Episode 14: The Emotional Rollercoaster of Facebook Ads

In this episode, I dive into the hilarious reality that most people think they are the “only ones” that feel stressed when running Facebook Ads, when in fact – we’re all on exactly the same rollercoaster.

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Full Transcript:

Hey everyone, this is Julie hope you guys are doing awesome. Today I want to talk to you about the emotional rollercoaster of Facebook ads.I have a lot of students and clients that are running Facebook ads and it’s so funny because they all talk to me and they all say the same thing and they all think they’re the only one feeling this way. So I thought, you know what? I’m just going to lay this out there and kind of level the playing field because Facebook ads are totally a rollercoaster.

First. I want to preface this by saying it doesn’t really matter how much money you’re spending in Facebook ads. For anyone who is only spending $30 a day or $30,000 a day, it’s still the same emotional response happens. I think the first problem with Facebook ads are there’s almost this mythical magical quality to Facebook ads that people think once they turn a Facebook ad on, everything is going to change in their business. And I’ve actually seen this happen where people turn ads on and then they immediately stop or they sort of kind of get lazy with the organic methods that they’re using because they feel like, oh, well, you know, traffic is running. That’s going to do all the lead generation for me. I can just kind of sit on my butt a little bit.

And the reality is that you should never be dialing down your organic traffic efforts. Never. Because no platform is really… nothing about this business is really as passive as everyone wants to make it out to be. When you start running Facebook ads do not stop any of the organic methods whether you’re doing podcasting, YouTube videos, blogging, Facebook groups, whatever it happens to be. Don’t dial it down because you turn ads on and you think, oh, well now I have ads.

The second misnomer about Facebook ads is that you can just turn an ad on and just let it run, right? And so I find people stressing out when an audience that was working, all of a sudden the cost of that audience, when they’re trying to generate leads goes way high. Or an ad that was doing amazingly well starts to tank and I get these frantic Voxer messages that say “well I had a great lead cost and now it’s so much higher and I don’t know what to do.”

And the reality is that Facebook ads are a full-contact sport. There’s always new audiences, the new ad, creative, new copy, different ads, whether it’s messenger ads or its image ads or canvas ads. The people that you pay when you pay a Facebook ads manager…I know you might hear from other gurus, “oh, this is the best job in the world has become a Facebook ads manager. You just throw up some ads and you push a few buttons and then you let it roll.”

But the reality is the reason that Facebook ad managers get paid as well as they do is that they’re constantly assessing ads, creating new ads, setting up different types of retargeting ads, looking for audiences. It is an active-active game.

So not only is it untrue that once your ads go on, you can just stop doing any organic lead Gen, but it’s also true that when ads go on, you have to actively and consistently manage, update, refresh, and create new ones.

The next thing I wanted to just say is that a lot of people, because Facebook ads are so easy to set up, right, the anybody can just log into their Facebook account and set up an ad in five minutes and throw $100 at something, that doesn’t mean they’re easy to set up. They’re not necessarily easy to be successful at.

I want to paint this analogy for you. Imagine back before ads on the Internet and all that kind of stuff. How did people advertise? Right? Radio and TV commercials. Especially with TV commercials, the barrier to entry was kinda high, right? You needed a well-produced video. We have all seen the horrible commercials, so you needed a highly produced video. You also needed a connection at a TV station you needed, and then you would hand your creative to an expert who would then put it on the channel. Right? But now we’ve been tricked to think that because the barrier of entry went lower, that the skill level to do it well is also lower. And that’s not true because in fact every time you put an ad on Facebook, you are competing with enormous brands like Pepsi, like General Mills, I’m just looking at all the things in my office right now. I keep talking about my deodorant. You are competing with these huge brands that have enormous budgets and entire teams that are working on the Facebook ads.

And so that’s your competition. And so don’t let Facebook fool you into thinking because it’s easy to set up an ad, it’s easy to be very good at ads because it’s not. It takes practice. So I think all of these things kind of play into this emotional roller coaster because we have unrealistic expectations from the start.

