“Your website should be your calling card, or your business front door.” – James Schramko
It’s the 21st century. If digital marketing isn’t an integral part of your business strategy, you’re going to get left behind. It’s not enough to just have a website and social media accounts that serve as online business directories. They must be digital extensions of your brick-and-mortar that work like a sales team around the clock.
A company website often serves as the first point of contact someone has with the business. Because of this, your website should be the hub of your marketing efforts. Your digital marketing goals are based on generating website traffic, whether it’s via organic search, PPC, social media, retargeting ads, etc.
But once people get to your site, then what? The truth is, most visitors WON’T convert because they didn’t find what they were looking for or the timing just wasn’t right.
Approximately 96% of visitors that come to your website are not ready to buy (yet). – Marketo (Source)
However, those website visitors still hold MASSIVE value even though they left without converting. They are leads who were interested enough to take a look at your site in the first place, so you don’t want to let them just disappear. Why not build upon those small victories?
Your business can benefit from the simple marketing tactic of creating a list of website visitors and then staying top-of-mind by showing them social media ads with offers for additional information or product/service specials.
Setup is easy, and social media is a gold mine for businesses looking to reach customers. In this article, we’ll provide an overview of the Facebook pixel and LinkedIn insight tag and how to add them to your website for audience-building. Whether you’re running social ads now or not, this simple marketing tactic can be a difference-maker.
What are the Pixel & Insight Tag?
First, a quick introduction to the pixel and insight tag. Both are types of “cookies” — small pieces of data sent from a website and stored on the user’s computer by the web browser. Their purpose is to track and remember a user’s browsing activity and build custom audiences based on user behavior.
The pixel and insight tag cater to the unique goals of individual businesses because you can create rules and parameters within Facebook and LinkedIn to build audiences based on visits to specific pages, as well as event triggers like button clicks or form submissions.
The pixel and insight are both available for free, which is another reason you should put them to work for you.
Targeting Custom Audiences
In addition to preventing leads from vanishing without a trace, the benefit of building custom audiences using the pixel and insight tag is relevance. When you track visitor behavior on your website, you can better appeal to them by serving up targeted social ads that are relevant based on their needs and pain points.
For example, you could put the pixel and insight tag on a blog article or case study to track the cold leads who showed interest by clicking on and reading the article. You can then target that audience (who now knows your company exists) with an ad aimed at getting them to show intent by responding to a low-commitment offer that you will provide in exchange for additional information about them. It could be an in-depth guide that they can download if they submit a form with their name, company, phone number and email address.
To demonstrate how you can take it a step further, you can then build an audience of people who submitted the form so you can target them with another ad. This ad, built for hot leads, can be more salesy in nature, perhaps soliciting a quote request or a sign-up for a lunch and learn presentation.
With the pixel and insight tag, your audience isn’t limited to just website visitors, either. That’s because the information they collect can be used by Facebook and LinkedIn to create alternative audiences:
- Lookalike Audience — This audience is one that possesses similar demographics, interests and characteristics as the ones who have visited your website. So, for instance, if one of your “cookied” pages had content about pipeline rehabilitation equipment, it’s likely the reader is a plumber or contractor. Knowing this, the lookalike audience generated would consist of other people who specify in their Facebook or LinkedIn accounts that they are a plumber/contractor or have an interest in pipeline rehabilitation
- Exclusion Audience — As the name implies, this is an audience of people you DON’T want to see a particular ad. If they already achieved a specified goal or converted, it’s a waste of money for an ad to appear in front of them asking them to convert. Utilizing an exclusion audience list ensures you’re marketing to the right people at the right time.
How to Implement the Facebook Pixel & LinkedIn Insight Tag
If you’ve worked “under the hood” of Facebook, LinkedIn and your website before, the process of installing a pixel and insight tag is relatively simple. Before you begin, make sure you have the ability to update your website’s code and can access the backend of Facebook and LinkedIn.
A Facebook pixel is generated within Events Manager by connecting your Facebook account and website. Follow the prompts to generate your pixel code. Once you have the code, it’s just a matter of copying it and pasting it at the bottom of your website’s header section, just above the closing head tag and completing setup as prompted.
Step-by-step instructions can be accessed here.
A LinkedIn insight tag is generated within Campaign Manager in the “Account Assets” tab. When your code is generated, copy and paste it into your website’s footer, right above the closing HTML <body> tag, which will let you track conversions or retarget on any page across your entire site.
Step-by-step instructions can be accessed here.
If you need further assistance implementing the pixel and insight tag, the IT Manager at your company should be able to help you. You can also work with a marketing agency, which can help you formulate a strategy to get the most out of your pixel and insight tag.
Why Social Media Ads?
You may be thinking, “Ok, this does seem like a simple marketing tactic, but why is it so critical to utilize social media ads?” The answer is simple: Your target audience is on social media, and social media ads work.
Check out these statistics:
69% of Americans are on Facebook, with 70% of those users accessing the platform daily. – Pew Research Center (Source)
LinkedIn is responsible for 80% of the B2B leads from social media. — 99Firms (Source)
37% of respondents said they get purchase inspiration from social networks — the most of any response — Global Consumer Insights Survey 2018 (Source)
When business owners and key personnel question the effectiveness of marketing on social media, which is commonly used for entertainment rather than business, we offer this explanation:
While your prospective customers may not be on social media to do business, think about TV, radio, direct mail and email. Are people watching their favorite show, listening to their favorite station, walking to the mailbox or opening their inbox hoping to see your propaganda and learn about your company, products or services? Sadly, no. But just like TV, radio, direct mail and email, we know the audience is there on social media and can be targeted.
No Website Lead Left Behind
Just because a website visitor exits without making a purchase or requesting additional information doesn’t mean they can’t eventually become a customer. By reading this article, you’ve learned that the simple marketing tactic of utilizing the Facebook pixel and LinkedIn insight tag to create custom audiences allows you to keep your business in front of those leads via social ads. Make this tactic a part of your larger digital marketing funnel to ensure no leads get left behind.
To learn more about the pixel and insight tag, click here. You can also check out our article How to Use Facebook to Generate Business for a more in-depth look at Facebook marketing. And for an overview of how to create the perfect digital sales funnel, as well as what to avoid, click here.
Have additional questions about Facebook or LinkedIn or want to learn even more? Call us at 815.431.1000 or submit this form to contact us.
