationship. But you've got to be really clear. I knew I wanted to work with like course creators and then I knew I could help them with ads, and so I was clear on that piece. So I think you've got to be really clear on that part.

So let's say that we know who our ideal audience is and we are ideal customer. What. And we want to build our list. What are you seeing? And I might be putting you on the spot here a little bit, so I apologize. What are you seeing that is working in terms of. Of list building? Kind of lead magnets type thing? Yeah.

I mean, so I am a big fan of just like lead magnets. Right. Checklists, swipe files, templates. The reason I love these types of offers is one, they work and they've been and they've worked for a long time. It's kind of one of those, like, core business strategies that I just feel like works really well. The other thing that I love about these offers is that when you're new to ads, they're not going to be as expensive to promote as something like a masterclass or webinar or even like a low ticket offer. So one of the biggest things I think people need to remember about ads is that the bigger the ask, the bigger the cost. And so that means you're going to need more budget. It's a. It takes a lot more budget to promote a low ticket offer compared to a freebie. So if you're just getting started and you don't have a big budget, start with the freebie because you can test your messaging, you can test what audiences work the best, and you can start to grow your list and then you can promote those other offers to your list. And then when you feel like you've got, if you've got a Low ticket offer that's working really well and you've got the budget, then you can absolutely start running ads to that. But it's often not the best place to start for someone that's new and getting started with ads just because it gets expensive fast.

So I love that. So just a regular lead magnet. Start with that. You don't even worry about the webinars or the masterclasses right now. Just regular PDF checklist templates, type thing. And I'm going to switch gears just a little bit because I know a lot of people who are listening. They may have run ads in the past, but they kind of stop doing them when all of the iOS updates and changes have. You know, I can put myself in that bucket, right? Really been doing that and I'm like, I think I need to start back into there. So can you tell us a little bit about what strategies are working now after, you know, all of those iOS updates? Hopefully it kind of like leveled out.

It was a bit of a roller coaster there for a while, wasn't it? I mean, things that were working and then Facebook, you know, we had all these extra steps we had to go through. So the good news is, I will say kind of post iOS updates 1. Facebook has rolled back some of those extra steps they added in, like verifying your domain and doing the aggregated event manager, which is like the worst name for something ever. Like, it just sounds more complicated than it needs to be. They've rolled back some of those things. So we're kind of back to setting up ads how we used to pre iOS updates. And I will also say that the cost, it was definitely a roller coaster there for a while and it was more expensive. And I think with all the changes to targeting, Facebook needed some time to sort it out. But I feel like now we're back at a place where I'm seeing cost that we used to see kind of pre iOS updates and ads are reporting better. So it's really kind of like we're getting back. But you know, with that being said, ads are always changing, right? There's always going to be a new feature, a new update. But I do think that that's why those core strategies like just focus on building your list, right? That's something that was consistent throughout all of the iOS updates and changes like that was one of the key strategies that just worked, right? Because once you've got people on your list, then you could promote those other things to them. So, yeah, so I think we're out of that. Like that iOS craziness now. So that's the good news.

Well, you've convinced me. I think I'm ready to kind of jump back in there after all of that craziness is gone. But I do want to kind of ask you about something because you talked about a little bit about the cost of ads and that's one of the things that we were seeing. Yeah. A year or two ago is it was crazy. I was trying to run webinar ads and I was having to pay like 10, $15. Right. Yeah, it was crazy. So what kind of return can we expect today if we're just doing maybe even just list building ads, which is what you suggest. And I agree with. Yeah.

So I think it, your return on ads is going to depend a lot on, you know, the offers and, and the funnels. And you don't even need a funnel.

Right.

But how many offers you're making to your list. So you may not immediately see a return on Facebook ads because you are just focused on growing your list and that's okay. But maybe you're growing your list because you know you're going to do a webinar in a couple of weeks. So you're building your list now and you can nurture that audience and build that relationship, knowing that when you go to do that masterclass to launch your course or program, you're going to have people to launch that course or program too. And so hopefully that's where you're going to see that ROI from the Facebook ad. So it may not always be an immediate ROI or return on ad spend. But if you do have those funnels with those offers in place, you know, it could be anything from like a tripwire where maybe you're just trying to break even on your ads or maybe you've got higher ticket offers in there where you're seeing like a 2, 3, 4 return on ad spend. I will say that when it comes to return on ad spend, my biggest piece of advice is really look at the long term impact of Facebook ads. So someone joins your list now and they may not buy right away, but maybe they do buy two or three months down the road. So what does that long term return on adspen? Of course that immediate return on admin is important, but what's it also look like kind of longer term for your business and the impact that it has on your business?

