Google Ads or Facebook Ads – Which is better?

In the present internet era, adopting online marketing strategies for improved visibility has become imperative. Among various options, the most popular online advertisement platforms are Google Ads and Facebook Ads. Understanding the fundamentals of how these platforms work will greatly help in choosing which one is the best for your business.

What is Google Ads?

Google Ads (formerly known as Google AdWords) is an online advertising platform developed by Google, where advertisers bid to display brief advertisements about their product and service offerings by way of texts or videos to the web users.

How does Google Ads work?

Advertisers use Google bid on keywords and phrases entered in search queries by Google users, in the hope that their ads will be displayed alongside search results for these queries. Each time a user clicks on an ad, the advertiser is charged a certain amount of money. Thus, Google Ads services are offered under a Pay-Per-Click (PPC) pricing model. It is also widely known as Paid Search. Essentially, in this model users are paying for the potential to find new customers based on the keywords and search terms they enter into Google.

Advantages of Google Ads :

1) Immense reach :

Using Google as an advertising platform gives the businesses an immense reach, because, Google is the world’s most popular and widely used search engine. Google handles more than 40,000 search queries every second. This amazing search volume is likely to increase, due to Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) Technology, which will ultimately increase the potential for advertisers to reach more new customers.

2) Special Features :

An incredible number of features in Google Ads make the Ads more appealing to prospective customers. Some of the special features are Ad extensions, social proofing such as user reviews, location targeting, site links, shopping ads etc. which help the advertisers to have control over their advertisements based on their requirements. ‘

3) Customisable Ad Formats :

In Google Ads, Ad formats can be customized based on the specific industry such as manufacturing, hotels, transportation, tourism, healthcare etc. Google is also continuously introducing new formats and features giving the advertisers an interesting experience to reach out to a greater number of audiences.

Now let us look at Facebook Ads, its popularity and Advantages.

Facebook Ads is a Paid Social :

While Google Ads is a ‘Paid Search’, Facebook Ads is ‘Paid Social’. It is known as ‘Paid Social’ because, Facebook is a social networking media. With the highest number of Monthly Active Users (or MAUs) of any social network in the world, Facebook has become an attractive social networking media for online advertisement for many businesses. In paid social, users find businesses based on things they are interested in. Thus, in Facebook Ads customers find the business, whereas in Google Ads businesses find customers.

How does Facebook Ads work?

In Facebook Ads, the advertisers create ‘lookalike audiences’. Advertisers upload customer information from their own databases to Facebook, which then applies filtering based on its own data and information provided by third-party data brokers to match users whose information the advertiser uploads. This creates the “lookalike” audience of users, allowing advertisers to effectively double the potential reach of their advertisements by targeting new customers who exhibit the same interests and consumer behavior as their existing customers. This way of reaching out to the potential customers works remarkably well and gives good ROI (Return on Investment) on Marketing spends.

Advantages of Facebook Ads :

1) Granular Audience :

Facebook has truly a vast audience, with more than 1/5^th of the entire world’s population, which is unparallel. Facebook’s users share the joys and accomplishments of life’s milestones with their friends and networks every single day. This presents advertisers with a unique opportunity to tailor their advertising messages to the specified target audiences at the granular level.

2) Powerful visual effects :

Facebook Ads are powerfully visual. The very best visual Facebook ads seamlessly blend in users’ News Feeds, enabling the advertisers to leverage the persuasive qualities of visual ads in a way that makes high-quality ads so compelling and captivating. Facebook constantly evaluates and improves its features, so that it can offer advertisers a superior marketing platform and users a satisfying, rewarding online experience.

3) Incredible Return on Investment (ROI) :

Facebook Ads provides incredible Return on Investment (ROI) on marketing spends, while considering the wide reach it offers. Especially for small businesses and companies with limited budget Facebook Ads is a very attractive proposition, because of its very affordable pricing model and positive results.

Conclusion :

In order to achieve maximum visibility, increase leads and find new customers, businesses should adopt a wider variety of digital marketing strategies. Both Google Ads and Facebook Ads have its own advantages and both can be used as complementary to each other and need not be viewed as mutually exclusive.

Harnessing the power of both Paid Search (Google Ads) and Paid Social (Facebook Ads) is a remarkably effective advertising strategy for any type of business. The advertisement strategy should align well with the respective strengths of each platform in order to maximise the impact of Google Ads and Facebook Ads campaigns.

There are many CRM Apps (Customer Relationship Management Applications) like HelloLeads, Zoho, Freshsales etc., available in the market which can be used to manage the leads generated through these online advertising platforms in order to convert the leads into customers, effectively and efficiently, thereby improving the sales.