With more than 4.4 billion search queries on Google per day, Google Ads is undoubtedly the most popular and effective type of online advertising. When comes to user-engagement, Facebook is also not much behind. It has 1.59 billion daily active users. Both the advertising platforms have plenty of exciting features that only add to the confusion of choosing the best ad network for your business. To give your thought process the much-needed clarity, we have jotted down the basic yet most important qualities and differences of Facebook as well as Google Ads.
What are Google Ads?
Google Ads is the advertising platform developed by Google where businesses can advertise with pay-per-click ads. Google Ads appear at the top of search result’s pages, just like organic search results; their appearance is based on the keywords searched by the user and the alignment of the keywords with the Ad content.
On Google, users are actively searching for a specific product or service. Since Google Ads are shown on the basis of your search, they are often relatable and offers exactly what was asked. This increases the chances of users clicking on the ad.
Google Ads are built in the Google Ad Manager interface. Though it is not easy to use, but advertisers can still quickly build a text-based ad by creating Campaigns, Ad Sets, and individual Ads with a headline and description.
Why should we choose Google Ads?
One of the main advantages of Google Ads is that they are not distracting or interrupting a user. Instead, they are the result of the query raised by the user.
AdWords put you at the top of the Search Engine Result Pages. Helping you to beat your competitors in real-time.
Google Ads also offers mobile Ads with all the required ad extensions. As the number of mobile users is continuously increasing, the chances of your Mobile Ad being noticed and clicked, also increase.
Other special and exclusive features of Google Ads are Google map ads, video ads, call ads, etc.
What are Facebook Ads?
On Facebook, you can create any kind of advertisement by choosing the title, images, and text of the ad. Advertisers are charged on the basis of clicks, impressions or actions. If you want to attract more and more traffic without spending much, Facebook Ads are can help you reach them in no time. Just a few clicks and your ad is all over Facebook, Instagram, and Messenger. A single ad campaign can you can reach millions of people on all of their favorite applications and websites.
Another promising feature of Facebook Advertising is Specific targeting. Facebook shows your ad to the people who are interested in similar products and services. This way even small businesses can thousands of potential customers.
Why should we choose Facebook Ads?
As we all know that Facebook owns Instagram, Messenger, Whatsapp, Oculus and several other such companies and applications where users spend most of their time. It is quite evident that Facebook has a broad audience reach.
If you are a small business whose main target is the local audience, you can’t get a cheap yet impactful platform than Facebook advertisements.
Be it a laptop or a mobile phone, with Facebook ads, you got all the devices covered with your ads. You also get to choose the type of ad, it’s placements and platforms to reach your audience with content that matches the ways your target audience spends time online. With Facebook, even a single picture can go viral within hours, so the power of Facebook ads is humongous. Any advertisement that needs visual demonstration must try Facebook Ads at-least once.
Facebook vs Google Ads
Both of them have proved to be significant drivers for a lot of businesses. Underestimating any of the two would be foolish and can affect your business in the long term. A lot of companies use both the advertisement platforms parallelly to make maximum profit. Regardless of having a lot of similarities, both Facebook Ads and Google Ads have a few differences that can help you choose the one most suitable for your business.
Cost
The Average Cost Per Click (CPC) of Google is more than that of Facebook. But always remember that the audience that clicked on Google Ads are more likely to buy your product. While Facebook is great for spreading awareness, Google is definitely in lead for increasing the no of buyers. For small businesses with a low budget for advertising, Facebook will always be a better and cheaper option.
Return On Investment- Google Ads have higher ROI than Facebook Ads as Google reaches the audience when they are searching for it while Facebook reaches the audience in its free time when they might find it useless and avoid it.
Audience Size
Both Google and Facebook have the humongous reach when it comes to the audience. But the question that arises here is whether your target audience using the same network you are advertising on or not? Even with 4.4 billion search queries, Google Ads are useless for you if no one is searching for your particular product or service. If you are entering the market with something that is new for the audience, first make them aware of it through Facebook. Then only they will make searches similar to it.
