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How do you grow your online business? Grow your email list? Build a social media following? Start a webinar, online course, or podcast? For many people, creating a profitable online business is the dream. Discover why thousands of online business owners have turned to Jennie Lyon to help them grow their online business using digital marketing and virtual assistant services. Jennie shares her best digital marketing tips, practices, and strategies to get you optimal results!
Running ads can be a game-changer for your business, but diving in before you’re ready can lead to wasting your time and money and getting so frustrated that you rule out running them ever again!
Today, I will cover why ensuring you’re ready to run ads is so valuable for your business. Even if you don’t have any immediate plans to make ads part of your marketing strategy.
By preparing your business for ads, you’re setting the stage for your business to experience more growth and scale to the next level. Paid advertising offers incredible opportunities to reach your ideal audience, build brand awareness, and drive consistent leads or sales. However, you risk losing its full potential without the proper foundation.
What’s more, the steps you take to prepare your business for ads are the steps you need to scale your business effectively. By focusing on your audience, offer, systems, and capacity, you’re ensuring the success of any ad campaigns you run in the future and laying the groundwork for sustainable growth. Scaling requires clarity, structure, and resources—the elements that create high-performing ad campaigns.
By getting your business ad-ready, you’ll avoid common pitfalls and gain the confidence to launch campaigns that truly deliver. From knowing your audience to optimizing your website, each step you take to prepare will pave the way for more significant results and a smoother experience. How do you know if your business is primed for paid advertising? In this blog, we’ll cover the essential signs that you’re ready to start running ads and how to set yourself up for success.
Let’s explore the key questions you need to ask yourself before hitting that launch button.
CONTENT OVERVIEW:
Do You Know Your Audience?
Do You Have a Clear Offer?
Is Your Website or Funnel Ready?
Do You Have a Budget?
Do You Have Time to Monitor and Prioritize?
Are You Prepared for Increased Demand?
Next Steps
1. Do You Know Your Audience?
Successful ad campaigns are about matchmaking. All we need to do is to introduce the right person to the right offer at the right time. That’s easier said than done! Everything you do in business will be 10 times more manageable if you start with a clear understanding of who your target audience is. If you’re unsure who you’re trying to reach, it’s time to research.
Ask yourself:
Who are my ideal clients or customers?
What are their pain points, desires, and goals?
Where do they spend their time online?
Pro Tip: Create a detailed customer persona before launching any ads. The more specific you can get, the better your results will be.
FREE RESOURCE: Ideal Customer Avatar worksheet
2. Do You Have a Clear Offer?
The biggest reason any sales campaign fails, whether powered by paid ads or not, is that the messaging is unclear or vague. Your ads should point to a specific, compelling offer. Whether it’s a product, service, or freebie, your audience needs to know precisely what they’ll get when they click.
Before running ads, ask yourself:
Is my offer clear, valuable, and aligned with my audience’s needs?
Do I have a strong landing page or sales page that converts?
Is my pricing competitive and justified by the value I’m providing?
If you haven’t been getting enough visibility on your offers recently, running ads can be a great way to test things out and make sure things are clicking for your target audience.
Pro Tip: Test your offer organically first. Please share it on social media or with your email list to gauge interest before investing in ads.
3. Is Your Website or Funnel Ready?
Your ad has one job: to get your ideal clients to click on it! After that, your campaign is only as effective as the page it leads to. You will likely lose potential customers if your website or sales funnel isn’t optimized.
Before you start ads, let’s make sure that:
Your landing pages load quickly and look great on mobile devices.
The call-to-action (CTA) on your page is clear and compelling.
Your funnel has a smooth, logical flow from ad click to conversion.
If you haven’t looked at your website or funnel since you first launched it, perhaps it’s time for an audit. Whether you hire a strategist like ours or choose to DIY it, you’ll find something that you can improve before you hit publish on your first ad campaign.
Pro Tip: Use tools like Google Analytics to identify and fix potential drop-off points in your funnel before launching ads.
4. Do You Have a Budget?
Believe it or not, you don’t have to spend hundreds and hundreds of dollars to be allowed to run ads. If you’ve tried ads in the past but didn’t see results, it probably wasn’t because you didn’t spend enough. Ads require an upfront investment and some perseverance, so setting a realistic budget is essential.
If you can start with just $10/day for at least a month, you have a realistic budget to start running ads for your business.
Before you start, consider these questions:
How much can I afford to spend without expecting immediate returns?
What’s my cost-per-acquisition (CPA) goal?
Do I have enough resources to test and tweak my campaigns over time?
Pro Tip: Start with a modest budget and gradually increase it as you identify what works.
5. Do You Have Time to Monitor and Optimize?
Running ads isn’t a set-it-and-forget-it strategy. They don’t need constant supervision, but you need to check in on them every few days so they don’t run wild without you!
Make sure you’re setting the time aside for regular monitoring and optimization. You might miss opportunities to improve performance if you’re too busy to check in on your campaigns.
Ask yourself:
Can I review metrics like click-through rates (CTR) and conversions?
Can I adjust ad copy, targeting, or budgets if needed?
If I get too busy, do I have someone in mind to step in or outsource this to if needed?
Pro Tip: Use tools like Meta Ads Manager or Google Ads’ automated insights to help streamline the monitoring process.
6. Are You Prepared for Increased Demand?
You must be ready for more leads or sales if your ads succeed. The last thing you want is to have a rush of new customers or clients and find that you and your team (if you have one) are overwhelmed and you’re dropping the ball. Make sure you can handle increased demand by asking:
Do I have enough inventory or availability to meet potential sales?
Is my customer service team equipped to handle more inquiries?
Do I have a follow-up process to nurture leads who don’t convert immediately?
Pro Tip: With our clients, we always map out the customer journey ahead of time to ensure a seamless experience from first click to post-purchase.
Next Steps: Setting Yourself Up for Success
Suppose you’ve answered “yes” to these questions, congratulations! You’re ready to start running ads. If you’re not quite there yet, that’s okay. Use this checklist to identify areas for improvement before investing in paid campaigns.
Our guide is the perfect next step for those ready to dive in: The $10/day Ad Strategy for Small Business Owners: Unlock the Secret to Increased Sales with Social Media Ads.
This free resource walks you through everything you need to know to launch and manage high-performing ads that drive results.
FREE RESOURCE: $10/Day Ad Template
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