How to boost a facebook post (and get results)
Once upon a time - in the glory days before 2007 - you would sit at your computer, share a post, and it would be seen by all of your followers, plus a few extras. And you were laughing as you sipped your coffee and watched your following grow to astounding numbers with hardly any effort.
If that’s the picture you have in your mind, I’m sad to say friend, those days are gone. Welcome to 2023 where it is pay to play baby. Facebook isn’t the megalith company because it’s giving away free air time. Businesses are paying money to get their content seen by their 3+Billion Users.
We’re taking an educated guess, if you landed here you’re probably new to this space. So let’s begin with this basics.
What is a “boost post” on Facebook?
We’re going to assume you know what a post is (and if not, you really need to talk to us!). A Facebook “boost post” quickly turns an organic post, into a paid ad. Or in other words, you take your free post and you put some money behind it and ‘hey presto,’ you’re now visible to a bunch more people. Facebook boost posts are a simple and effective way to broaden your reach beyond your existing Facebook Page audience.
Boosting posts on Facebook can help you:
Attract new followers (Page likes)
Improve engagement
Promote your brand
Understand what content works best for your goals and audience
Begin exploring social media advertising
How to boost a post
Boosting a post is quick to do from your Facebook Page but there are a few prerequisites:
You will need to be a page admin for the Facebook Page.
You will need a Facebook Ad Manager account with a current payment method.
Once you have these two things sorted out, follow the steps below to boost your first post.
1. Go to your Facebook Page
You can boost a Facebook post from a web browser or the mobile app.
2. Find a Facebook post to boost.
Scroll through recent posts to find the one you want to boost, then click Boost Post at the bottom.
Button grayed out? You can’t boost some Facebook posts, but 99% of this time, you’ll be able to.
3. Choose a goal.
Facebook will automatically fill in goal suggestions, audience targeting criteria, a link, duration, budget, and more. You could press Boost Post Now and run your ad.
But for the best results, go through each section of the page to ensure accuracy. Start by clicking Change in the Goal section to see all available options and choose the best fit. For example, if you’re including a link in your boosted post, your goal should be to “Get more website visitors.”
4. Edit the action button and URL.
Next, choose what you want the action button to say. Facebook defaults to Shop Now, although I’m going to change it to Sign Up. Ensure the link URL is correct, too.
5. Target your audience.
Select who you want to target with this boosted post, or choose one of your existing custom ad audiences (if you have any). You can also save your criteria as a new custom audience for next time.
You can target:
Gender (Only men, women, or both for now. Hopefully Facebook will represent all gender identities in the future.)
Age range
Location (Choose from the country level all the way down to individual cities.)
Interests
6. Set a budget.
The default duration is 7 days which is fine for most Facebook boost posts. Set your total budget for the post and you’ll see an estimate of how many people you’ll reach and how many clicks your link will get.