Am I Ready for Facebook™ Ads? The Truth Behind the Funnel First Myth

In this episode of Abundant Funnels, Jayne answers a question she hears all the time from business owners who feel stuck in that uncomfortable middle ground. Organic content is not performing the way they need it to, but they have also been told that ads only work if they already have a proven funnel or a successful business. Jayne explains why this is not the full truth and what actually needs to be in place before you start running Facebook™ Ads.

She breaks down the difference between needing a certain revenue level and needing the right foundations, why waiting to “prove” a funnel organically can keep you stuck, how ads can help you gather meaningful data much faster and why starting with a modest budget is often the smartest way to begin. She also covers the mindset shift that makes a huge difference when you first start running ads, seeing them as a test and optimise strategy rather than expecting perfection straight away.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• Why you do not need to be making a certain amount of money before you run Facebook™ Ads.
• The two real foundations you need before you start.
• Why the “proven funnel first” advice can keep business owners stuck.
• How ads can help you prove and improve your funnel faster.
• Why you do not need a huge budget to begin.
• What numbers to watch once you start running ads.
• Why ads are a test and optimise strategy, not a set and forget one.
• How to know if you are actually ready to start.

Connect with Jayne:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/webonize

Website: https://webonize.com.au/

FREE Resource - The Facebook™ Ads
$3 Lead Formula: https://learn.webonize.com.au/leadformula

