Facebook Pixels

Facebook pixels are important if you are wanting to achieve success with your ad campaigns. In this article, I’ll talk about the importance of Facebook pixels along with the benefits you can receive from using the pixel.

What Are Facebook Pixels

A Facebook pixel is a code that you put on your website. This code helps you track conversions that have been made from Facebook ads.

If you are setting up your pixel for the first time you can find the steps to take in your Facebook ad manager under measuring & reporting, then pixels. Here’s what your generic pixel will look like.

That generic pixel is something you will want to be installed on every page of your website.

The pixel also helps Facebook optimize your ads based on the data that it collects. It’s also great for building custom audiences, lookalike audiences, in which you can use for targeting in future ads.

How Do Facebook Pixels Work?

The Facebook Pixel works by triggering cookies to track potential customers and users as they are on your website. It also tracks the actions they took with your Facebook ads.

If you are wanting to see if you have your Facebook installed correctly on your site I recommend using a chrome plugin called, Facebook Pixel Helper.

Think of it this way. You see an ad on Facebook for a pair of Nike shorts that catch your eye. You click on the ad and you are taken to the Nike site where those shorts are.

You then decide to add them to your cart but end up deciding to not purchase at that time.

A day or so later you are now seeing an ad in your newsfeed of Facebook reminding you that you left something in your cart over on the Nike site.

That’s the power of a Facebook pixel installed on a website. Nike had a pixel installed that was able to track your actions on their site which in return allowed them to retarget you at a future date.

Cool huh?

So Why Use Facebook Pixels?

Well, there are many reasons that the data the pixel collects can benefit you and your business. Here are 4 main ways that you can use the data:

Track Conversions – Monitoring the way that people interact with your website right after they saw your Facebook Ad is very appealing. You can even track what devices customers use when they’re on your website. For example, you might find that most people view your ads on a smartphone, but then they switch to a desktop once they want to make a purchase. Maybe they typically find your ad on desktop though. This is something you won’t know until you track it. This information can help you tailor your ads to your specific audience.

Re-market Yourself – With a Facebook pixel installed on your site, you can create targeted ads for people who have previously been on your website. You can get as specific as you want with this. For example, if you notice that someone abandoned something in their cart, you can show them an ad for the exact product that they left in the cart.

More Effective Facebook Ads – When you have a Facebook pixel installed on your site you typically will see better performance with your ads since Facebook will optimize your ad for a specific objective.

Using Facebook Pixels with Standard Events

You can use a Facebook pixel to track and collect data with standard events that has Facebook established.

Don’t let the words “standard events” scare you. It’s just a fancy term that Facebook uses that are actions people take on your site.

Here are the 9 standard Facebook pixel events that you can track by adding these snippet codes to your site underneath the generic pixel:

View content – Someone lands on any of your website pages
Search – Someone uses the search button to look up something on your website
Add to cart – Someone adds something to their cart on your website
Add to wishlist – Someone adds something to their wishlist from your site
Initiate checkout – Someone begins the checkout process on your website
Add payment information – Someone enters their payment info to purchase a product from your website
Make a purchase – Someone successfully completes a purchase from your Website
Lead – Someone signs up for a trial or something similar, identifying themselves as a lead on your website
Complete registration – Someone completes a registration form on your website. An example would be a subscription product

Here’s an example of a snippet code that you would install with your generic pixel on the thank you page of your website to track leads.

Conclusion

Many advertisers think of a Facebook pixel as a difficult task to implement on their sites. Sadly it really isn’t as difficult as most people think.

Without a Facebook pixel, many advertisers are missing out on important benefits.

The most important, tracking. It’s important as an advertiser to know where your money is going with your Facebook ads and are you getting results because of that ad.

Without a Facebook, pixel installed you will never know these things.

Are you using your Facebook pixels? If not what struggles are you having? Let us know in the comment section below.