Facebook Marketing Playbook

Facebook Marketing
in 2015:
Building Success for Content
Without Free Distribution
What the recent changes to the Newsfeed
algorithm mean for your marketing.

CitizenNet delivers patented technology for audience targeting
and media optimization proven to double social media advertising results
Facebook Marketing in 2015:
Successful Content Strategies Without Free Distribution 2
Early Days
Congratulations! By reading this you
are placing yourself in the vanguard of
Facebook marketing. According to,
Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg speaking at
last year’s Preferred Marketing Developer’s
Summit, we are still in “Early Days” of
marketing and advertising on social media
and the best is yet to come.
Early Days are always tumultuous and
Facebook marketing was experienced
it’s share of upheaval. The last 12 months
witnessed a dramatic shift from reaching
fans for free to the elimination of organic
distribution for promotional messages.
Change creates opportunity and smart
marketers are adapting to the changes
in Facebook to create unique strategies
and tactics for direct response campaigns
while using different techniques for brand
engagement. This guide will give you
actionable insights for accomplishing both
these objectives in 2015.
Facebook continues to be a revolutionary
platform for marketers and the recent
changes promise to only make it more
effective for those advertisers taking
advantage of all it has to offer. CitizenNet is
committed to giving you the tools you need
to create meaningful connections between
consumers and brands, leveraging the
insights available through social media. This
guide is dedicated to you.
“Together, we will build
the future of success with
Facebook marketing and
social advertising.”

Evolution of
Facebook’s
Newsfeed
Since the beginning, Facebook’s guiding
principle has been to continually improve
the user experience. Since the Newsfeed
became the central Facebook element in
2006, a better user experience is largely
defined as more relevant and engaging
content in the Newsfeed.
Although Facebook
does allow promotional
and commercial content
in the Newsfeed, it is
designed to be more
relevant to consumers
than the advertisements
on other sites. This is why Facebook
provides advertisers with access to so much
data for targeting the right message to
the right audience. It is also why Facebook
makes it easy for users to understand
and have control over adjusting their own
targetable interests.
As the platform has evolved, Facebook
marketing strategies have moved with it.
Originally, companies asked customers to
“Like” them on Facebook so they could
continue to reach them for free whenever
they posted. As more companies joined
Facebook, Newsfeed inventory became
scarece and Brands tried to trick Facebook’s
Newsfeed algorithm into delivering more
reach by asking their fans to Like, Share, and
Click on posts, hoping to show Facebook
that their content was engaging and worth
spreading. Ultimately,
brands tried to trick their
fans by creating posts that
were really ads, disguised
as content.
In a recent focus group,
Facebook brought
in a number of users
to learn more about their experience
using Facebook. When asked what
percentage of their Newsfeed was ads they
overwhelmingly agreed “At Least Half.”
Interestingly, Facebook knew definitively
that less than 10% of the Newsfeed items for
these users were paid advertisements. The
glut of commercial messages masquerading
When asked what
percentage of their
Newsfeed was ads the
users overwhelmingly
agreed “At Least Half.”

