Introduction

Marin Social offers full support for Facebook's Reach & Frequency campaign type.

By using a Reach & Frequency (R&F) campaign, you'll be able to plan (and predict) the delivery, cost and reach of your campaigns in all-new ways. In this article, we'll provide a full overview of platform support for the Facebook R&F campaign type. 

Benefits Of Reach & Frequency

There are plenty of benefits that come from using R&F campaigns with your Facebook advertising. The main advantages are as follows:

• You're able to enter a lifetime campaign frequency cap for the specific individuals who see your ads on Facebook.
• You can receive your estimates via either a maximum budget amount, or a desired reach goal. Reach and budget estimates are (according to Facebook) 99% accurate.
• Increase the reach of your campaigns to encompass unique people across your target audience.

Limitations Of Reach & Frequency

While R&F campaigns are supported by the platform, there are a few limitations that you should keep in mind.

Objectives

At present, R&F campaigns are only available for the following objectives: 

• Post engagement
• Outside traffic
• Video play
• App install
• Conversions
• Brand Awareness

Note: Conversions objectives do not support Instagram for Reach and Frequency.

Audience

The placement of your R&F campaign ads must be one of the following:

• RHS Desktop
• Newsfeed Desktop
• Newsfeed Mobile
• Newsfeed Desktop and Mobile
• Newsfeed Mobile and Instagram
• Newsfeed Desktop, Newsfeed Mobile and Instagram
• Newsfeed Desktop and Instagram
• Instagram

Audience Limitations

• Audience does not use Website Custom Audience and Connections for friends.
• Only one country can be specified.
• Minimal iOS version cannot be specified.
• The Audience should be at least 300k people in size.

Other Limitations

• There is a minimum run-time of 1 day and a maximum of 90 days (Note: This maximum can be lower in certain countries and for certain accounts).
• The stop time of an ad set needs to fall within 6 months of prediction.
• Reach: There is a minimum reach of 200k people

Note: Currently, Reach & Frequency can only be edited at the ad level, not at the ad set level. 

Step-By-Step Guide

The actual setup of a Reach & Frequency campaign is broken down into three different steps: Prediction, Ads, and the Summary.

Below we'll outline each of these steps for you. 

Prediction Step

1. The first thing to do is to set the criteria for your R&F campaign. This includes Audience, Time Range, Frequency, and Page. Note: Please bear in mind the limitations mentioned above.
2. Next, you'll be able to Run Prediction. This will actually display all of the possible predictions on a curve to give you a visual representation of the possibilities. 
3. Using the Comparison Mode, you can compare different sets of criteria. Each curve shown is related to a specific set of criteria, and you're able to compare one criteria type at a time. On the curve, you can also compare the different budgets for a given reach. This also works the other way: by clicking Compare against Budget/CPM. You can navigate on the curve, by clicking on it manually. For your reference, the precise coordinates of the selected point will be displayed above the chart.
4. You can also write the exact desired reach/budget in the header, it will display automatically the related budget/reach.The prediction selected is the one displayed in the header. Next to the reach, you'll be able to see a percentage value for the Reach. This represents the prediction divided by the maximum potential reach of your audience. The Avg Frequency value it is the average frequency that will be achieved on your total campaign running period.
5. Once you're done, click Save and the platform will select this prediction.

Ads Step

1. Next, you are able to select either existing posts, or create brand new ones.
2. A preview will be displayed where you'll be able to select Ad Sequencing. This designs a certain sequence of ads to be delivered to your users in order. Please note that the ad duration is fixed by Facebook and cannot be modified. Note: Ads whose order is higher than the frequency cap will not run. If you'd like an ad to run twice or more in a sequence, we recommend that you create it twice (or more).
3. Note that when the objective is Mobile App Install, the mobile app ad is created via Create Post > Link Ad > and then the link of the post should be the link of the store. Note that this should be the one selected in the prediction step.

Note: You can actually choose to skip this step, and add your ads later. However, if you don't do so within the first few hours after booking, your prediction from the first step will expire. We therefore recommend that you create ads during this step, or shortly after booking.

The Summary Step

The summary allows you to review all of your settings and give a name to your new campaign. 

When clicking Book, Facebook will book your prediction. After booking, you are still able to cancel your booking by deleting your campaign, however please note that frequent reservation cancelations may result in loss of access to Reach & Frequency buying.

Important Notes

For each of the steps above, you're able to save your campaign as a draft and re-use it later with all your previous settings pre-loaded.

If ads are removed after booking a campaign, you must create an ad within 24 hours for ad sets lasting 3 to 30 days, or 6 hours for ad sets lasting 1 to 2 days. If you do not, Facebook delete the reservation

If you book and delete multiple times R&F campaigns, Facebook can prevent you from using this type of auction in the future. Before booking a R&F campaign, make sure all settings are correct.