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With digitalization taking the world by storm, e-commerce is has become the fastest growing industry. Even regular brick and mortar stores are setting up e-commerce profiles where people can check out the products online and then pick them up later at the store. With every kind of business wanting to enter the e-commerce space, the industry is growing by 15% every year. With such kind of growth there is bound to be a lot of competition too. This just means you have to buckle up and have a powerful online ad strategy to keep your business going. Speaking of ad strategies, the most popular platforms to float your ads online are Facebook and Instagram. But what do you do, if you don’t have the budget to get on board both of these. What are the factors that you should consider when you try to deduce which platform is better suited for your e-commerce store? Let us find out.
Which platform gives you a better audience reach?
Facebook certainly is home to the largest number of internet users – so much, that it could call itself a country. The user base of Facebook stands at 2.07 billion and no other platform even compares to it. Although, it doesn’t mean that you will be able to reach all these people, it certainly gives you the idea of the vast possibilities Facebook presents in terms of expanding the reach of your business. Because of the huge number of users, Facebook also offers great targeting option where in you can specifically select the kind of audience you want to reach based on factors like demography, gender, interests, age and even create custom audiences. Facebook also gives you the option to create lookalike audiences, so you can rest assured that Facebook is doing a great job when you want your ad to reach prospective customers on Facebook.
So, if a wider, more international audience is your business goal, you may want to choose Facebook for your advertising efforts.
Instagram, on the other hand gives you access to about 800 million which is still a quite large audience. The good thing about Instagram is that it is an excellent platform for increasing your organic reach. Additionally, Instagram lets you search using hashtags which again is quite a useful feature that comes in handy to expand your reach. There is also the ‘suggestions for you’ section via which shows you what your friends have liked which is another key feature helping businesses expand their reach.
If organic reach is what you want, Instagram is where your ads need to be.
Which platform is better in terms of user engagement?
Although Instagram has a smaller user base, it does beat every other social media in terms of user engagement. Without any long reads or descriptions, the quirky lively photos appeal more the audience inviting their involvement. 80% of the users on Instagram are following at least one business. 70.7% of the businesses in the US were using Instagram by 2017 and this figure was an increment of 40% from 2016. This just shows how much businesses are rapidly moving towards Instagram for their social media marketing. It’s all because of the fact that Instagram has successfully engaged the audiences which has resulted in better conversions. 95 million pictures go live everyday on Instagram yielding 4.2 billion likes. This figure itself speaks volumes of the engagement on Instagram.
Hence, when it comes to user engagement, Instagram is the clear winner. Instagram users stay online on the platform 40% longer than any other social media.
On the other hand, engagement on Facebook is one tough cookie. Although the scope for engagement from organic posts might not be the best, it still presents some great opportunities for targeting your ads. And with that kind of specificity in targeting, you will be able to get the users you want to engage with your ads.
What is the demographic on each platform?
When it comes to Instagram, it is more about its colors and the visual appeal. This has resulted in more women flocking towards Instagram. Also, a majority of Instagram users are millennials as in they are young adults in the age group of 18 to 29. 55% of the people who use the internet are on this mobile based app where they spend an average time of 21 minutes per day.
The number of female users in higher than the male counterparts on Facebook as well but the difference is that, more men prefer Facebook to Instagram. Also, the largest age group on Facebook is 25-44. Facebook does reach all age groups but appeals more to audiences above 30.
Which platform you choose again boils down to who your target audience is. If you deal in products and solutions for women go with Instagram. If you are dealing with man stuff, you would rather choose Facebook. Another factor you need to consider is the age group you are targeting.
Where do your ads perform better?
Facebook automation helps to get great click through rates with the several ad formats it has to offer like photo ads, carousel ads, video ads, slideshows etc.
Instagram has now upped its game by adding the stories feature which again has given a great boost to the performance of ads.
What is your Budget?
The average CPC for Facebook ads is $0.80 while o Instagram it is $0.35.
On Facebook these prices again depend on the age group, the time of the week, the season of the year etc.
With all these facts in hand, and your business goals in mind, you should now be able to make an informed decision as to which platform you should choose for your ads.
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