as content from brand pages
and publishers, was hurting the
user experience.
It’s no surprise that Facebook
began restricting commercial
content. Forcing companies to
buy advertising for commercial
messages has two positive
outcomes. The first is that
obviously, Facebook generates
revenue, which keeps the
site operating as a valuable
marketing channel. The second
is that it allows Facebook to
control the number and quality
of ads that users see.
This is a great thing! Limiting
inventory means that fewer ads
get more attention. Control
over advertising messages
means that Facebook can
penalize advertisers that fail to
leverage user data for targeting
relevant prospects.
The evolution of Facebook’s
Newsfeed to a paid advertising
platform is a good thing for
advertisers and users.
The King is
Dead - Long
Live the King
As of September 2014, 71%
of online adults in the US use
Facebook regularly and for 18-
49 year olds its 80%. Clearly
the cultural impact of Social
Networking in general and
Facebook in specific cannot be
denied.
The recent eliminations of
free distribution is no reason
for marketers to ignore the
platform altogether. As
described in the section above,
these changes will improve
the effectiveness of Facebook
advertising moving forward.
As Facebook evolves, it’s
worth noting some of the
unique capabilities that make it
valuable for marketers to keep
pace with the changes.
Customer Data
There is no other platform
where customers so willingly
Facebook and Brand Reaction Timeline
2006
Facebook
Launches
Newsfeed
2007
Facebook
Launches
Brand
Pages
2011
Facebook Launches Storefronts
and Ads on Right Hand Rail
2010
Facebook launches Timeline and
changes the look of Newsfeed
2012
Facebook
launches
Newsfeed Ads
Brands see better response rates to Newsfeed ads. Create
posts to promote products/services via newsfeed. Posts
with engagement get more reach. Encourage Liking,
Clicking & sharing contant for reach
March
2013
Facebook launches
Newsfeed Redesign with
larger Photos for Ads
2014 2015
Sept
2009
Facebook
Launches AutoPlay
Video in Newsfeed
Facebook restricts
posts with “Spammy
Links,” to pages with
ads and “Like Bait”
Brands receive additional
reach by tagging other
brands
Brands begin
video posts in
Newsfeed
Dec
Facebook promotes high quality content and
news posts. Resurfaces older posts with current
engagement. Restricts Meme photo posts
April
Facebook bans “Like Gating” special
content available only to page fans
Aug
Facebook restricts
commerical posts
from brands
Nov
Facebook further
restricts “promotional”
posts that resemble ads
JanFeb
2008
-Brands seek “Fans” driving page likes.
Posts reach most of their fans. Contests/
Promotions drive more fans and reward
engagement
Brands buy ads to build fans. Promote
products to Fans and “Friends of
Fans” with ads on Right Hand Rail

and frequently share such a high volume
of information about themselves. This is
information that savvy marketers can use
for customer research and insights as well
as prospect targeting and segmentation.
There are quite literally thousands of
different attributes and dimensions which
marketers can use to slice the marketplace,
leveraging demographics, behaviors,
interests, and even third party data to see
psychographic profiles and offline behavior.
Audience Targeting
In addition to niche targeting with
Facebook’s data, companies have many
other targeting options available on
Facebook that exist no where else. Offline
businesses can target customer lists by
uploading “Custom Audiences” built from
CRM databases and matched against
Facebook’s user profiles in a completely
privacy-safe way. Online businesses can re-
target site visitors or cart abandoners with
images of the items they shopped for or
even show different color variations. Both
of these audience groups can be expanded
using Lookalike audience modeling based
on Facebook user data. No other platform
offers so many powerful and flexible
targeting options for advertisers.
High-Impact Creative
The Newsfeed is the focus of all user activity
on Facebook and this is where ads appear.
Eye tracking studies prove advertising
resistant customers often ignore the edges
of websites where ads live, but Facebook
solves this by inserting ads directly within
content. Facebook offers long headlines,
lengthy descriptions and clickable links all
surrounding large beautiful images or even
video. Few advertising environments can
rival Facebook for the quality of the ad unit
and the integration within the content users
care most about. On most mobile devices
the ads completely fill the screen making
them even more powerful.
Mobile Penetration
US consumers spend more smartphone
time on Facebook than the next 10 activities
COMBINED. That includes YouTube, Google
Search, Google Maps, Yelp - everything! In
fact, 17% of all time on the mobile web in
the US is spent on Facebook. On average,
Facebook users spend 37 minutes per

