At the time of recording, Q4 is upon us. That crazy season with Facebook ads where it’s super competitive but also super lucrative. So what do you need to do now to help ensure that your client has the right expectations for Q4 in 2021 and that you and your client are best prepared for a successful Q4? We’re going to dig into four things today that will prepare you and your client for Q4.

The first one is communication
You are going to need to communicate with your clients and set expectations. As I mentioned, 2021 Q4 is going to be an extra crazy time.

Last year, coming out of pandemics and such, there were really high CPMs. We are seeing just as high if not higher CPMs this year. Because of all the iOS changes, Facebook losing data and us losing tracking. It has been a very interesting time for ad managers. So communicate that with your clients in case you haven’t already, but I’m sure you probably have.

We are helping them to set expectations, letting them know that this is a Q4 like never before. That we’ve got high CPMs happening now as we speak, we’ve got Facebook having lost a lot of tracking. We can’t see a lot of information coming through in ads manager, so we don’t know what best to optimize for. It’s going to be very competitive. There are many big buyers out there who spend hundreds of thousands of dollars a day on Black Friday sales.

So making sure your clients are aware that it’s a very different Q4 this year than any other year. Anticipate it to be a very competitive time in the Facebook algorithms. So expect high cost per clicks and high CPMs. It doesn’t mean that you should run away and not do Facebook ads. Your audience is still going to be on Facebook. They are still going to be buying, but how can you make that more profitable?

Communicate with your clients and set expectations, even if they’ve had a great Q3, or they had a great Q4 in 2020, or earlier. This one is likely going to be quite different, but assure them that you are on it and that you will be doing your best. You’re going to be in there optimizing, making the changes as necessary as the data comes in to help them get the best results they can. Set the correct expectations.

I know many ad managers who have clients with evergreen funnels or are doing a launch, and they’ve said, “Oh, but the launch back in July, the cost per lead was half the price.” Yes. Things are very different from July to now. Things can be very different from one week to another week. So set those expectations up with the client, let them know that it’s very different, very competitive. It’s not a reason to stop Facebook ads, but you’re going to be all over it and helping them just to have realistic expectations.

Number two is helping them to start building their audiences
That’s going to be super valuable for them as we go into Q4 so that you can keep bringing audiences in top-of-funnel, doing some warm audience building, and then nurturing and retargeting. If you don’t have a retargeting sequence that’s nurturing your audience (I’m not just talking about people who have opted in and here’s a seven-day retargeting window to come back and buy), you’re leaving money on the table that is super valuable to help set up your client with their ideal client. To build awareness of what they do and how they help people establish their authority in the marketplace and continue to build affinity with their ideal client. That way, when their ideal client is ready to purchase, they are the one that is front and center of mind.

That’s where my Client Attraction Code training comes in. Here’s the link if you don’t have it yet. Go over, grab it, and get that incorporated into your clients so they can use that to bring in existing audiences. People who have been engaging with them on Facebook or who are on their email list. Bring them all in. Bring in top-of-funnel and also cold traffic to start warming them up, so that when they’re making that offer in Q4, they have this beautiful, warm audience who knows exactly what they do and how they can help them. And then it’s time for them to say, I want you to help me with whatever service they provide.

So warming up audiences now, with readiness, as we go through Q4. Super valuable, and they’re some of the cheapest campaigns that you’ll be able to run. Big bang for your buck, with getting thousands of people every day into their funnel.

Number three is to start list-building
If they’re not list-building now, start list building!
Get people onto their list so that when they send out emails for the sales, they’ve already got people on their list ready to buy. We don’t want to have to spend on Facebook ads all the time. Start spending, getting them in now, but then you don’t have to rely on your ads to make the sale in Q4 or whatever time it is. They can just send out an email list and make money straight away without worrying about my ads feeding out, or how much is my CBM? What is the cost per click? These people are on their list, and they can be tapped into. Send those emails out and make sales.

When it comes to building a list, it is super important that your client has email sequences that will nurture that audience. Don’t just get them on a list; send them the automation of five, six or seven emails. Have weekly emails that are going out to them. That is going to be of great value. You’re giving them more information and building up the relationship.

With those emails that they send out, it’s always great to have at the bottom: if you have any questions, hit reply. This way, people will click reply, ask further questions, and help your deliverability along the way. So make sure your client, if they’re list building (which is a great idea) that they continue to nurture that audience with regular emails.

With that list building as well, that’s where you can also get back in front of them with Facebook ads because only about 30% of the people will continue to open those emails. That means 70% of the contacts on their email list are not going to continue to open up their emails. So 50% or 40% may never even open an email considering you’ve paid for them to get on the list. What a waste.

So bring that audience into the nurturing campaign, where they may not see the emails, but you can get the emails in front of them through retargeting. This is super valuable as well. That’s getting your client to do list building, sending out nurture sequences, and bringing that audience into your retargeting stack and into that nurture sequence.

Number four is to consider building a new funnel just for Facebook ads if they haven’t done that already
With all the issues of tracking that’s going on, we’re still not exactly sure what’s coming in by organic means, what’s coming in through Facebook ads. There’s always going to be discrepancies.

One of the best ways to do it is to have a funnel dedicated to your Facebook and Instagram ads. That way, you have the best chance of identifying actual numbers. Sure someone may see the ad, and they may share a link with someone else. But it’s still coming in via an ad they’ve seen. They’ve seen the link, maybe shared it. That’s going to be your best friend when it comes to tracking, especially here in Q4 this year.

If your client can, get them to start building that funnel now. Chances are, it will be a fairly simple process. It will be a duplication of the funnel. They may need to hook up some extra tags or campaigns or whatever it is, but that’s going to do both of you a big favour as we go through Q4. They put this ad spend in, and then you’ll be able to go into the back end of the funnel and see, we spent a hundred dollars today on the ads, and we see that we actually got 20 people opting in. Great. So that was $5 leads or whatever it may be there. So a new funnel just for Facebook ads would be your best friend and your client’s best friend.

So how to go about all this, getting your client ready for Q4? Well, it would be great for you to book a strategy session. So whether that is part of their package, or you may want to choose to have that as an extra where you can say, let’s get ready for your Q4. I’ve got some planning sessions available. Normally that would be like $1000 for 90 minutes, but because you’re an existing client, I’m happy to do that for you for $800 or $750, whatever fits in with your pricing model.

If it’s part of your agreement with your contracts, then that’s fine. You would reach out to them and say, let’s book your quarterly strategy session and plan out Q4. Start doing it now because your clients may initially think I’m not going to do anything for Q4. But then they’ll be caught up in all the Q4 excitement, and they say to you like two weeks out, let’s do a black Friday promo, and you’re going, oh my gosh, I’m snowed under with doing this is for everybody else. Sure. I’ll do it. And you’re up all night loading campaigns. That’s not what we want.

So let’s talk to our clients, be proactive, get them booked in for strategy sessions. Talk to them about Q4 plans, set expectations, and look at building up their warm audiences, putting in those nurturing campaigns, doing list building and setting up a new funnel for them.

I hope you found this valuable. Take action so that you, as an ad manager, don’t get caught out with your Q4 craziness. Set the expectations with your clients appropriately. You’ve had the opportunity to discuss with them so that everything is planned out and it doesn’t all come back to you at the 11th hour to be loading up campaigns suddenly.

If you would love to get more tips about running ads for clients and the nitty-gritty of Facebook ads, head over and join my free Facebook group, Ad Manager Adventures.