The Reality of Facebook Ads in Tutoring

In our tutoring community, many have turned to paid Facebook advertising, aiming to attract new clients. However, the stark reality is different from our expectations. These adverts, instead of reaching the parents and students we are trying to connect with, are predominantly displayed to fellow tutors. It’s akin to fishermen casting their nets only to find they’ve caught other fishermen instead of fish.

This misdirected targeting illustrates a critical flaw in Facebook’s algorithm – it struggles to differentiate between those offering and those seeking services in our specialised fields.

Following this, the digital landscape of today presents an undeniable attraction for utilising Facebook’s extensive network for our marketing purposes. As a UK-based tutor in a specialised niche, this platform promises a direct connection to the families and students I aim to reach, offering sophisticated targeting capabilities and the potential for expansive reach. Yet, as I navigate through this digital marketplace, the actual outcomes often starkly contrast with any initial expectations.

This blog acts as an introduction to a more in-depth discussion, paving the way for a comprehensive guide coming very soon that will reveal effective strategies to engage potential clients on Facebook, sidestepping the unreliable results of paid advertising. As I delve into the intricacies of Facebook’s algorithms and their impact on our industry, I invite you to join me in rethinking the conventional approach to paid adverts and exploring alternative avenues for genuine engagement.

The allure of Facebook advertising lies in its promise of precision targeting and broad reach. However, industry data and my own experiences paint a different picture, particularly for niche sectors like ours. While Facebook reports an average click-through rate (CTR) for ads across all industries at around 0.9%, the tutoring sector often sees a significantly lower figure.

A closer inspection reveals that a significant portion of the audience reached by these ads comprises peers within the tutoring community rather than the intended demographic of parents and students seeking tuition services. This misalignment is further exacerbated in niche markets, where the specificity of our services fails to translate into effective targeting through Facebook’s algorithms.

The result is not just a lower CTR but also a diminished return on investment (ROI), as the ads fail to engage the very audience we aim to attract. This disconnect highlights the need for a tailored approach to marketing within our industry, one that goes beyond the conventional metrics of digital advertising success.

Consider the digital marketing sector as another example, which is similar to our tuition industry in this way. A digital marketing specialist advertising their services on Facebook might find themselves viewing ads from other digital marketing professionals. Their professional interest inadvertently aligns them with the target audience, yet they are not in any way potential clients of their competitors or visa versa, but Facebook can’t tell the difference between someone interested in the topic because it is their job and a potential customer.

Now, contrast this with a business in a different industry, like pet supplies. A pet shop owner selling dog bowls who naturally has an interest in animal products may find other dog-related adverts, including those from competitors, relevant and engaging. Their business and personal interests align with the advertisements they see, which is just not the case in our industry.

Why Peers, Not Parents, See Your Ads

Why am I writing this blog today?
It struck me today yet again that virtually all the sponsored posts (which are paid adverts) which are in my own Facebook thread are from other tutors.

Despite their investment, these paid adverts reached me – a fellow tutor, not their intended audience…

This leads to a vital question about Facebook’s algorithm: what proportion of people viewing these ads are actually like me, a fellow tutor, rather than the parents and students they aim to attract?

I suspect the number is significantly high, rendering these adverts totally ineffective for their intended purpose.

What about you?

Do you constantly see adverts for other tutors?

I bet that you do!

Adding to this issue is the content of some of these adverts. A number of them contain claims that are either misleading or blatantly false. “Raise your GCSE grade to Grade 9 in a month” Such dubious content, viewed by professionals like us who know that there is no such thing as a guarantee and certainly that huge leaps in attainment are rare. These adverts not only fail to attract potential clients but, in the long term, also risk damaging our profession’s credibility if they are seen by real potential clients who assume that all tutors “peddle snake oil.” The problem is two-fold: the nature of these claims, and the fact that these ads are being shown to other tutors, and we are all too aware of these exaggerations, which is annoying.

The evolution of Facebook’s algorithm over the years, with its increasing focus on user engagement and complex targeting parameters, has inadvertently made it more challenging for niche services like independent tutoring to connect with our intended audience through paid ads.

Why do boosts or paid ads not really work for us?

