“We boosted a few posts and nothing came of it.”
Service
Meta Ads Calgary
Facebook and Instagram advertising for the situations where nobody is searching for you yet — and honesty about when that isn't your situation.
- Check whether this is even the right channel
- Put the tracking in first
- Build the audience from real signals
- Make the creative say one thing
Sound familiar?
You’re probably here because…
“We get likes and followers and no actual enquiries.”
“Nobody searches for what we sell — they don’t know it exists.”
What’s actually going on
Search advertising and paid social solve genuinely different problems, and the difference is intent. Somebody who types “emergency plumber near me” has a problem right now. Somebody scrolling Instagram has their thumb moving and no particular problem at all.
That single distinction decides most of whether this channel is right for you. If people already search for what you sell, you can buy their attention at the exact moment they want it — and paying to interrupt somebody who was not looking will usually cost more per job. For most of the trades we work with, that is the situation, and this page exists partly to say so.
Where paid social genuinely wins is when the demand has not formed yet. A service people do not know exists. A local business whose customers are not searching by category. A seasonal offer that has to reach people before they think to look. In those cases search has nothing to buy, because nobody is typing anything.
There is also a second, quieter use that is often the best value here: reaching people who already visited your site and did not get in touch. They know who you are, the audience costs very little to build, and it is a much easier ask than introducing yourself to a stranger mid-scroll.
The work
What we’d do, in order.
- 01
Check whether this is even the right channel
If people already search for what you do, paid search will almost certainly beat this on cost per job. We would rather lose this piece of work than take it while a better answer is sitting there.
- 02
Put the tracking in first
Same rule as search: if the only thing the platform can see is clicks and engagement, that is what it will optimise towards, tirelessly, with your money.
- 03
Build the audience from real signals
People who visited your site, people who engaged, and lookalikes built from actual customers rather than from a guess at demographics.
- 04
Make the creative say one thing
A scrolling feed gives you about a second. One idea, legible without sound, with the offer stated rather than implied.
- 05
Judge it on enquiries, not engagement
Reach, likes and video views are diagnostics. The number that matters is cost per enquiry that turned into work, and it is often the number nobody reports.
What you actually get
Every deliverable, and how often.
No bundles, no “strategy” line item you can’t inspect. If it isn’t on this list, we didn’t promise it.
- Channel fit check An honest answer on whether paid social is the right instrument for your business, before anything is set up. One-time
- Tracking setup Conversions recorded properly, so the platform optimises towards enquiries rather than towards cheap attention. Pixel added only when you supply the account. One-time
- Audience build Retargeting and lookalike audiences built from your real visitors and customers. One-time, refreshed
- Creative & copy A small set of ads that each say one thing, built to work without sound. One-time, then refreshed
- Campaign management Budget, audiences and creative reviewed against enquiries — not against engagement. Monthly
- Plain-language report What it cost, what it produced, and whether it is still worth running. Including when the answer is no. Monthly
The difference
How this usually gets done, and how we run it.
How it usually goes
How we run it
Paid social is sold because it demos well and the reach numbers look enormous.
We check whether search intent already exists first, and say so when it does — even though that means recommending a different service.
Success is reported as reach, impressions and engagement.
Success is enquiries, and cost per enquiry that became work. Engagement is a diagnostic, never the headline.
Boosting posts from the page, because the button is right there.
Proper campaign structure with real objectives. Boosting optimises for the wrong thing by default.
The ad account belongs to the agency.
Your account, your audiences, your pixel data. Audiences take months to build and you should not lose them by changing supplier.
What this doesn’t fix
Worth saying plainly, because paying for the wrong thing is the most expensive mistake on this list.
If people already search for what you do — plumbing, towing, roofing, most trades — paid search reaches somebody who has the problem right now, and it will usually beat this on cost per job. This is the honest first recommendation.
Google AdsPaid social sends people to a page. If that page does not answer what the ad promised, the money is spent before anybody had a chance to convert.
Conversion optimisationHow you’ll know it’s working
Agreed before any money is spent, so there is something to hold us to.
- Cost per enquiry, and cost per enquiry that turned into work.
- Which audience and which creative produced them, so the next round is informed rather than a fresh guess.
- Whether it beats what the same budget does in paid search — checked honestly, and acted on.
- A standing willingness to recommend switching it off. If it is not earning against the alternative, continuing to bill you for it is not a service.
What you won’t get from us is a promised ranking, a promised number of leads or a promised date. Nobody controls those, and quoting them before the work starts is guessing with your money.
What it costs, and who does it
A fixed number before anything starts, agreed with you first — not an hourly rate that drifts. What the number is depends on what we find, and we would rather look before quoting than quote and revise.
10+ years of digital marketing experience. How we work, in full →
Before you ask
The questions we actually get.
Should I be on Facebook and Instagram at all?
As a business, probably — the profile is a credibility check people do. As an advertising channel, only if the economics work better than search, and for most local trades they do not. We will tell you which case you are.
Why do you keep recommending Google Ads instead?
Because somebody searching "emergency plumber" has the problem right now, and somebody scrolling does not. Intent is the most valuable thing in advertising and search is where it lives. When intent does not exist yet, this channel becomes the right answer.
What about boosting posts?
It optimises for engagement by default, which is why boosted posts get comments and no phone calls. If it is worth advertising it is worth a proper campaign objective.
How much budget do I need?
Enough for the platform to learn, which is more than most small tests allow. If the budget is genuinely small, that is usually an argument for putting it into search instead, and we will say so.
Who owns the ad account and the audiences?
You do. Audience data compounds over months and you should never lose it by changing who manages it.
Will you tell me if it stops working?
Yes, and that is the entire point of reporting on enquiries rather than reach. A channel that has stopped earning should be switched off, not re-presented with better-looking numbers.