I will say that every time I turn on a Facebook ad, I feel a little bit like I’m going 200 miles an hour around a corner with one hand on the wheel. And the more money you spend per day, the more anxiety-producing it is. Because I’ve been spending about $1,500 a day on ads and when I make sales that equal that amount, I feel really happy. If there goes a day where I don’t make sales because not every day is the same, I feel a tremendous amount of anxiety because I feel like I’ve just thrown $1,500 on a blackjack table and I lost it all. Right? And so God forbid you to have two or three days like that, you can, if you are not ready for it, you’re going to panic.

So this is the classic thing that I see with my students and clients. They finish, some sort of sales funnel and they’ve been laboring over the sales funnel. So there’s so much relief and excitement that the funnel is done. There’s also a ton of trepidation at turning on the ads, right? So that’s the first emotion you might feel as like, “Oh God, what if this doesn’t work?” That’s always the fear is after all this time and energy birthing a sales funnel, if this doesn’t work, I’m just going to die. You’re not going to die. But that’s how it feels, right?

If you get over that emotional hump, then you actually set up the ads and then you turn them on and there is a little bit of an adrenaline rush there because they go into pending review and you feel like, okay, all right, here we go. Right? You’re in the car, you’re in the rollercoaster, you’re buckled up, you’re ready.

So then if the ad gets approved, you’re so excited. Right? If the ad doesn’t get approved, but that’s a whole different roller coaster. Maybe we’ll talk about another day. So the ad gets approved. You’re super excited, but you’re also nervous because you’re spending more money than you felt comfortable with because a lot of us thought, oh, I’ll just spend $30 bucks and make $300 until you run into someone like me or other teachers that are like, “no, you actually got to spend a grand here in the first 48 hours to get some good data,” and you’re just like, “oh my God.”

So you’re spending 100 bucks a day, let’s say. So you’re nervous and you’re checking your ads every three minutes. Now you’re forgetting the fact that Facebook doesn’t really know your customer very well, doesn’t really know your funnel, and it’s going to take time to optimize and if you’re not spending enough money to give Facebook the juice in gas, it needs to find your customer, it’s going to be a very, very slow roll. And then you’re going to obsessively…Then this is where the obsession starts to come in where you start to check, check, check, check, check, like every five minutes if you’ve gotten a lead or you know someone has opted in or whatever it is you’re trying to do.

The funniest part is when you do get leads right away or you get a sale right away, the high is so high. It’s like that first lead, that first application, that first sale is just like all the angels in heaven are just pouring down on you and you just feel like you can do anything. And it’s pretty common. It’s happened. You know, I’ve seen it both ways, right? Where people get sales right away or a leads right away. And then people who just kind of drags on and on.

But what happens is usually after that first initial rush, because let’s face it, if you, if you’ve done any kind of organic visibility stuff, people are going to see your ad and know who you are. And I always see, like when I first released a campaign, I get a kind of a rush of, of leads and sales and I’m like, Whoa, it’s amazing. And then silent. And then all of that, initial stuff just kind of slowly, it’s like a slow downhill. And then your anxiety goes up and up and up and up. And it’s like, what do I do? What do I do? How do I change it? Why is that not working? It was working, now is not working. What do I do? You know? And it’s like this frantic panic.

And I see this happening again and again, so many people do not have the stomach for Facebook ads when they start, they have no idea. You know, when you invest in anything like, especially cryptocurrency and everyone’s always like, oh, just you better have a strong stomach. And we’re like, Oh yeah, I’m strong.

You invest in the stock market. Oh yeah, I can ride the lows. It’s fine. I’ll hold. It’s exactly the same with Facebook ads. It’s like you make a when you make a sale, you get a lead, you’re high, and then it starts to, the ad starts to fatigue or the audiences get colder and harder and people are just not converting as well. And you have to figure out what’s wrong with your funnel. And the panic. It’s like I’m spending money. People don’t have the kind of stomach they think they have, even though they promised themselves at the beginning of this that they would spend a thousand dollars just to test their $500 in and they’re panicking.

And it’s, okay, I remind you, you said you were going to spend a thousand dollars just for data and testing. Why are you panicking? And so, the psychological rollercoaster that happens when you invest in the stock market or you invest in cryptocurrency is the same exact psychological response in Facebook ads.

So if you are struggling with Facebook ads and you’re struggling with that high and that low, I would encourage you to read up on some of the psychological mind exercises that people have to do when they invest in the stock market or cryptocurrency or things that are volatile because it’s the exact same mechanism.