day on the platform and 60% of that time
is mobile. Because this is spread across
approximately 17 visits per day, it creates
a huge opportunity for business to reach
consumers on the go while shopping, etc.
Facebook leverages user identity so it’s
easy to understand how interactions in
mobile impact purchases on desktop.
Identity Across Channels
Facebook offers a unique opportunity for
Cross Channel attribution. Over 13 Million
websites and Apps use the Facebook
Integrated Login, including more than 35%
of the websites for the Fortune 500. This
means Facebook can gather user behavioral
data from apps and sites visited outside of
Facebook.
Most of the activity on Mobile devices
exists within an app. Facebook is the only
platform that can do what cookies cannot,
link consumer behavior across mobile
applications, mobile browsing and then
connect that back to activity on a different
device like a laptop -- all using Facebook
identity as the link.
Identity allows for message sequencing and
other unique advertising opportunities that
only Facebook can provide.
Despite the frustrating loss of free
distribution to page fans, Facebook remains
a powerful marketing channel for 2015
because of it’s unique capabilities with
user data, audience targeting, high quality
creative, mobile impact, and cross channel
attribution.
Regardless of the volatility in the channel,
marketers must adapt and learn how to use
this powerful platform.
“Over 13 Million websites
and apps use the Facebook
Integrated Login, including
more than 35% of the
websites for the Fortune
500. ”

How-To: a
Roadmap for
Facebook Success
in 2015
To succeed with Facebook in 2015, social
media marketers must adapt to changes
within the platform. Companies must have
two separate and distinct sets of strategies,
one for promotional campaigns and another
for brand campaigns.
In the past a concert venue could see great
success sharing a video post of a well
known artist backstage, using the copy to
invite users to click through and buy tickets
to an upcoming show. Moving forward
this type of post will receive virtually zero
exposure, selling few tickets
Instead, this same marketer should now
share the video with the fans of their page
to cement their brand position as the best
place to see live music and use a separate
post targeted to a specific audience
segment, supported with advertising, to
promote the sale of tickets.
In the next two sections we will review
key Strategies and Tactics for success on
Facebook in 2015, taking into account all the
recent changes and different promotional
and brand oriented objectives.
Promotional
Campaigns on
Facebook
2015 is the year many marketers will begin
to make serious investments in advertising
on Facebook. In the past, these same
marketers saw large volumes of traffic and
some conversions from Facebook’s free
distribution of content. Moving forward,
marketers must support their commercial
“In 2015, companies must
have two separate and
distinct sets of strategies”

messaging with advertising budgets forcing
these campaigns to be more accountable.
In building a framework for success, it is
important to understand the appropriate
use-case for paid advertising on Facebook,
as well as building an appreciation for
the best combinations of messaging and
targeting.
When to use Promotional Campaigns
on Facebook
In light of the latest restrictions Facebook
is placing on “promotional” content, any
campaign that is encouraging consumers
to engage with a company for business
purposes should be considered Promotional.
Most companies engage in social media
for the purpose of generating revenue. As
such, most campaigns should be considered
Promotional moving forward.
Truly altruistic campaigns (sharing tips and
tricks that don’t push products for sale,
sharing humorous or instructional videos,
sharing inspirational quotes, etc.) fall into
Brand Building. We will discuss these types
of campaigns in the next section.
A Framework for Success with
Promotional Campaigns
Before spending any advertising dollars,
it’s important that social media marketers
clearly define their objectives and the
Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) that
will serve as the measures of success.
Additionally they must solidify the targeting
and messaging strategies they will use to
accomplish these objectives.
For most advertisers, objectives will
include some type of conversion, whether
it’s a checkout or an offline action on an
eCommerce site. This is different from the
previous generation of Facebook campaigns
which measured success in engagement;
tracking likes, shares, video views,
comments or referral traffic. Although these
may be good leading indicators, the next
generation of campaigns must ultimately be
accountable for a conversion that can lead
to revenue in order to justify the cost of the
media.
The ultimate measure of success for most
promotional campaigns is revenue, but
some companies may have a long sales

