How to Boost a Post on Facebook 2021 and What is a Boosted Post

Wondering how to boost a post on Facebook, or whether boosting posts is worth it at all? This article discusses those questions and provides a quick tutorial on how to boost your Facebook posts.

In brief, a Facebook boosted post is a less complex version of an ad. They are easier and faster to set up and run, but overall less powerful (especially if you’re talking about using a significant budget).

A boosted post probably won’t outperform an ad most of the time, unless it’s being compared to an ad set up by a beginner, in which case it certainly could. But if you know how to write ad copy and how to set up Facebook ads, you should be able to do better than the average boosted post.

Looking at Facebook in the light of a social platform and not just a marketing tool, let’s take a step back and consider how to get the best reach and engagement out of our content. 

Facebook Boost Post vs Facebook Ads

As anyone campaigning against boosted posts will be quick to tell you, Facebook ads are definitely better than boosted posts. Why? They have more options, come with better analytics, and overall offer you a better chance of finding and communicating with your target audience.

Regardless of whether you go with a boosted post or an ad, make sure you understand Facebook’s ad policies. These change fairly regularly, so if you are running a lot of traffic from Facebook it’s worth reviewing the policy monthly or quarterly.

That said, there are advantages to using the boost post function; it’s not a mere money grab by Facebook as some marketers would have you believe. First of all, boosting a post is faster and easier than running a proper ad.

Additionally, a boosted post can have a much lower budget than an actual ad. While it’s true that you can stop an ad at any time to avoid paying the full budget, that involves having the expertise to use the ad manager and the time to check up on your ads regularly to pause them as necessary.

After much research and deliberation, my conclusion for myself and my clients was that boosting posts on Facebook is worthwhile in certain circumstances. If you’re just getting started on Facebook and only have a small budget, and find the ad manager too complex, it’s a good option for getting your page some extra exposure. Likewise, if you have a significant budget for Facebook ads, you may find it saves some time and effort to put a small percentage of that budget into boosting posts.

With that in mind, I decided to create this tutorial on how to boost a Facebook post. Facebook is constantly updating things, so the screenshots and videos may not be exact, but this should be an easy to navigate walkthrough for boosting your best posts.

Which Facebook Post to Boost

Choosing which Facebook post to boost is important – if you boost something no one has had any interest in, it’s not likely to gain you may new followers. The easiest way to decide on a post to boost is to view all of your posts in the Published Posts section of the pages publishing tools. Click on “Publishing Tools” in the secondary menu on your business page to access the published posts section.

s a general guideline, you want to pick a post which has had a decent number of reactions from your current followers. However, it’s also important to consider why a post got the reactions it received. For example, if you have many friends who like memes following your business page, your most popular posts might be a funny cat meme. That doesn’t mean that you should promote a meme; you should pick a post which represents your business and your brand. Pick a post that is likely to help you achieve your goal, whether that is simply to spread awareness or to create a conversion.

Boosting a Post from the Published Posts Page

From the published posts page, click on the post you wish to boost. A dialog will open displaying the posts stats and displaying a boost post button. This is the best place to make your final decision about whether or not to boost this particular post.

If you decide to go ahead with it, click on the blue button to proceed. The dialog will change as pictured below, providing you with a number of fields to fill out and options to select.

The first decision you must make is whether to optimize your post for clicks or for reactions. In my video example I chose to go with reactions, for a couple of reasons. Firstly, you can use reactions for any type of post whether it links to your website, a different site, YouTube, or nothing at all. Secondly, when someone reacts to your page’s post you get the option to invite them to like the page as well. Once they like and follow your page, they’ll receive all of your posted updates and be more likely to click through and consume more of your content.

Optimizing a Boosted Post

I highly recommend selecting a button from the dropdown menu pictured below – including a button or “CTA” (call to action) will make users more likely to click on your ad.

Choosing an Audience for a Boosted Post

There are a number of factors to consider when choosing an audience for a boosted post. For example, is your business mostly B2B (business to business) or B2C (business to customer)? If you’re mostly B2B you may target business owners, people who studied business management in school, or entrepreneurs in certain lines of work. If you’re mostly B2C, you might focus more on interests related to the product or service you’re selling.

It’s important that your audience be specific enough that those shown your ad will be likely to click on it, but it’s also important that you appeal to a broad enough crowd for Facebook to have some room to work. There are a lot of options to choose from when selecting an audience, so if at first your choices are too restrictive, try getting a bit creative. 

How to Budget a Boosted Post

I recommend starting with a budget of $1 per day for 5-10 days. This will allow you to test the waters and see how your chosen audience reacts without committing too much money to advertising. 

Did you find this post helpful? Use the buttons below to share this post with your friends! I’m planning on making several more Facebook tutorials, so feel free to comment with questions and requests!