Buyer Intent
Since people use Facebook more to socialize and relax than to shop, the buyer’s intent of Google is much higher than that of Facebook. Even if 40 people click on the Facebook Ad, there are chances that even 40% of those 40 people won’t buy it but with Google Ads, even if you get only 10 clicks, chances are 7 out of those 10 might buy your product. Google shows results on the basis of keywords searched by users. Since users are already intended to buy products with similar keywords, you get an opportunity to convert potential customers into actual buyers.
Targeting options
Both Facebook and Google have a lot of beneficial options for targeting and re-targeting your specific audience. Google Ads offers audience targeting options such as Re-marketing Lists for Search Ads (RLSAs) and custom affinity audiences. But the problem with Google Ads is that these targeting options are beyond the reach of small businesses. They are complex and are mainly used by expert marketing teams and PPC management companies.
When comes to targeting, Facebook beats Google through its comprehensive targeting options such as demographic information, interests, browsing behavior, location, political affiliations, life events, and dozens of other parameters. Facebook also offers a lookalike audience tool that helps you reach people whose interests and choices match with your existing audience.
Ad Formats
While you only get to add text in Google Ads, you can add images, videos, slideshows and a lot more in Facebook to make your ad visually attractive. You can’t experiment much with Google. While with Facebook, you get to do all sorts of experiments with your creativity to make the best out of every ad. Since a picture speaks more than a thousand words, the creative and exciting ads on Facebook have a higher impact on the audience.
Advertising Platforms
In Facebook, ads can be placed in user feeds, in the right column, in stories, in the marketplace, and in streaming videos, as well as on Facebook Messenger, Instagram feeds and stories and through the Facebook Audience Network. Since all these platforms are where the audience spends most of its free time, you get a great advantage of putting up your ads here. But with Google Ads, you get only two main ad placement options: Google search results and display within the Google Display Network which also include the top marketing sites such as Amazon, Bonanza, Newegg, etc.
Ease of use
Since Google Ads only shows text, they might appear appears more difficult to use as a heavy-data platform. But once you have used it, you will realize that it is even easier than Facebook Ads. Google Ads are easy to use and understand because they do not offer many ad types, ad placements, or audience targeting options that Facebook Ads do. Facebook Ads Manager has an intuitive and user-friendly interface that makes it easy to set up ads. But since Facebook constantly adds and changes features, it becomes hard to keep up with it. Also, a variety of ad formats, platforms, and targeting options makes it a little more complex than Google Ads.
| Features | Facebook Ads | Google Ads |
| Cost per Ad(CPA) | Cheap, suitable for small businesses also | Expensive |
| ROI | Low | High |
| Buyer Intent | Slightly low | Maximum buyer Intent |
| Targeting Options | Special features such as look-alike audience, sub-categorization of the audience, collected info of billions of monthly users are always an advantage | Less options and pre-saved data of the audience |
| Ad formats | More creative ads with videos, images, carousel ads, and more | Less creative with only text in the Ads but definitely easier |
| Advertising Platforms | Facebook News Feed, Instagram, Audience Network, Facebook Messenger | Google Search, Google Display Network, Google Maps, Google Play |
| Ease of Use | A little complex | Easy to use |
Conclusion
If Google Ads are king of online advertising then Facebook Ads are the ace. Both platforms are highly efficient and useful. Consider the above-mentioned points before choosing the best option for your business. If your main focus is on increasing the sales at the earliest, try opting for Google Ads. but if you want to expand your brand reach and want brand recognition, Facebook Ads can help you with it. For B2B businesses, bigger brands with high budget experts prefer Google Ads while they suggest Facebook Ads for B2C and small businesses with limited budgets.
Even if you decide to use both platforms to gain maximum output, you can always track the results and compare the metrics to know which platform is performing better for you.
