For many businesses, advertising on the social network Facebook has proved to be very successful. Facebook’s model is to be pretty rigid in terms of what you can and can’t do in your ad. They’re all the same size, shape and format. There are specific character counts for the headline and the body copy.

So you have to work pretty hard to capture someone’s attention, considering all the sameness. The ads are inexpensive, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy to do them well. If you’re going to invest the money, be sure you consider these suggestions.

Start with the end in mind: As in any marketing effort, you should set your goals up front. How will you define and measure success? Know what niche you’re targeting and what you want the potential customers to do.

Decide – click or view: You can pay for Facebook ads in one of two ways. You can pay for impressions or for clicks. If you’re just looking for awareness, impressions may make more sense. If you want to drive people to another website or a specific product’s landing page, then clicks will work better.

Already be there: Ideally, you would couple your Facebook advertising with a robust Facebook fan page. You should also change the standard URL that Facebook assigns your page to a custom URL. It’s free once you have 25 likes for the page.

Visuals: Facebook allows you one photograph per ad. The maximum size your photo can be is 110 pixels wide by 80 pixels tall. You’re much better off to pre-size your photo yourself, rather than have Facebook do it for you.

You want to have a picture that pops off the screen, and that’s tough at 110 pixels. Be sure to choose a photo that is dramatic and not too busy. You’ll get bonus views if your image is unusual, very local (if that’s your target) or even something shocking or impossible.

Hit the target: One of the biggest benefits offered by Facebook ads is the ability to hyper-target your ads. You can target by geography (down to a specific city), gender, age, education and even marital status. Beyond that, you can also target your ads by keywords. You can be so specific that, for example, the only people who will see your ads are married women who live in Colorado Springs, are between 25 and 33 and love black-and-white photography, horses and iPads.

This means there is very little waste. You can pinpoint exactly who matters. You can also narrow the field too much. Be sure to think through these decisions carefully.

Less is more: You have only 135 characters for your body copy, so choose every word with great care. Don’t waste any words on giving users contact information (they’re going to click on the ad if they want to reach you) or details that aren’t critical to getting them to click. As in all advertising, asking a question can be a very compelling way to get someone’s attention.

Testing 1-2-3: One of the best things about Facebook ads are all the free analytics. You can track and test your ads over and over again until you’ve reached the pinnacle of effectiveness. Run multiple ads in a campaign and see how they perform. Watch for ads that start to slow down. Change something simple like the headline or image to see if activity picks back up.

Facebook ads can be a potent tool in your marketing arsenal, so make the most of them.

Drew McLellan is Top Dog at McLellan Marketing Group and blogs at www.drewsmarketingminute.com. He can be reached by email at Drew@MclellanMarketing.com. © 2011 Drew McLellan