I have been running facebook ads now since Nov 22, 2007 and you can see from above some break down of how it is going. Since starting we have had only 90 clicks which has cost us $7.75 USD. Our ads are highly targeted to several specific groups and are geotargeted to both the US and Canada. The majority of impressions and clicks are coming from our $59 Development Servers Ad target to Canadians.

The 90 clicks has resulted in 3 development server sales so the ROI is definitely there. Also unlike Google Ads the price for those clicks is less then 20 cents. If I were to buy 90 clicks for dedicated servers on Google Ads that wold cost in the $120+ as compared to Facebook’s $7.75.

I have heard that a lot of people think that Facebook traffic sucks and that the don’t click on ads. My advice to these people is that you need to do target marketing and then understand what that market will click on. If you are targeting everyone with your product or service the odds are you will get very poor traffic with bad returns through any medium of advertising you choose.

Have you tried Facebook advertising for your company? If so how has it worked out for you?

If you run any sort of online business or even if your offline business has an online presence, you may want to consider advertising your products or services through the Internet. With such a huge potential audience for your advertising, it seems like the Internet is an excellent place to expose the world to your brand and what your company has to offer.

The options, fortunately or unfortunately, are daunting. It can be difficult to decide what sort of online advertising would be the most effective for your business, so be sure to do some research and don’t be afraid to partake in a little experimentation. It’s also good to avoid putting all your eggs in one basket; this way, you can reach the largest possible audience. Here are a few strategies you may want to try.

Pay Per Click: This is probably the one that you are most familiar with, because it is the model behind Google Adsense. Your ads will show up on a variety of websites and you only pay when a visitor clicks on one of your ads, getting directed to your website. The same system is used with Facebook Flyers. There’s no guarantee of a sale, but you’ve sent one more person to your sales page.

Pay Per Action: This is where you only pay if your ad spot “converts.” It is up to you to define what is considered a conversion. Some folks pay every time a visitor provides an email address whereas others pay when a sale is completed. This is also where many affiliate programs come into play, like the one here with BlueFur. It could be a set payout amount or commission-based.

Pay Per Impression(s): This form of advertising is based on how many eyes see your advertisement. It does not take click-through rate into account, because you pay based on how many page impressions you get. This is typically calculate on a per 1000 impression basis, resulting in what is called CPM or cost per thousand impressions. If you have a particularly effective ad, this could be a better value than PPC/CPC ads.

Private Sales: Afraid of click fraud? Text link ads and banner ads may be a good way to advertise your company, because you know exactly how much you will spend each month. Make a private sale with a particular website to “own” a piece of advertising real estate for a month, regardless of how many impressions or how many clicks it receives.

Pay Per Play: One of the more recent developments is pay per play audio advertising. It works on the same notion as CPM, except an audio ad is automatically played to every visitor. Some may find this form of advertising intrusive and it may not be that effective, because your website name and URL are not actually displayed.

There’s something to be said about adhering the standard. Some people will think that you are a wild erratic kook if you don’t fall in line with everyone else, if you don’t do as those around you do. For example, it’s become pretty standard to have some sort of blogroll on your WordPress-powered blog. It’s also fairly standard to have a search field, an archive, and a contact page. If you don’t have these basics, then your blog isn’t exactly standard and people may not come back.

At the same time, there is a definite advantage to departing from the herd and doing things a little differently. For example, the standard color for a feed icon is orange. I use orange on Beyond the Rhetoric, for example, just as guys like John Chow, Nate Whitehill, and InvestorBlogger all use orange for their RSS feed buttons. But what if orange sticks out like a sore thumb on your WordPress theme?

If you’re not particularly skilled in PhotoShop or you can’t be bothered to do a palette swap on your own, you can head on over to feedicons.com where they have a free package of several RSS feed icons. There are at least two shades of orange, in addition to blues, greens, purples, and pinks. Choose the color that suits your template the best.

By using a “custom” colored feed icon, you add just a touch of personalization and originality to our blog. You don’t want to be exactly like everyone else, do you?

Last week we asked we asked how much you budget for web design and only 37% of the people that answered say they budget any money at all. The other 63% design their own sites.

With PHP 4 end of life coming soon and 2008 being the year of upgrading to PHP 5 and Apache 2.2 you should be sure to test your site with PHP 5 if you have not already.

This weeks question is…

I have a daily quote widget in my iGoogle personalized homepage, and while I don’t pay attention to it every day, it’s good to know that it’s there whenever I’m looking for a little insight, a little inspiration, or perhaps a good chuckle. One of the quotes that I read today is particularly profound, so I thought I’d share it with you guys today.

“Talent hits a target no one else can hit; Genius hits a target no one else can see.

This was said by German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer, who lived from 1788 to 1860. Schopenhauer spent most of his academic career critiquing the views and works of Immanuel Kant, another well-known German philosopher. Reading through his biography on Wikipedia, I learned that Schopenhauer is partly (wholly?) responsible for the concept of will or “will to live”. The human species is fueled by desire and this drives our human experience.

Anyways, getting back to the quote, I think it clearly illustrates the critical difference between simple talent and genius. We could say that Roberto Luongo is talented, because of his exceptional skill on the ice. We could say that many top athletes and high-ranking corporate executives are talented, because they have managed to achieve so much in their careers, but they are all vying for the same goals, the same targets as many of us are. They’re just better at hitting that target.

By contrast, you can look at who we consider to be geniuses. Revolutionary figures like Albert Einstein and even Steve Jobs can be considered geniuses, because they were approaching targets that many of us did not even know existed. Charles Darwin is perhaps another example, because no one else even considered the possibility of evolution. These are innovators and people who see what the rest of us do not see.

There’s nothing wrong with being “just” talented. But it’s better to be a genius.

Still looking for a great gift for that entrepreneur on your Christmas list?

Sculpting the Business Body is a compilation of 37 Canadian entrepreneurs stories of their success. Read how companies like 1-800 Got Junk and the Running Room became a success.

The book is 192 pages of great tips that every business owner should know. The book is easy to read and would be a great book to read over the holidays. The book is only $22.95 and is available to be purchased online.

As a Christmas present to our regular readers we will be giving away a copy of the book. Just post a comment on what makes an entrepreneur successful and we will select one commenter randomly in 2 weeks.

UPDATE – Dr. Cossack was named the winner by the Author of the book and a book is being shipped out.