It seems like everyone and their mother is jumping onto Facebook chatbots, doesn't it? They’re social, fun, useful, super cool, and… unfortunately they're often pretty complicated to make.

People are saying that chatbots are the future, and it totally makes sense. While business owners are busy doing other things like serving clients and running a business… People online expect you to react instantly to their emails, Facebook messages, comments, and more.

I’ve seen over and over again with my salon clients that they’re overwhelmed with Facebook messages from several days ago and don’t even have a chance to respond before they have 5 more.

Imagine this, though: Having an artificial intelligence sidekick to answer questions, book appointments, do marketing promotions… it sounds like a dream.

And it could be, if only chatbots weren't so complex. Because they're so customizable, they can get pretty complicated to do on your own, or pretty expensive to have someone make for you.

In this blog I show you exactly how I made a chatbot for a salon in less than 5 minutes. We used this bot in her Facebook ad campaign and it has been amazing for bringing new clients in.

The future of Facebook ads for beauty businesses

By now, most salons know Facebook is a honey pot of potential clients. You can target exactly the right demographics with the right interests, show them your services and bring them in for an appointment. It’s perfect!

But there’s something interesting I’ve been noticing about Facebook ads. It's related to the new Facebook algorithm that you've probably heard a lot about.

People don’t want Facebook ads to be like ads anymore.

They want them to be personal, friendly, immediate, and Facebook-oriented. They want any ad they see to be more like a conversation with a friend on Facebook.

And you know what’s not like a conversation on Facebook? A business hiding behind its logo, doing a bland promotional sale that brings you to a website to book an appointment.

Think about it.

When you’re on Facebook, scrolling and looking to be entertained and distracted, who will capture your interest?

A business with fancy graphics and stock photos that wants you to click a link to their website?

Or a personal video showing an amazing human being doing what they love to do, and an invite to chat?

Yeah… you'll probably choose the chat one.

I'm going to show you a case study from my recent client and how we completely turned around her salon's Facebook ads.

Originally, we started out with ads that were pretty “businessy” with stock pictures and nothing personal.

Then, we completely changed up the ad and made it a personal video. We also set up a super simple chatbot so that instead of sending people to a booking page, we would connect with them over Messenger to get them in for an appointment.

Spoiler alert: the second ad has been crazy successful.

I'm also going to run you through a video of exactly how we set up this simple and free chatbot. It will make your ads engaging and give you a huge return on investment.

How to be a lovely human being on Facebook... even in your ads

If your salon's posts on Facebook have slumped in reach, engagement, video views and more… you’re not alone.

Facebook was pretty clear when it said it will clean up the newsfeed and make business pages lower priority under friends, family and Facebook groups. It sucks, but it's reality.

The best way to combat these changes with your organic posts is by revealing the human, personal side of your business.

Show pics of your staff, share live videos and get in front of the camera, no matter how nervous it makes you (trust me, it’s something I’m still getting used to!)

So what about ads? Did the Facebook algorithm change those too?

Not technically. But coming from someone who has been doing Facebook ads for myself and for clients for the last 6 years… I can 100% tell you that things are changing.

First of all, ads are getting more expensive. With thousands of businesses jumping on board every day, that’s no surprise.

But second of all, from a content perspective, the type of ads that were once successful don’t get any clicks or engagement at all. If you keep playing the old game, you can pour money into Facebook without getting a single booking.

Here’s the simple truth: People ignore Facebook posts that look like ads.

The less like an ad it looks, and the more personal and “Facebook-like” it is, the better. So the same rules that apply to organic posts, apply to ads.

To show you just how powerful “be a human business” on Facebook is, I'll show you an example from a client of mine.

The original ad we started with

The link brought people to a landing page (mini website) where people could book an appointment.

Over a couple of weeks a few leads trickled in, but not too much excitement or interest. It just wasn't personable enough.

So we paused it and reformulated a strategy.

I wanted people to see just how cool the owner of the salon is, and how much passion she puts into her job of caring for others.

So we redid the ad. I got her to film her location and some of the services we were promoting. I packaged that into a cute video with relaxing music, but also, very importantly, we made the description of the ad super personal.

The new and improved ad

See how we introduced the owner of the salon and showed her passion for what she does?

We’ve been running this ad for a couple of weeks, spending only $5 a day, and we’ve had 38 people comment to book in an appointment. Not bad at all!

So how do we take those comments (the call to action was to comment "Spa day" under the ad) and turn them into bookings. Enter the super easy but super effective chat bot.

How to connect your amazingly human ad to a chatbot that will bring in appointments

Here’s where things get super interesting.

I’m going to show you exactly how I set up an ad like this and connected it to a free chat bot service called ManyChat that will bring people in for appointments.

Watch the video below to see exactly how I do it:

To summarize the video, here are the different steps I took to make an ad exactly like this:

1) Start with an awesome, personal video that is under 1 minute long.

2) Set up a Facebook ad campaign with the Campaign Objective of getting engagement (very important!)

3) Choose your target audience (I usually just go on gender, age, and proximity). Try to make your audience consist of at least 50,000 people.

4) Make the placements on Facebook "news feed only" and choose your budget. $5 a day is a good place to start.

5) Upload your video and write your ad. Introduce yourself, talk in a conversational way about your salon and your offer. Make it friendly and talk like you would in real life. Make sure that at the end, in order to claim your offer, people have to comment something specific.

6) Publish your ad and wait for it to get approved.

7) While you’re waiting for approvals, create an account on ManyChat.com and connect your Facebook page to your account.

8) Go into Growth Tools > Facebook comments and insert the “post ID” of your Facebook ad.

9) Choose the “trigger words” that will start the bot conversation and the first message they’ll receive. It should be something along the lines of “Thanks so much for claiming your *explain package*. To get yours, please reply back to this message with your name and phone number."

10) Select a followup message if people reply. Give them info to book in, whether that’s a link to a booking page or a phone number to call you on.

11) Follow up with people who you haven’t heard back from in a few days. If they haven’t replied with their contact info, ask for it again. If they provided you their phone number but haven’t booked in, call them up and talk with them.

And that’s it! You’ve just set up your very first chat bot!

Why chatbots and Facebook ads are the perfect combo

This bot works so well because it engages people right when they’re commenting so it’s immediate. They don’t have to wait for you to come online and message them.

Also, if you keep the tone of the bot personal and friendly, it’s the perfect way to stay “human” and not corporate in your ads.

Finally, you’re keeping people on Facebook. Most of us prefer not to be brought to external websites. Facebook also wants to keep people on its platform, so this form of advertising tends to be less expensive.

In conclusion

Whether you’ve been experimenting with Facebook ads for your salon for a while or your a total beginner, this is a simple, doable ad campaign that will bring you interest and bookings.

Just remember to be human in everything you do (not businessy!), make a short video that shows who you are and what you love doing, and create a friendly chatbot.

So now that you've created an amazing Facebook ad and a friendly chatbot, how can you make your ad even more successful? Show it to the right people, especially people who are already familiar with your business.

Download my free PDF guide where I show you exactly which people to show your ad to that will lower the cost of your ads and get you even more engagement.