I got scammed!

Sometimes if something seems to good to be true it probably is.

At the end of last year I decided I wanted to make my website look more professional and have my own domain name on it, so I went in and took a look at the plan offers. I chose one that required I pay for the year upfront, I would have gone for a slightly cheaper one but I liked the look of the advertising package it offered with it, Twitter Ads, FB Ads and Google ads so I decided to go for it.

First disappointment was the twitter ads, I didn’t activate it in time my mistake with that one, google ads clearly states you have to spend cash first but I was not too bothered it was the FB ads that I believed were the really important ones,

I followed instructions and went to set my ad up realising time was running out however turns out that it was not that simple.  I had at one point clicked on a link on my FB page and looked at setting up an ad and the costs it seems because I had done this it rendered the voucher invalid, I only learned this after several stroppy messages to FB including a plethora of screen-shots and then finally realising why my voucher had not worked and referring my to some hidden terms and conditions in the Wix side of things, as you can imagine a stroppy message has now been sent to them.  I was lucky and because I was on top of it only ended up a tenner out of pocket in total others were not so lucky judging from forum posts and set their ads for higher daily values and have been charged more.

So I guess the other thing to address is FB ads themselves and whether they are worth it…

I set it to just spend two pounds per day, and as I have cancelled it this morning after finally getting to the bottom of this I spent £8.45, I gained 8 likers as a result of the campaign at the cost of £1.06 per like and my ad was shown to 621 people.

I have to be honest it is not something I would bother doing again in terms of page likes, it is easier and far more interesting to get those by visiting other pages and interacting with people, the only benefit is you reach people you do not personally know so it does broaden your demographics but only within the targeted market.  I might consider it at a later date using it to promote a book with a link for sales but for just gaining likes it is too expensive unless you have more money to spare in order to reach a wider audience.

My mistake was not too costly and in the long run can be seen as a learning experience but I will be certain to double check all the terms and conditions before I go for anything offering me perks again.