Paid advertising is a major part of digital marketing. And when it comes to paid advertising, there are two major players. Facebook Ads and Google Ads.

And as a digital marketer, I keep getting this question over and over again.

What is better? Facebook Ads or Google Ads?

Some say Facebook Ads work for them and bring results. Some say Google Ads work for them very well.

But what is the truth?

Let me explain the difference in this blog post.

Today, you will get clarity.

Facebook Ads

People do not log in to Facebook to find a product or service. They login to consume content inside the platform.

Facebook has a lot of information about its users. Age, gender, demographics, location, and so on.

When you run an ad on Facebook, people may or may not be interested in what you have to offer. But you can reach your target audience who are most likely to like what you have to offer.

Let’s say I am offering my Digital Marketing Internship program for people looking for digital marketing training. People may be interested in it, or may not be. I have no way of knowing.

But I can run ads only to the people who are most likely to be interested in my program instead of showing it to everyone on Facebook.

The age group of 18-35. People who are interested in the topic of “Digital Marketing”. It gets the targeting right, but it is still not intent-driven (where they are looking for me).

When I run Facebook Ads, this is what I experience:

  • Low CTR (Click Through Ratio)
  • Lots of impressions
  • Low cost of impressions

The people who are interested in what you have to offer might be less but the cost is also low. That means you can filter out the highly interested people from a large group of potentially interested people.

Facebook Ads are really good if you are trying to reach an audience who does not know the existence of your product. They might not be searching for it proactively.

It’s also good for branding and driving brand recall for your product or service.

Facebook Ads are outbound advertising. You are reaching out to people instead of people reaching out to you.

Now let’s compare this to Google Ads.

Google Ads

People search on Google because they want something.

In Google, you will not have much information about who the audience is but you will know what they are searching for.

What they are searching for. There is a better term for it. Keywords.

Since they are making their intent very clear with the search keyword, we do not need to worry about their demographics and interests so much.

You are going to look at what people are searching for (through keyword research), and you are going to show ads to them. Anyone of any age looking you specifically is a potential customer.

(Please note that I am talking about search engine ads when I say Google Ads here. I am not talking about display ads or YouTube ads.)

Let’s say people are searching for “Digital Marketing Training”.

The intent is very clear.

People who search for this are looking for a solution. I can run an ad for them and tell them about my Digital Marketing Internship program.

With Google Ads I get:

  • Higher CTR – because only the people looking for me are seeing my ads.
  • High CPC – because I am getting targeted high-quality traffic.
  • Higher cost per lead but higher quality

A lot of people think that Google Ads are costly and they don’t want to use it. But that’s not the way it has to be seen.

You should not worry about the cost per click or cost per lead.

You should think about your ROI (Return on investment).

In Digital Marketing terms we call it ROAS (Return on Ad Spend).

And that’s how these two platforms are different.

In terms of the mechanics of search, SEO and SEM work on the same principles, except SEM gives you an opportunity to bypass the organic search results and show paid ads on the search engines itself.

I wouldn’t say Facebook Ads are better or Google Ads are better. Both are good in their own ways. I generate more than 1,000 leads from Facebook every day and more than 1,500 leads from Google Ads every day.