If you have a business page set up for your travel business on Facebook, you’ve probably noticed the blue Boost Post button in the lower right corner of your posts. When boosting Facebook posts, you pay to have the posts shown to more people than just the people who Like or follow your page.

Consider your target audience, your goal, and how you’ll track your efforts before you boost a post for a smarter approach to your paid posts on Facebook.

Who is your target audience?

When you boost a post, Facebook allows you to set an audience for that post. You can choose a relatively specific audience (people who like your page and their friends) to a general audience (frequent travelers). It’s natural to want to reach as many people as possible with your post, but you consider the post’s content and goal. Who is it going to appeal to, and what action do you want them to take? You don’t want to spend advertising dollars trying to reach an audience that isn’t interested in what you are offering.

For instance, if you are boosting Facebook posts about river cruise itineraries, you’ll want to target an older audience. If you are promoting a trade show that you’ll be participating in, you’ll get more interest from those within in driving distance of the venue, so you’ll want to narrow the geographic location.

What is your goal?

Before you even think about hitting that blue button, consider what you want the person who sees your boosted post to do. If your business page is relatively new and you don’t have a ton of followers, getting a certain number of new Likes on your page is a logical goal. By building up your followers, you’ll have more people who will see your posts organically (i.e. without you having to pay for more reach) going forward.

You could also boost a Facebook post educating followers on the value of travel agents, with a call to action to contact you for a complimentary consultation.

If you have a more established page with engaged followers, you can start to boost posts related to specific offers and promotions. Set a realistic goal for how many inquiries or bookings you want to get about that offer. Urgency plays a big part in the success of promotional posts. Encourage followers to contact you within a certain period of time in order to take advantage of the special.

How will you track it?

Whenever you spend money to market your business, you’ll want to track if it was a worthwhile investment. Part of setting a goal for a post is determining what methods you have available to track if you hit the goal.

If the goal was to earn a certain number of Likes on your page, check your page’s Insights after the boost period is over to see if your post was successful. If your goal is to get 10 inquiries about a limited-time offer, make sure to ask those who contact you about it how they heard about the offer. Keep track of the reach and engagement of the post, to see whether your audience responded to it in the way you hoped they would.

The key is to only use ONE specific call to action per boosted post, whether it to be to Like your page, comment on the post, visit your website, or call you to learn more. Facebook allows you to add a post button to your boosted post with options like “Learn More” and “Send Message” to help you emphasize your call to action and track your results.

Quick Tips for Boosting Facebook Posts

• Start small. The minimum budget to boost a post is $1.00 a day, so you don’t have to spend much to test out one or two boosted posts. After that, see what worked and what didn’t, and then make tweaks.
• Play around with Facebook’s detailed targeting. You can view Facebook’s suggestions for your audience, and you can also browse by demographics, interests, and behavior.
• You can not boost posts that you have shared from another Facebook page—use your own original content or approved content from suppliers or KHM Travel Group. You also can not boost posts from your personal profile.
• The more specific and meaningful you can make the content of your boosted post, the more you will inspire your followers to pay attention. Just because you are paying for more reach, doesn’t automatically mean more people will book with you.

Facebook is just one way to communicate your value as a travel agent! Current KHM Travel Agents can visit the Marketing section of the Agent Portal for more marketing tips and tutorials.

If you’re considering starting your travel business from home, learn more about what KHM Travel Group’s platform of support, education, systems, and resources can provide you by requesting our Travel Agent Information Guide. You can request it by filling out the form on the right or by calling 1-888-611-1220.