Over the years, I’ve made numerous attempts to utilise Facebook Boosts or paid advertising for my tutoring services, only to find each attempt a monumental waste of money. Despite the lack of success, feedback from fellow tutors, such as ‘Good luck with your new group lessons, I saw your advert about it’, was somewhat comforting. It confirmed that my ads were visible; however, they were not reaching my intended audience, and I had paid for the privilege! Initially, I thought the problem lay in my targeting choices, leading me to tweak demographics and ad options, but this didn’t give any real improvement.

Gradually, the more I engaged with other tutors back then and shared experiences, the clearer it became: Facebook advertising was not a viable strategy for us. Despite various attempts to refine my approach over two years, the results remained the same. The ads often probably only reached other tutors instead of parents, never gaining me any leads and leading to wasted funds. I was cautious, never spending more than £10-£20 on a single campaign and no more than £100-£150 in total; even that now feels like money down the drain.

The issue, I learned, stems from Facebook’s constantly changing algorithms, which are designed more to encourage continuous spending than to deliver tangible advertising results unless you have big budgets. From discussions with more experienced tutors in coaching sessions, it became apparent that at that stage of my business, paid Facebook advertising was utterly pointless.

While Facebook paid advertising may work well for industries with a broad target market, the tuition sector operates differently. Such businesses can afford to spend hundreds on targeted Facebook adverts, casting a wide net that, even with a small conversion rate, can lead to substantial sales. But, our aim is to secure a few more clients, not to sell thousands of products, and we rarely have any advertising budgets, limiting us to reaching maybe 500 to 1000 potential clients on their timelines. If the targeting misses the mark – reaching other tutors instead of parents – the chances of attracting actual tuition clients are nearly non-existent.

The reality is that with a small base of followers, boosting posts or paying for adverts often results in minimal increased visibility, and primarily among those who have already shown interest in our pages.

What is organic reach?

This is the figure that Facebook gives you as to how many people get to see your post. Organic means it’s the opposite of a paid advert. Historically, organic reach for Facebook business pages has been reported to be quite low. A few years ago, it was common for pages to reach approximately 5-10% of their followers organically. However, more recent figures suggest that this number has dropped even further, with estimates often cited as low as 1-2% for some pages, particularly as the platform continues to prioritise content from individual users (your friends) and the groups you belong to over businesses onto your timeline.

It’s important to note that these figures can vary widely based on multiple factors, including:

• Content Quality: High-quality, engaging content that resonates with your audience can see higher organic reach.
• Engagement: Posts that receive more likes, shares, and comments may then have increased visibility and influence the reach for future posts.
• Posting Time: Content posted when your audience is most active can see higher reach and engagement.
• Frequency of Posting: Posting too frequently can lead to audience fatigue, whereas too infrequently may mean your content is less likely to be seen.

Imagine you’ve got 200 followers on your business page, which seems decent. But here’s the kicker: if you post something without boosting or paying, less than 20 of those followers, maybe as few as 5 or 10, will actually see it. This all comes down to organic reach, which is just a fancy way of saying the number of people who might see your posts naturally, without any paid promotion. So, even if 200 people like your page, the harsh reality is that way fewer than 20 will even see your content. After hitting ‘like’, most won’t check your page again. Sad but true.

Consider your own habits: when was the last time you revisited a page you liked?

I have used the estimation that 10% of people who actually follow your page and also see your post will engage with it by liking and commenting, but that is a very high estimate. The industry average is 1% for clicking through (CTR) to somewhere else, so likely, with these figures, 1/2 a person out of the 200 would then click through on any link you have.

Boosting posts

When you create a regular post on your Facebook business page, advertising your service without paying for ads, Facebook often tries to tempt you into boosting it. You might notice a ‘want to boost your post?’ prompt almost every time. They’re hoping you’ll bite and decide to boost it by, say, £10 or £15 and take a gamble it might work. But let’s break down why this usually doesn’t work for us, using a bit of maths. Imagine multiplying numbers: the larger your base number, the larger your result when multiplied by a decimal. Conversely, if your base number is small, the result when multiplied by the same factor, will be much smaller.

This principle applies directly to Facebook boosts. Theoretically, when you go into the ad centre on your page, it will tell you how many people a certain amount of money will get your advert in front of. If, for example, you said that you wanted to boost your advert to women between the ages of 30 and 45 who have children and live in a particular town or area of a city. Facebook will tell you that, for example, for £10, it will put your advert in front of 10,000 people. However, in my experience and in research for this, that actually isn’t the case. When I remember back to when I did this myself when I looked at the analytics after the campaign had run, I didn’t have 10,000 people who had seen the post; I had at most 100-200 people.