cycle, or rely on customer lifetime value
(CLTV) as a better measure of profitability.
In these instances, it is important to
structure KPIs that are strongly correlated
to revenue and high CLTV. CitizenNet
generally recommends a balanced score-
card approach that builds in KPIs from
across the customer journey. Typical
scorecards might include efficient CPMs,
strong Click Through Rates (CTR) and some
measure of the quality of the traffic, like on-
page conversion for landing pages (whether
lead forms or eCommerce).
It is important to note that Facebook’s
auction is different from Google’s. As such,
Optimized CPM (oCPM) bidding is almost
always preferable to a Cost Per Click (CPC)
model for ultimately driving conversions.
For a detailed discussion on this, please
review CitizenNet’s blog post Facebook
Bid Optimization for Direct Response
Advertisers.
Strategies and Tactics for Promotional
Campaigns.
Facebook offers a full toolbox of options
for driving success with promotional
campaigns. Picking the right tactics is vital
for success.
Core Audience Targeting: Perhaps the
simplest strategy is to target an existing
core audience of fans, custom audiences
or fans of competitor pages. This is a
perfect strategy for building CLTV, selling
new products to existing customers or
conquesting a competitor’s customers.
These groups often demonstrate strong
response rates, although the reach is
somewhat limited. See below for tips
on expanding these audiences without
sacrificing response rates.
Custom Audience Targeting and
Retargeting: Facebook stands alone in
it’s ability to leverage existing customer
lists for ongoing targeting. Using custom
audiences, marketers can upload an existing
CRM database or email list and target these
customers with new offers. These lists can
be segmented to only inactive customers or
“The ultimate measure
of success for most
promotional campaigns is
revenue”

perhaps leads that never converted. In the
same way, marketers can import other lead
list acquired through different marketing
activities. With only an email address or a
phone number, Facebook can match target
lists to users in a completely anonymous,
privacy-safe way.
Retargeting works in a similar fashion,
except the custom audience is generated
dynamically based on site visitors. Using a
re-targeting vendor, eCommerce advertisers
can target users with dynamic creative
reflecting items in a cart, different sizes and
colors or recommended accessories / items
frequently purchased together.
Lookalike Targeting: Facebook Lookalike
Targeting was developed specifically to
expand upon a known high value audience.
Based on any of the audiences above,
marketers can use a simple slider interface
to reach more users that resemble this
known audience. Obviously finding users
who resemble high value customers is a
strong targeting strategy. Unfortunately,
Facebook’s Lookalike targeting is somewhat
opaque and it’s unclear which attributes and
dimensions Facebook is using to identify
and target Lookalikes, so its not always easy
to repeat or expand.
Audience Expansion: Using Facebook’s
Audience Insights Tool (or some targeting
technology like CitizenNet’s Predicted
Affinity Audience targeting), brands are
able to expand upon their core audiences
in a more transparent and repeatable
way than what is available with Lookalike
targeting. For a robust discussion of how
to use Facebook’s Audience Insights Tool,
see CitizenNet’s Whitepaper ”The Facebook
Audience Planning and Purchasing
Playbook” this download includes Excel
worksheets for identifying new audience
segments for expansion, as well as
budgeting tools for planning media to reach
these audiences.
Reach and Frequency: Facebook’s ability
to limit frequency is unique among online
platforms. Reach and Frequency buys
ensure high penetration and awareness with
“Facebook stands alone
in it’s ability to leverage
customer lists for targeting.”

