Google or Facebook? Where to Start Your Business Marketing Journey.

Which platform should I focus my time and money on first?

About 90% of all digital ad spend is spent on Google and Facebook’s ad platform.

There are two aspects, or categories, to breaking down this question.

And it all revolves around BUDGET.

Whatever you don’t have in your budget, you need to replace with time!

Like everything in life…

…as well as, everything that involves running and creating a business, you need one of two things.

You either need time or money.

If you are lacking one, you need more of the other.

If you’ve somehow managed to accumulate both well then…  You’ve won!

It’s a trade-off.

And with that being said, you now have your two categories:

• Organic
• Paid

ORGANIC

Creating an organic marketing campaign is really all about how much time you have.

The time it takes to:

1. Create content
2. Publish content
3. Distribute content

Interacting with your community with your content

Realistically, this takes a TON of time!

But of course, if you don’t have time – you are going to need a bankroll.

You’ll need a big budget to hire, outsource, or otherwise get the job done.

Google SEO is still the way to go with organic marketing campaigns.

Google’s search and its organic algorithm is still the best when dealing with “search“.

Their algorithm works very well…

…as opposed to Facebook’s.

Obviously seems a little off, coming from me!

I know.

BUT

To be perfectly honest organically, for Facebook, its nowhere near how amazing Google’s organic basic reach is.

Facebook is a pay to play system, just like all the other platforms.

But, after Facebook’s recent algorithm change…

…it has become even that much harder to reach organic audiences on Facebook.

Unless you have a pretty good following, a decent sized community, and a regular group of followers who engage with your content, it is VERY difficult to get the word out about your business on Facebook.

The thing about Google’s organic reach is that, unlike Facebook, you have room to be lazy!

That’s right.

I said it.

With FB, you need to be active and produce super-value all the time.

Whereas with Google, you have some leeway.

Yes, I say this out of experience!

Even for my own business, I started with a blog and targeting cold audiences on Facebook.

To this day I still acquire around 2-leads per week just from Organic search on Google.

As opposed to Facebook, where I still get organic leads, the overall quality of leads we receive from Google are far better than what we get from Facebook.

So until the day Alexa, Siri, & Cortana (…Skynet!) take over…

You’re still good to go with producing awesome content (written, in audio, or visual form) on Google’s platform and using some basic SEO skills.

DIGITAL ADVERTISING (…PAID!)

Now, the other side of the coin is when we have money to play with – which platform should we start with?

Obviously, I’m a little bias…

It would be like if you went to a Doctor, they’d say you need to take this medication, a Chiropractor would say you need an adjustment, and a masseuse would say you need a massage!

So I will say, START WITH FACEBOOK ADS.

They probably are your best bet anyways, and the reason I say that is simply due to Facebook’s level of targeting.

Their targeting is unparalleled. Not even Google has reached the level of targeting Facebook allows for.

For example… If I wanted to target a:

• Mother of 3
• Lives in Atlanta
• Has a toddler aged child in the home
• Drives a Mercedes
• Works in Real Estate

I could do that!

(Can anyone say… Cambridge Analytica!)

As for Google…

If we look at Google Adwords and how it works, to simplify things, Google is a query-based system.

You’re paying for the “query” – the search term or keyword.

For example, let’s say you type something into Google… Say, “Taylor Swift“.

Google’s system will then (in theory) change that query into a question.

• Who is Taylor Swift
• What is Taylor Swift
• Where is Taylor Swift
• How is Taylor Swift

Then the algorithm will produce results based on the rankings system, or the number of “votes“.

Votes also known as, backlinks.

So you’ll see results like: Taylor Swifts Wiki page, IMBD page, her latest album, etc.

Now let’s say, she wants to sell her latest album.

And she wants her albums page to be at the top of the rankings…

Then she’d most likely advertise her album on Google, based on the “Taylor Swift” keyword, and her album Ad will be at the very tippy-top.

Needless to say, it’s very keyword centric, compared to Facebook’s ad platform.

Still with that said, at the end of the day, it’s all about your audience!

AUDIENCE

Now… You should know this information.

Nobody should know your audience better than yourself.

Let me reiterate…

YOU NEED TO KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE!

Even before you think of starting a business, you need to know your audience.

Okay… SO you know them… Good!

What terms do they search for?  What lingo or terminology do they use?
IS – ARE – WERE – the terms your audience uses to search for solutions popular terms?

For example…

If I am helping a Realtor run ads on Google, we’ll end up targeting keywords people are most likely to search for: “Buy a home“, “house for sale“, “sell my home” (bad examples I know).

BUT I will pay a boat-load for that placement, whereas with Facebook I can get a little creative and lower my cost per acquisition.

Now, if I am selling a widget…

…is the widget a popular widget?

Is it something new and innovative?

Will people actually search for it?

If your target audience doesn’t even know it exists, how will they search for it on Google?

STARTING TO MAKE SENSE?

With Facebook, I can put my message and offer directly in front of those exact people I am looking to target.

In a perfect world, you would target cold audiences on Facebook and remarket to those audiences on Google.

CONCLUSION

When looking at which platform to double down on, in the beginning, when first starting your business, working the two hand-in-hand is the best way to go.

BUT

Understanding your available resources of Time & Money will help you determine where to start…

If you have less money, you better have more time!  And with that time, spend it building out your organic marketing campaigns on Google.

If you’ve got more money, run some split tests, but budget more cash for Facebook Ads.