So in fact although they are promising large amounts of people for your money when we are dealing with very small budgets not only are the numbers not huge but in fact what they say will have your advert in front of them and what actually happens on not the same. They get around this by saying the figures are “potential reach”, but that is the total maximum number if absolutely everything else works well. With anecdotal evidence from myself and many other people within this industry only having a small, tiny marketing budget, it really does seem to appear that you are actually at the most getting your adverts in front of about the same number of people who actually like your page. Although they do not say this is the case, it seems to be that boosts merely amplify your post’s organic reach, which is often disappointingly low to begin with. So, when you boost a post with already minimal reach, the end result is an increase that’s barely noticeable, making it hard to justify the expense.

In this example, I am assuming that the boost rate is 50%, which would give you 15 seeing it instead. Even if we boost the full 200 likes at 50%, you will only probably get about 300 people seeing it despite what they might originally suggest. Again, if 10%, then engage with the boost. You might expect 30 likes and comments, but only 3 would also click through.

For our business pages, only a tiny slice of those who’ve liked the page stay engaged. Boosting a post might seem like it’ll increase visibility amongst your 200 followers, but don’t be fooled. The reality is, even with a boost, you’d be lucky if 50 see it. That’s £10 or £15 spent just to reach the audience you assumed was already seeing your content.

This means that even if you have hundreds of followers, only a small fraction will see your unpaid posts. Take my larger tuition business page, for example, with 331 likes. Only 23 people, just under 7% of my followers, saw my last post organically. Boosting might marginally increase this, but not significantly, as it will probably be in effect in boosting the 23, not the 331.

Sometimes, the algorithm might showcase your boosted post to new people, but it’s unlikely, even then, they’ll be the exact audience you’re aiming for. More often than not, it ends up showing your boosted posts to fellow tutors, who are women between the ages of 30 and 45 who have children and live in a particular town or area of a city. Even when delving into full paid adverts through the professional Business Centre dashboard, where you can test different ad setups, the visibility remains disappointingly low. It’s been several years since I last used paid adverts, and unfortunately, Facebook’s history doesn’t allow me to check back that far. However, from what I remember, even doubling the viewership through boosting only ever reached a fraction of my followers. A fully paid advert set up through the ad centre might fare slightly better and also appear on Instagram, but that’s assuming your target audience uses Instagram.

After much consideration and analysis, I’ve concluded that for small tuition businesses like mine, paid Facebook advertising doesn’t justify the cost. The most effective strategy is to add quality content to your page and share these posts in local groups, which can serve as free, organic adverts.

Shifting Towards Organic Growth in Tutor Marketing

Building authentic connections and reaching parents actively seeking tuition services is invaluable. Yet, this desired reach is virtually impossible with paid Facebook advertising. The very nature of paid adverts means we’re not achieving organic reach; instead, for us, we’re also paying to reach the wrong audience. The algorithm is more likely to display these ads to our peers, not the interested parents we aim to engage. This highlights the need for a shift in our marketing approach on Facebook, focusing on strategies that foster genuine, organic connections.

In my upcoming eBook guide, I’ll delve deeper into how this approach can help attract tuition enquiries and grow your follower base naturally. By consistently engaging with your audience and sharing relevant content, you can gradually expand your reach and ensure more people see your posts.

I suggest that tutors focus on creating and sharing valuable, niche-specific content that addresses the unique needs and pain points of their target audience. This content can take various forms, such as blog posts, educational videos, and infographics, and it can be shared organically on your Facebook page and relevant groups to attract and engage the right audience without relying on paid ads.

As we navigate the complexities of marketing in the tutoring industry, it’s crucial to reassess and redirect our strategies. We should concentrate on cultivating relationships and networks organically, bringing us closer to the families and students who genuinely need our services.

Let’s invest our time and efforts into building these authentic connections rather than pouring resources into a flawed advertising model that doesn’t serve our specific needs.

My next blog covers how to do this in more detail and has an ebook guide and spreadsheet to help you reach the right people in the right way. This will dive deep into effective, non-paid strategies tailored for us independent tutors, ensuring our marketing efforts resonate with the right audience and reflect the unique value we bring to our students.

If you want to discuss this or anything else do reach out to me at https://www.jackpotmaths.com/contact-us/ , and I will happily support you.