a specific audience and can be applied to
any of the targeting strategies discussed
above (as long as the audience is at least
1 Million Monthly Active Users). For a
detailed discussion of Reach and Frequency
buying on Facebook and Best Practices see
CitizenNet’s Blog Post Facebook Reach and
Frequency Buying.
Messaging Strategy and Creative: Facebook
is the world’s largest real-time focus group,
and can provide insights for messaging
strategy across media channels. Facebook’s
built in tools or those available through a
media buying platform allow marketers to
see engagement with promotional posts
(ads). The volume of likes, shares and
comments can be a strong indication of the
quality of the message and how well it is
received by the target audience segment.
Many 3rd party tools (like CitizenNet)
can even provide sentiment analysis, with
insights on how positively or negatively
the target audience is reacting to a specific
message.
It is important to remember Promotional
campaigns are different from Brand
Oriented or engagement campaigns
your company may have executed in
the past. Promotional Posts supported
with advertising budgets should be non-
published / dark posts and considered
ad units. As such, traditional advertising
principles are important. Strong headlines
with a Unique Value Proposition highlighting
a product’s specific benefit to this target
audience are crucial. Powerful images (or
videos) help promotional posts leap out of
the Newsfeed and grab the users attention.
Or course, a strong call to action is essential
to stimulate a response.
Testing and Optimization: Ongoing
optimization is the key to driving efficiency
with any media. Facebook offers so many
unique variables for testing and optimization
that many marketers rely on some type
of technology platform, like CitizenNet, to
analyze and optimize ongoing campaigns.
Testing Mobile vs. Desktop, different
images, headlines, targeting criteria, etc.
“Promotional Posts
supported with advertising
should be considered ad
units.”

all lead to performance improvements. It
is essential that marketers continue to test
and modify their targeting as well as their
messaging to drive the best results with
Facebook promotional campaigns.
Brand Building on
Facebook in 2015
Given the recent changes to Facebook’s
Newsfeed, what should brands do with
their pages? As discussed in the previous
section, they should no longer look to their
pages to drive near-term sales outside
of paid promotional campaigns using
dark posts and managed like advertising.
However, companies have the opportunity
to deepen engagement and build long
term brand preference and loyalty through
engaging with their customers on the
platform.
Remember, beginning January 15, 2015,
Facebook considers any post that asks
for engagement of any kind (likes, clicks,
shares) to be commercial. Even posts that
are only sharing a non- commercial post
on a company’s blog off of Facebook
may be considered commercial in nature
because they ask users to leave Facebook
to visit another page where there may be
an advertising message or call to action.
Additionally, if the post contains any of the
same content as a paid ad, it is considered
commercial. Even certain keywords
associated with promotional offers, like
“Tomorrow” have been shown to impact
organic reach.

Despite these changes, many brands
should still use Facebook as a channel for
deepening engagement with their existing
fans. Creating and sharing high value,
altruistic (non-commercial) content will
cement the emotional connection between
a brand and their core audience and will
result in sharing to new potential customers.
Companies that do not participate in
market-shaping and brand building may be
better served to focus on direct response
objectives using promotional campaigns as
described in the previous section.

Measuring Brand Engagement
Objectives
Although posts should not overtly ask for
user action -- likes, shares, views, and clicks
are still good measures of engagement for
content and make for meaningful objectives.
Moving forward brands should not however
use referral traffic as a KPI.
Over the last year, Facebook has made a
significant investment in improving their
native hosting
capabilities for video
and other content.
In August 2014,
Facebook passed
YouTube for Video
Views, and in early
2015, Facebook is creating a video hub for
brands within their Facebook brand pages.
These developments signal an emphasis
on hosting original content directly on
Facebook. In the past, Facebook was a
promotional channel for driving traffic to the
content. In 2015 and beyond, Brands should
see Facebook as a publishing channel for
hosting content, in the same way they host
content on YouTube or their owned blog.
By simply sharing content with a specific
point of view, many brands use Facebook
as a platform for strengthening brand
association. For example, home insurance
companies are sharing ‘Move Day
Checklists’, as a completely altruistic tool
that homeowners can use to prepare for a
move. Through this content, the insurance
company strengthens their position as a
helpful brand in the mind of the consumer -
even with consumers
who do not use the
checklist. Likewise,
hotels hoping to
build a perception of
sophistication share
high quality artistic
images of tourist
attractions in markets where they have
properties. Neither of these campaigns are
measured by specific revenues. This is the
type of content that will continue to do well
by reaching existing fans and being shared
on Facebook. What’s more, this content
impacts any audience that sees the post,
whether they engage with it or not.
“In 2015 and beyond, Brands
should see Facebook as
a publishing channel for
hosting content.”