It is very normal for you to have good days and bad days. You have to look over the month or maybe at the minimum over the week, not per day. And if you’re on a diet, you watched the scale day by day. It’s like you have a good day. If you’ve lost an ounce, you have a horrible day. If you’ve gained an ounce, it’s the same thing with Facebook ads, don’t look, just walk away.

And my biggest, my biggest piece of advice for people who feel completely thrown by the emotional rollercoaster, that is Facebook ads. I will say to you this, decide what you’re going to do before the ad goes on. How much are you going to spend and what is the stake in the game? And then don’t waver from it because that’s the biggest mistake. It’s like, oh, I’ll see and know how much are you going to use? How much are you going to invest? And then do that and don’t look. And if you really, really struggle, you may just need someone else to manage your ad account a because they’re going to have a stronger stomach with your money, then you will.

So I hope that helps. I hope for any of you who feel like, “gosh, my ads fatigue so faster, my audiences run out. That’s normal. For those of you who feel like, gosh, it was so…I had such a good run at the beginning and then things started to fatigue. That’s normal. For people who are like, oh, I was making a great return on ad spend when I was at $500 a day. Now I’m at a thousand. I’m not making any more profits. That’s normal. That’s called the painful art of scaling Facebook ads. You are normal. This is a full-contact sport. Anybody who tries to tell you that it’s very passive and that you can just sit on the beach and role in millions of dollars while you know you’re one little Facebook ad just churns out money for you is lying. It is not true. All the big people making millions have an entire team and this is their active job constantly. Don’t give up your organic methods when Facebook ads. Don’t get lazy. And just remember, we’re all on the roller coaster together. I’ll talk to you guys soon.

If you’re ready to create, grow, scale your online business, you can go to createyourlaptoplife.com/podcast and get a free plan on how you can get started today.

Episode 12: Your First Test As An Entrepreneur

In this episode, I talk about a common problem I see with start up entrepreneurs wading into the waters of the online business life. If you’re just starting out, here’s a test!

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Full Transcript:

Hey, what’s up guys? This is Julie. It is actually 3:00 in the morning and I am recording podcasts because I can’t sleep. One of the things that kept me up tonight that it was making it really hard for me to go back to sleep was this idea of, you know, I have a lot of students and clients and they all come to me with this question. Yes, but what about my business?

And what I mean by that is as a course creator, as a coach, I’m constantly trying to figure out where the patterns are and the themes are in online business. If you want to start a coaching business or if you want to start a course business or an agency business or a software business, what are the themes and the patterns in that business to follow? This is important for me to know because I write books because I build courses and I create curriculum that is aimed to help people on that journey and yet no matter how many times I go around this merry go round and no matter how many times I say, this is the process, this is the way you do it.

I get people that come to me and they say, yeah, but what about me in my business? And I find this so fascinating because I think intrinsically as humans, we want to be unique, right? We want to think that our idea, our business, our life circumstance is somehow unique and that other people don’t experience what we experience. In fact, I had someone the other day join my program The Digital Gangsta and it’s basically a comprehensive digital marketing program designed for most online business types, right. It’s designed for agencies and course creators, coaches and consultants, even software businesses, blogging businesses. The only kind of business that Digital Gangsta doesn’t work as well for is a physical product, e-comm business or a local business.

So anyway, the point is it’s a big curriculum. It’s pretty comprehensive and it is going to give you digital marketing fields for all those businesses and yet even with learning paths and welcome modules and step by step instructions on kind of where to go and how to get there, I still get the question all the time, yes, but what about me? What about business? I’m trying to start this type of business and then they proceed to tell me this same type of business I’ve been helping for the past three years. Or they say, yeah, but what about me? I’m a single mom, or what about me? I don’t have money or…

I guess my question, one of the things that are tumbling around in my head is in your business, in your journey to a laptop life, how many times do you think that you’re unique? Do you think that the problems that you’re having getting started or the tools that you can’t figure out how to use or the customers who are hating on you, on your Facebook ads or whatever that happens to be. You think, yeah, but this is unique like this happened to me and this doesn’t happen to other people.

