If you are currently advertising on Facebook, or if you plan to in the near future, having a Facebook pixel on your website is a must. This tool will allow you to optimize and fine-tune your ads in order to get the most out of every dollar you spend.
What is a Facebook pixel?
The Facebook pixel is an analytics tool that comes in the form of code. This code is provided to you by Facebook which is then added to your website. When installed correctly the pixel begins to fire when someone visits the site. It tracks the actions and behaviors of that visitor and communicates that data back to Facebook.
How can the Facebook pixel help?
The Facebook pixel allows you to gain more insights into your audience, and track the effectiveness of your paid social media efforts. There are many different ways this data can help optimize your Facebook campaigns. Let’s go over a few of these.
Remarketing
Let’s say someone visits a particular product/sales page on your website. For whatever reason, they did not make an immediate purchase or inquiry during that visit. But, the fact that they landed on that page proves that they do have some interest in that particular product/service.
Remarketing is a clever way to reconnect with those visitors. You can deliver ads to that audience while they scroll through their Facebook newsfeed, view what their friends are up to on Instagram, or while they check Messenger inbox.
Knowing exactly who your audience is can prove to be very powerful. It allows you to craft copy, creative, and an offer that speaks directly to the product/service they showed interest. This can significantly improve engagement rates. In fact, Facebook remarketing ads get 3X the engagement then regular Facebook ads!
Track conversions
A conversion is when a user performs the intended action of your marketing campaign. For example, if you deliver an ad with the goal have someone sign up to your digital newsletter the conversion would be the user subscribing.
Tracking conversions are key to understanding the success of your Facebook marketing efforts. Knowing how many people have converted is one thing but some of the most powerful data can be found in the people who didn’t convert.
Lookalike Audiences
Lookalike Audiences are a great way to expand your potential customer base. Facebook starts by gathering data on the people who have already visited your website. It then searches for other people within the platform who share similar interests, likes, and demographics. Now you have a new audience of people who “look like” your ideal customer persona.
How to use Facebook pixels
The Facebook pixel collects data on various events. All of which can be classified into two groups: standard events and custom conversions.
Standard events
Facebook has a lengthy list of prebuild standard pixel events. They cover the vast majority of events most advertisers are looking to track. Below is a list of those standard events and how they are used.
Add to cart
Track when items are added to a shopping cart (ex: click, landing page on Add to Cart button).
Add payment info
Track when payment information is added in the checkout flow (ex: click, landing page on billing info).
Add to wishlist
Track when items are added to a wishlist (ex: click, landing page on Add to Wishlist button).
Complete registration
Track when a registration form is completed (ex: complete subscription, sign up for a service).
Contact
A telephone/SMS, email, chat or other types of contact between a customer and your business.
Customize product
The customization of products through a configuration tool or other application your business owns.
Donate
Track donation of funds to your organization or cause.
Find Location
Track when a person finds one of your locations on the internet or application with the intention to visit.
Initiate checkout
Track when people enter the checkout flow (ex: click, landing page on checkout button).
Lead
Track when someone expresses interest in your offering (ex: form submission, sign up for trial, landing on pricing page).
Purchase
Track purchases or checkout flow completions (ex: Landing on “Thank You” or confirmation page).
Schedule
Track the booking of an appointment to visit one of your locations.
Search
Track searches on your website, app or other property (ex: product searches).
Start trial
Track the start of a free trial of a product or service you offer (ex: trial subscription).
Submit application
Track when a registration form is completed for a product, service or program you offer (ex: credit card, educational program or job).
Subscribe
Track the start of a paid subscription for a product or service you offer.
View content
Track key page views (ex: product page, landing page, article).
Custom conversions
In the case where a standard event doesn’t work, Facebook allows you to create a custom conversion. Custom conversions are rule-based events and are triggered by specific URLs and keywords.
Let’s use an example of a sports store to better understand how this works. Instead of tracking views on all content using the “view content” standard event you may want to separate those who viewed hockey products from those who viewed basketball gear. You can do this by using custom conversions and tracking the URLs for each of those product categories. This type of granular information can be very useful when creating ads because it allows you to speak directly to their interests.
How to add the Facebook pixel to your website
Step 1: Create your pixel
- Go to your Pixels tab in Events Manager.
- Click Create a Pixel.
- Click create in the box that appears to finish creating your pixel.
A quick note…you are only allowed one pixel per ad account so make sure you name your pixel accordingly. The name of your pixel should best represent your business not the name of a specific campaign within the account.
Step 2: Add the pixel code to your website
Your now ready install your pixel. To do this we need to add some code to your website. There are three ways to go about this 1) update your website’s code manually 2) using an integration tool or 3) send to a developer for help.
Option 1: Update your website’s code manually
- Go to your website’s code and find the header of your website.
- Copy the entire pixel code and paste it at the bottom of the header section, just above the closing head tag.
- Check that your code’s working correctly. Click “Send Test Traffic” after placing the code on your website to make sure your pixel’s working properly. If your status says “Active”, your base code has been installed correctly. This can take several minutes to update.
Option 2: Using an integration tool
A lot of website building platforms and 3rd party tag management tools offer a more intuitive approach to adding your pixel code. Since each will have their own specific set of steps we will not go into detail for each in this article. To help, we have listed links to some of the more popular platforms and tools below.
Website Platforms
Tag Management Tools
Option 3: Send to a developer for help
If you are unsure of how to do any of the above we recommend passing this job off to a professional. It is crucial that the pixel is installed correctly.
Follow the steps below to email instructions to set up the Facebook pixel on your site.
- Go to the Pixels tab in Ads Manager.
- Click Set Up Pixel
- Click Email Instructions to a Developer.
- Enter the recipient’s email address.
- Click Send at the bottom of the page.
Step 3: Confirm your Facebook pixel is working
Now before the metrics start to pour in we want to make sure that they are accurate. Follow the below steps to ensure your Facebook pixel is firing correctly.
The Facebook Pixel Helper is a troubleshooting tool that helps you find out if your pixel is working correctly. It’s a Chrome plugin you can use to see if there’s a Facebook pixel installed on a website, check for errors, and understand the data that’s coming from a pixel. Here is how to set it up:
Note, Before getting started, you’ll need to have the Chrome web browser. If you don’t have it yet, install the Chrome browser.
Install Facebook Pixel Helper
- Go to the Chrome web store and search for the Facebook Pixel Helper.
- Click + Add to Chrome.
- Click Add extension.
Once you’ve successfully installed the extension you’ll see a notification that the plugin has been added to Chrome and a small icon will show in your address bar.
Check that your pixel’s working
- After you’ve installed the Pixel Helper, click the Pixel Helper icon in the address bar.
- Check the popup to see any pixels found on that page, and whether they’ve been set up successfully.
If the Pixel Helper finds a pixel on your site and there are no errors, then you’re ready to start using your data and creating Facebook ads. If you see a notification that no pixels were found on your site or that there’s an error, then you need to troubleshoot the installation.
My recommendation, get the pixel installed on your site today. It will take only 5 min of your time to implement and it starts collecting data immediately.
It’s important to mention that even if you’re not running Facebook ads just yet that setting up your facebook pixel is still a good idea. This way by the time you decide to incorporate Facebook into your paid marketing strategy you have a seasoned pixel with healthy data to use for retargeting out of the gate.