And kind of what I'm getting from this conversation is we need to always be list building. If we are always list building, then we're going to have that audience to sell tell to which will increase our return going down forward. So let's talk about, let's say, you know, people are ready to jump on board. They're ready to, you know, start those list building ads. Can you talk about any things that they need to avoid or maybe mistakes? Mistakes that you see people making that are new to this?

Yeah, of course. So, I mean, the first one is just make sure you're following, like Facebook ad policy, right? So we've got to be really careful not to break any of the rules. Like weight loss claims and income claims can be really tricky. So you can't tell people they're going to make, you know, 100k in 90 days. Like, we can't make promises like that. Right. So we've got to be really careful that we're not breaking any rules. But really the biggest thing that I find is that when you start ads, and this is kind of a post iOS update thing, is that it does take ads a little bit longer to optimize now. So you may notice that your ads are really, really slow. Like, I started some masterclass ads a couple of weeks ago and I was just like, nothing's happening with these ads. Like, no one's clicking. I'm not getting any signups. But after like day two or day three, it started to pick up and those leads started to come in and the cost started to come down. It can just take your ads a little bit of time to make sure you're giving them enough time to optimize. And if your ads are slow in the beginning, that's okay. You're probably not going to see leads pouring in right away. Facebook needs some time to get your ads into the feed and figure out who who to get them in front of. The other thing I will say is that creative has always been important, but one of the other big shifts with the iOS updates is our targeting is a lot more broad now. We just lost some of the targeting features we used to have. And in general, Facebook, we find that Facebook works better when we use, like, really big, really broad audiences. And so it's even more important now that you're creative is very clear who this offer is for. So having text on your images that like, clearly calls out who you're talking to, what this offer is for, who it's for, that's really going to be the most important part of your copy. People are going to see your image or your creative people are going to see your image first. That's what's going to get them to stop Scrolling and then your copy. Right. Will be the next important part. But you can add as much text as you want. Now we don't have the 20% rule anymore, but we find that adding really clear text to make sure that we're getting the right people to click because targeting is a lot more broad now. So don't, don't be afraid to add a lot of text. Readable text. Right. To.

Yeah, well, I think that's a really good tip because there used to be a lot of restrictions. I would have ads get declined when they got such a text on there.

I know. And sometimes I was like, that's not text Facebook. And they had the text tool. You have to upload your image and see if it was too much or, you know, yeah, it was a pain. But now they, they don't have that. So we can have as much text as we want.

Those are some great tips. Now, Amy, do you have any last minute tips or things you just want to mention before we wrap it up here?

Yeah, I will just say, you know, with Facebook ads, I think, you know, I know we've talked a lot about list building, but I really believe that that is like the best place to start. It's going to be the easiest place to start, the easiest campaign to run, the easiest campaign to don't feel like because you're not spending a ton on your Facebook ads and you're not running these complicated campaigns that they're not going to work. This is really one of those, like key, like foundational pieces of your business. So if you do just spend $10 a day on this, I can guarantee that you will start to see that traction in your business. So don't feel like you've got to spend a lot on your ads because Facebook is going to reward you for how good your ad is, not how much you're spending. So if you've got a great ad, you've got a great offer. Facebook is going to show your ad to more people and hopefully that means your cost is going to be a little bit lower. But it's not going to be because, you know, you don't need to spend a ton of money on your ads to get those results.

Amy, can you let people know where they can find you? And I believe you have a free gift for them also.

Yeah, of course they can find me@amycrane.com and I've got some free ad templates. Those are actually, they're on the homepage too. So if you hop over to amycrane.com they're right there. And this is where I just break down a couple of my best performing ads that I've used to promote webinars, workshops. My freebies grow my membership. So I break down the images that I use, the copy that I use, you can see what these ads look like, and then you can use that to go and create your own ads. And there's some other goodies that I also give you along the way too. So. Yeah.

And Amy, I believe you have a membership. Can you tell people a little bit more about that membership and how you support people who have courses or memberships that they want to promote via Facebook ads?

Yeah. So our Amplify membership is probably where I spend the most time, and it's really perfect. I created Amplify for beginners for anyone getting started with Facebook ads and on a budget. So we really walk you through how to set up these really simple campaigns step by step. So it's not overwhelming. My whole goal is just to make it really simple. And then every month we also, my favorite part is we give. We drop new campaign assets and content to help you create your Facebook ads. So sometimes it's new ad images, sometimes it's opt in page templates, sometimes it's tripwire templates. So tons of cool stuff that you'll get every month to help you create gorgeous Facebook ads that you're excited to get out into the newsfeed.

Amy, thank you so much for joining us today and kind of giving us the lowdown on where Facebook's are. Where Facebook ads are today.

Yeah, thank you so much for having me. I love chatting with ads and this has been so much fun. Thank you.

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