I can assure you $10 thousand, million, billion, bajillion percent that it is not unique. You are not as unique as you think you are and that it is happening over and over and over again to other people. That shouldn’t be a discouragement to you. That should be an encouragement, which means number one, you’re not alone. Number two, there are a lot of people who start their online business life. Maybe they buy a course or they sign up with a coach and what happens? They feel overwhelmed. They feel like, well wait, this isn’t like. It doesn’t say, Susie, step one, go over here and do this, step two, you know, let your cat out and then do this over here. And so people then they panic, right? Because they’re looking for that spoon fed step by step, this is what you do, but maybe because you’re scared, maybe because you’re not sure you’re overwhelmed and then you think to yourself, well, but what about me?

Right? And I see this happen all the time with Russell where he’s like, I’ve given you the blueprints. Like Russell Brunson has written Dotcom Secrets. He’s written Expert Secrets. He’s created courses. He’s hired coaches like me and Steven Larsen and other people like this to help walk the path that so many people have walked over and over and over and over and over again. Right? And so one of the things that, that as a coach I do in, in both of my business and over with ClickFunnels, is we coach people. We help people and it never fails even after the path has been laid out again and again and again. People come to us and say, well, this isn’t working for me because I have a unique situation or my funnel has to be unique because of X, Y, and Z and it somehow our drive to be unique or to be like the exception to the rule and, I guess what I want to do is I want to flip that on its head and say, listen, I know it may feel like saying, hey, you’re not the exception to the rule like everyone else, you know, 8,000 people before you have gone through this, but I want to flip that to be an encouragement to you. That if you trust in the fact that there are a lot of people who run this path before. There’s a lot of people who’ve signed up for courses or signed up for programs or embarked on the laptop life and then all of a sudden felt like they were drowning drinking from a fire hose and completely unable to see the forest through the trees. That’s normal.

I’m reminded of a story when I started with WordPress. So I back in my journey. I applied for a job with WordPress, which is a company called Automatic and, they give their new hires a six week trial and at the time I was just applying for like a customer support role or was it applying for anything exciting and I remember them telling me that they were going to throw me into basically into their entire system with very, very little in the way of instruction.

And that that was kind of the point in that the idea was that they would figure out who is best for the job based on how they fared in the ocean of Automatic. And I remember the first day that like I got my account and the first day I got access to the software and it was just like, holy crap. There was like this whole underworld of things happening. I remember entering and being like, oh my gosh, look at this, look at this Slack Channel, look at this, this and look at this whole forum. And there was just like this massive society of WordPress team members that was living right underneath my nose. And I didn’t know it and I felt like I was drowning. I felt like I was drinking from a fire hose. I didn’t know which way was up, which I was down.

I didn’t know who to ask. And I remember them saying to me like, that’s the point. That’s the whole point because you’re never going to be ready for this job if you can’t navigate this landscape. And so I want to say to you, if you’re starting an online business and you’re feeling that overwhelmed, that firehose, your instinct is to be like, well, this isn’t for me. Like this isn’t unique to me or my business is different or my. My situation is different than the actual thought that I think you should switch it to is actually, no, this is normal. This is my first test. This is my first test to see if I can survive this feeling of overwhelm. This feeling of the firehose. This feeling of I’m not sure what to do next, but you know what? Dammit, I got to just take a step in a direction I gotta try.

I gotta fail. Because of that very, very first feeling when you create that laptop life for the first time and you’re just freaking out, that’s actually a part of this journey. Like everybody goes through that you’re not unique. You’re not alone. It’s not a problem with your, uh, your mentor or your course, you know, we want to look for something to blame. Like, oh, well, if I just had a different way of looking at it, it would be easier. Better. I would figure it out. No, actually this is normal. This is how it feels. This is what you’re supposed to feel in this stage. This is actually your first test. How are you going to fare overwhelm? How are you going to fare the firehose feeling?

And so my encouragement to you is if you’re starting your laptop life and that’s how you feel. If you feel like the person who joined the Digital Gangsta, and said oh my gosh, but what about my business? Like, I’m totally overwhelmed. This doesn’t seem like I don’t know how to figure it out. The reality is that it is exactly for you. That feeling is normal and it’s your first test.

So I hope that that helps and I appreciate you all and I’ll talk to you again soon. If you’re ready to create growth scale your online business, you can go to createyourlaptoplife.com/podcast and get a free plan and how you can get started today.