Join Abundant Ads Academy: https://courses.webonize.com.au/abundantadsacademy

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

I'm Jane Day and welcome to Abundant Funnels. I help coaches, course creators, and online experts get high quality leads and consistent sales without relying on guesswork, constant content creation, or $10 leads. In fact, I'm known for getting some of the best cost per lead results for quality buyers in the industry. This show is where we break down the ad strategy, the funnel, and the numbers so you can grow your revenue and buy back your time in a way that's actually sustainable. Let's get started. Hello and welcome back to the podcast. I'm so delighted to have you tuning in today. So today's episode has been inspired from a question that was asked at a recent masterclass I ran. And is also a common question I get asked by business owners who are wanting to start running Facebook ads. The business owner who asked it said something like, I feel like I'm in this limbo. My organic content isn't performing the way I need it to, but at the same time, everyone says you need to have a successful business before you start running ads. So I don't know where I fit. Am I even ready to run ads? And I just want to say if this is you, I really hear you because that in-between place is genuinely uncomfortable. You're working hard, you're showing up, and it can feel like you're doing everything right, but still not getting traction. It can feel like you are doing all this work and not getting anywhere. And then you look at ads and think maybe that's the answer. But then someone tells you that ads only work if you already have something working and proven. But how do you get that when you don't have a big audience already? So you just go around in circles not making any real progress. So today I want to give you my perspective on this after working with hundreds of business owners over the past 14 years that have been exactly at this stage. This is what actually needs to be in place before you start running ads, and you might be a lot closer than you actually realize. Okay, so first things first, let's address that idea that you need to be already making good money before you can run ads. Because I hear this a lot and I want to be really clear. This is simply not true. If you look at the businesses running ads that are very successful, they aren't running ads because they're successful. They're successful because they are running ads. The running ads comes first, not the other way around. What I think people mean when they say that you need to be already making good money before you can run ads, and there's a bit of truth in here, is that ads amplify what's already there. So if your offer isn't clearly defined, if your messaging is off, if your funnel doesn't make sense, then yes, throwing ad spend at it is going to be painful and expensive if you're not careful. But that's a different conversation that you need to be making X amount first. You don't need a certain revenue level to start. You need the right foundations, and those are two very different things. Alright, so let's talk about what you do need. And I want to keep this really simple because people overcomplicate it. There are really just two things. Number one is a way to collect leads. You need something that gives people a reason to hand over their email address, a lead magnet, a free guide, a quiz, a private podcast, a challenge, a workshop. Whatever makes sense for your business and your audience. Something of genuine value that your ideal client actually wants. And look, I know that can feel like a whole project in itself, but it doesn't need to be elaborate. Some of my clients' best performing lead magnets are simple: a checklist, a short video training, a free masterclass. It's not about how big it is, it's about how relevant it is to the person you're trying to reach and how it takes people on a journey from being a lead to then becoming a paying client. Number two that you actually need is an offer on the other side. So you need something to actually sell. Something your leads can move into once they've gone through your nurture secrets, seen your content, and built some trust with you. And that's it, that's the backbone. Now you can start collecting leads before you have this offer set in concrete and ready to promote, but you do need to know what your offer is going to be in order to be collecting leads that are going to be interested in that offer. If you have those two things, the lead magnet and an offer, you are ready to start running ads. Now here's another piece of advice that comes up a lot, and this one I want to spend some real time on because it sounds completely logical and it's actually holding a lot of business owners back. You've probably heard some version of you shouldn't run ads until you have a proven funnel. And look, in theory, it's great advice. It totally makes sense. If you know your funnel converts, you can pour ad spend into it with more confidence. I get it. But here's the reality for so many business owners. Unless you already have a large engaged audience, and most of the people I work with don't, that's exactly why they're looking at ads. Proving your funnel organically can take an incredibly long time. We're talking months, sometimes longer, because you're waiting for enough people to trickle through organically to actually get any meaningful data. So you end up in this holding pattern. You're waiting to prove the funnel, but you can't prove the funnel because not enough people are going through it. And you can't get more people through it because you're not running ads yet. It's a loop that keeps you stuck. This is where ads completely change the game. Ads are a shortcut, and I mean that in the best possible way. They compress the timeline. Instead of waiting six months to get 50 people through your funnel organically, you can get that same traffic in a week or two, and now you actually have data to work with. Now you can see what's working and what isn't, and you can make informed decisions. So rather than waiting until your funnel is proven to start running ads, use ads as the tool to prove it. That's a much smarter way to think about it. There is another part of that question that I really want to address because I think a lot of people assume that meta ads require a huge budget to get results. And I just don't see that in the accounts I look after. You do not need to start big. In fact, I actively encourage my clients and students not to start big when they are starting out. When starting out, there will be two strategies that you'll want to start with for your ads based on the framework that I use. They are audience building and lead generation. Audience building can be successful on just $1 a day ad spent to build a warm audience. Your lead generation phase is where the majority of your budget goes. And even then, I'd suggest starting at around $20 a day to begin with to start seeing results. Which, yes, is a real investment, but it is a fraction of what people assume they need. The point of starting small is that you're testing, you're learning, you're finding out what messaging resonates, what hooks land, what your ideal clients actually respond to without blowing your budget in the process. Now I also want to come back to something else in that original question because she mentioned that her organic content wasn't performing the way she needed it to. And I see this a lot. Here's something worth thinking about. When you're relying purely on organic, it's really hard to know what's actually working and what isn't because the volume of traffic is just too low unless you have a big engaged audience. You can't see clearly where people are dropping off in your funnel because not enough people are going through it. Ads fix that. Ads send traffic through your funnel consistently, which means you can actually see your data. You can see where people are opting in when they're dropping off, what they're clicking on, what they're not. And that gives you something really valuable. It gives you information you can act on. So, in a way, ads don't just generate leads, they give you clarity. And when you've got clarity, you can make better decisions faster. Okay, so I want to talk about something that I think is one of the biggest mistakes I see people make when they first start running ads. And it's a mindset thing more than a technical thing. A lot of people launch their ads and then they kind of just wait. They cross their fingers and hope it all comes together. And then a couple of weeks later they're disappointed because it hasn't magically worked and they conclude that ads don't work for them. I want to gently but honestly tell you the chances of your ads working perfectly, straight out of the gate, are very rare. And that's not a reflection of you or your business, that's just how it works. Ads are not a set and forget strategy, they're a test and optimize strategy, and you keep testing and you keep optimizing. There's a difference there. So when you start running ads, I want you to go in with this mindset. You are gathering information first and getting results second. Because the information and the data leads to the results. Here's what that looks like in practice. You're looking at a few key things. Firstly, are your ads actually converting at a good cost per lead? This tells you whether your ad itself, the hook, the copy, the creative, it's doing its job of getting people to click through and opt-in. If your cost per lead is way higher than you'd expect, something in the ad needs attention first. Second, once people land on your opt-in page, are they actually giving you their email address? This is your landing page conversion rate and it's separate to your ad. You could have a brilliant ad that gets loads of clicks, but if your landing page isn't compelling or clear, people will leave without opting in. So you need to look at this number independently from your ads. Thirdly, once someone is on your list, are they actually engaging with your content? Are they opening your emails? Are they clicking through? Are they consuming what you're sending them? Because if people are opting in but then completely disengaging, that tells you something important about the gap between what your ad promised and what they're receiving. Each of these is a different level, and when one of them is off, you don't scrap everything, you identify which part isn't working and you fix that part. This is so important, and it's something I go really deep on inside Abundant Ads Academy because people often come to me thinking that they have an ads problem when actually they have a leaning page problem, or they think they have a leaning page problem when actually it's the email sequence that's dropping the ball. The ad is just the door. What happens after someone walks through that door matters just as much, if not more. So please, when you start running ads, don't just let them run and hope for the best. Check in. Look at your numbers. And when something is off, edit it straight away, improve it, test a new version. That's how you get results. Not by hoping, but by paying attention and responding to what the data tells you. Okay, so let me leave you with these three things to ask yourself. You if you are at the stage of thinking of starting to run ads, do I have a lead magnet or something of value I can offer in exchange for an email address? Do I have an offer, even if it's not fully launched yet, that I can sell to the people who come through my funnel? And lastly, can I commit to a modest daily budget, even $20 a day, and go in with the mindset of testing and optimizing rather than expecting perfection straight away. If you're nodding yes to these three things, then you're ready. You don't need to wait until you hit a certain revenue milestone. You don't need a proven funnel. You don't need a massive audience. You just need those foundations and a willingness to learn and adjust as you go. I hope this episode has given you a bit more clarity and a bit more confidence about where you sit right now. Because I really do think so many people stay stuck in that in-between place longer than they need to, waiting for some magical moment when they feel ready enough. The truth is that moment doesn't come on its own. You create it by taking the next step. If you've got questions about this or if you want to talk through whether your specific business is at the right stage to start running ads, come over and find me on Instagram at WebNIS. I genuinely love these conversations. And if you found this episode helpful, I'd so appreciate it if you could leave a review or share it with a business owner friend who might be in that same in between place. It really does help more people find the show. Alrighty, that's it from me today. I'll see you on the next episode. Bye for now.