A clear statement of objectives like
deepening engagement, increasing strength
of association with specific brand tenets,
etc, can help guide what content is created
and published on Facebook.

What is Engaging for your Audience?
The restriction in free distribution will
require brands to be more sophisticated
in their approach to content marketing on
Facebook in 2015. Fortunately, Facebook
offers many tools for gaining more insights
into a particular audience. Facebook’s Page
Insights Tools offer an understanding of
the type of content page fans engage with,
when they engage, and even what types of
posts they prefer.

Many companies gain an even deeper
understanding of their market using
Facebook’s free Audience Insights Tool.
This tool is an invaluable resource for
understanding different interest segments
within your core audience. Through
analyzing the overlaps and gaps between
different audiences and their interests,
brands can gain a clear view of the type
of content that will make an impact.
Interpreting these interests through the
filter of a company’s overarching brand
strategy, marketers will be able to know
what content will be the most engaging
and best support the brand objectives. This
blog post provides a detailed overview of
how to use this tool. “How To” Guide for the
Facebook Audience Insights Tool.
When creating content for your audience,
remember, goals should center on
connecting with specific brand principles
and beliefs, not informing them about
new products or sales promotions - those
types of objectives should be handled with
advertising campaigns.

“Understanding different
audiences and their
interests, brands gain a clear
view of the content that will
make an impact.”

Amplifying Content
Companies with a large number of fans
may choose to share certain content
only with specific segments of their fan
base. Facebook now makes it easy for
page owners to target which aspects
of their audience see which posts. This
same segmentation strategy should be
applied with advertising budget to amplify
particularly powerful content to reach a
greater proportion of the fan base and
seed the social conversation to facilitate
continued sharing.
The End of the
Beginning
Facebook has been evolving towards a
paid media channel for some time. The
restrictions on organic reach and free
distribution over the last year, culminating
with the change of January 15, 2015, signal
a significant shift in this direction and the
beginning of the next phase in Social Media
Marketing.
This isn’t surprising. There are many
analogs between Search Marketing and
Social Media Marketing. Search engines
are myopically focused on delivering the
best possible content on the results page
in the same way Facebook is committed
to delivering the best possible content in
the Newsfeed. Early on, marketers gamed
search engine algorithms with SEO tactics
designed to get free exposure -- the same
way marketers gained free traffic from
Facebook sharing content to fans. As
Search Marketing evolved, companies
made a commitment to Paid Search and
now Pay Per Click advertising is the basis
of competition for many in this channel.
Most successful search marketers use
technology to support keyword selection,
bid optimization, targeting etc.
“There are many analogs
between Search Marketing
and Social Media
Marketing.”

As Facebook transitions to a paid channel,
most marketers will adopt technology to
support their advertising efforts. CitizenNet
is the only Facebook Marketing Partner
with technology proven to improve social
media performance through better audience
targeting and media optimization. With
solutions specifically designed for either
brands or the agencies that serve them,
CitizenNet’s clients see success using both
self serve and fully managed solutions.
For a more detailed overview of CitizenNet’s
technology or to schedule a demo, please
contact us through the form on our website.

References
http://www.pewinternet.org/fact-sheets/social-networking-fact-sheet/
https://www.similartech.com/technologies/facebook-connect
http://www.leadledger.com/tech/Facebook-Connect
http://media.fb.com/2015/01/07/what-the-shift-to-video-means-for-creators/
Imagery
Andres Arenas from the Noun Project
Images taken from Flickr.com under Creative Commons commercial use license
LadyDragonflyCC - >;<, rachaelvoorhees, JWPhotowerks, Sonny Abesamis, Metropolitan
Transportation Authority of the State of New York, DWHonan, kalmyket, Rudi Riet, ARBRE
ÉVOLUTION, Tiffany Creatiff Photos, Uqbar is back, Graham Coreil-Allen, tanakawho and

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