When looking for new channels to increase your lead generation, you shouldn’t overlook the many ways in which Facebook can help you build your book of business. While marketers have plenty of experience leveraging traditional ad types on Facebook, one under-utilized ad format is the Lead Ad—and it just might be your next high-performing lead generator.

Like other paid ads, Facebook lead ads allow you to target a specific audience on Facebook and Instagram.

Lead ads can help you:

Identify potential customers
Collect subscriber information for newsletters and email communication
Encourage downloads
Understand the interests and behaviors of potential clients
Get people to enroll in your programs

If you want to dive into market research, get more customer feedback, or even increase conversions, Facebook lead ads can help you achieve those goals! Here are all the requirements and some additional recommendations to help you set up your first lead generation campaign on Facebook.

Requirements

As I mentioned, lead ads are a type of ad that allows you to run lead generation campaigns on Facebook and Instagram. The ads are optimized for mobile (Facebook cites it takes users 40% longer to complete forms on desktop) and can be synced with your existing customer relationship management (CRM) system or downloaded as a CSV file.

However, lead ads have certain requirements that differ from other ad types on Facebook.

Most notably your campaign will need to include:

A link to the privacy policy for your business. All advertisers who create lead ads are required to have a privacy policy on their business website. (Including any legal disclaimers are optional)
A list of the info you need to collect in your form. Facebook provides a number of default fields you can select, but you can also create custom questions.
Information you want to include on a welcome screen. Utilizing the welcome screen allows you to give more info about your business within the ad, and assures potential customers about how you will use their information.
The copy, video, or images assets for your ad. Lead ads have the same ad requirements for text and images as regular ads on Facebook.

Connecting & Using your CRM

To add a CRM from your Page:

Go to your Facebook Page.
Click Publishing Tools at the top of your Page.
Click Leads Setup.
- In this section, you'll be able to connect to a CRM you already use or connect to a CRM for the first time. Follow the directions below based on your preferences.

There are tons of different options you can use to manage the leads you get from your Facebook lead ads. Once integrated, you'll be able to automatically leverage the communication channels and systems you've already set up to maximize the value of the leads you collect in real-time. (If you don't integrate a CRM, you can still download the leads.)

Recommended CRM Integrations

Gmail
Constant Contact
Zapier

This post contains references to products from one or more of our advertisers. I may receive compensation when you click on links to those products. I stand by my opinions and only recommend products and subscriptions that I use.

Creating a Facebook Lead Ad

Go to Ads Manager.
Once in Ads Manager, click Create in the top left-hand corner.
Next, click Lead generation as your objective and name your campaign.
Set your target audience, placements, budget, and schedule.
Choose your lead ad formats.
- Now select from carousel, single image, video, or slideshow.
Add your copy (headline, body text, and call to action).
Next, click Create Lead Form.
- This is where you add the form title, intro, questions, your company’s privacy policy, and a “thank you” screen.
Click Finish in the top-right corner.
Review your ad from Ads Manager and when you’re ready to publish, click Confirm.

General Recommendations

After getting your initial campaign set up, the real fun begins. Think through variations in ad creative, messaging, and audience targeting. Where can you make improvements as you start to see results? It’s important to keep your overall goals in mind when thinking through any future iterations. Once you’ve got your starting place, here are my top 4 recommendations to ensure a successful lead ad campaign.

Keep it Simple

First and foremost, keep it simple. (AKA only ask for the most relevant information.) Think about forms that you’ve been asked to fill out. The longer the form, the higher the chance of drop off. Conversely, the easier your form is to fill out, the more likely you’ll have a high completion rate.

Provide Value

People are much more willing to share personal information and give feedback when something is offered in return.

Popular incentive examples include:

Exclusive deals, offers and promotion codes
Sweepstakes and contests entries
Product samples
Downloadable assets

Targeting

When setting up audiences within Facebook Ad campaigns, there are literally thousands of different combinations of audiences you can work with. By changing certain demographics, interests, or behaviors within your filtering, you will have a completely new target. When creating lead ad campaigns, there are two types of audience targeting that I recommend working with.

Custom Audiences: When working with Facebook ads, Custom Audiences are your best friend. You can base custom audiences on your customer lists, website visitors, or engagement. You can include or exclude anyone you want in this audience. The goal of custom audiences is to narrow in on your messaging and to increase your conversion rate, return on investment, and learn more about your audiences.
Lookalike audiences: The goal of lookalike audiences is to find more people similar to a selection of people you already know. For example, if you have a customer list with lifetime value (LTV) data, you can build a lookalike audience modeled from the most valuable customers, or repeat buyers.

Regardless of the audience you build, remember it should always closely align with your overall campaign goals.

Test, Test, Test

Testing is a key part of any digital marketing strategy. The best lead ads are often the result of multiple rounds of testing. With so many variables within the ad, you can test your audiences, creative, offers, etc. till the cows come home! As always, try to isolate and test one variable at a time for the most accurate results.