Facebook pixel

The ultimate Facebook pixel guide

We often stumble upon business that need help with installing a Facebook pixel onto their site. So we decided to team up with one of our partners Tickster to create a post regarding this.

You will also be able to get hold of the guide as an infographic in either English or Swedish. All you need to do is to fill out your emailadress as a comment in the comments section below and we will email it to you.

Before we start…..

Here is what we will go through

1. What is a Facebook Pixel

2. Why is it important to have a FB pixel?

3. Step by step guide – install FB pixel.

4. The different types of standard events.

What is a Facebook pixel?

The Facebook pixel is a code snippet that you place in the HTML code on your website. 

When the FB pixel is placed on your site, it triggers cookies when users interact with your website.

The pixel then collects data that helps you track user interactions on your website. 

And why is this good……..?

The data that the FB pixel collects allows for ad optimization such as targeting (audience targeting) and remarketing to people who visited your website or specifically took some form of action on your site.

There used to be two types of Facebook pixels:

Prior the FB pixel they used to be called the Conversion pixel or the Custom audience pixel. Facebook removed these two pixels 2017 and switched to what now goes under the Facebook Pixel.

If you are using the Facebook conversion pixel, you will need to switch to the FB pixel.

You can learn how to do this here. 

If you are still using the custom audience pixel, you can read here on how to transition to the current pixel.

Anyways let’s get on with why should install the Facebook pixel in the first place…..

Why is it important to have a FB pixel?

There are 3 main reasons why you need to have a FB pixel installed if you would like to advertise with Facebook Ads.

1. Track Conversions

You may get 100 clicks to your site through your ads but how many of these clicks convert and become customers? You will not be able to track conversions unless you have a Facebook pixel in place.

2. Ad Optimization

If the Facebook pixel is implemented correctly, it collects information about visitors to your site that you can use to create better Facebook ads and your ads will more likely show to relevant audiences that are more likely to convert.

3. Retargeting Ads

Create customized audiences depending on what actions your visitors have taken on your site. For example, if someone added an item to their shopping cart but did not complete their purchase, then it will be possible to target these visitors with new adds to remind them to complete the purchase.

Retargeting Ads data:

• There is 70 times higher probability of people going through with a purchase VS when shown a regular ad.

• 10 times higher CTR (Click Through Rate) for retargeting ads.

• People who are exposed to retargeting ads usually spend 5 times more money than people exposed to regular ads.

Example of a desired action

Suppose that you want to reach people who click on your ads and land on your site to buy tickets to an event. Without a FB pixel, the ads will not be able to determine which people are relevant to show the ad to (the target audience), which will cause the ad to show up to lots of irrelevant people. –> This results in wasting money on advertising that doesn’t lead to a desired action.

As soon as the FB pixel is in place and the more data collected, the likelihood of reaching the desired target audience increases.

The pixel learns over time to show ads to relevant people who will take desired actions (in this case, click on the ad and buy a ticket on your site). This, in turn, will increase the conversion rate for your Facebook ads, which will ultimately result in a higher return on ad spend for you.

Good to know regarding a Facebook pixel:

Even if you don’t use Facebook ads today, you should install the Facebook pixel as soon as possible. 

This is because the pixel starts collecting data as soon as implemented which can be valuable data when you decide to start advertising with Facebook.

Step by step guide – Facebook pixel implementation 

1. Start by logging into https://business.facebook.com/

2. Click on the menu in the upper left corner.

3. Under the Measure & Report column, click: Events Manager.

4. Once you have clicked on Events Manager you will be presented three Data source options. 

a) Choose: Facebook Pixel: Track Website Activities.

5. Enter the name of the pixel and domain where the pixel will be implemented and click Continue.

6. In the next step you will find three options for installing the pixel

Option 1: Partner Integration

For example, if you use WordPress as a CMS tool you will be able to set it up through your WordPress account or you could use GTM (Google Tag Manager).

Option 2: Manually install the pixel yourself. You could use this option as well if you would like to implement the FB pixel by using GTM. This step enables you to copy the code that you will need to apply in your GTM container. 

Option 3: Email instructions to a developer.

7. If you have a Web developer in-house or the client you are working for (if you are an agency) has a Web master then we recommend you to choose option 3: “Email instructions to a developer”.

If you choose option 3 the next step will look like the following:

8. Fill out the developers email address and click Send.

9. If you choose Option 2, the next step will look like:

10. Important! Don’t forget to enable advanced matching! 

This means that you are more likely to collect data for all your conversions. 

There are also studies that have shown that you can increase the reach of your ads by 5% – 25% when advanced matching is enabled. This also allows you to target advertising to target groups similar to your target groups that have already converted. 

Read more about advanced matching here. 

11. Once the FB pixel is in place, don’t forget to test the pixel so it works properly by clicking Send Test Traffic.

12. Last but not least, you need to add one or more event codes for each landing page depending on what you want to track, for example, it could be to track purchases or when users complete a registration form. We will go through all the different standard event options in the next section.

List of Standard Events

The most common types of Events

Events can be described as activities performed by visitors to your site as a result of getting there through an organic source (such as from a search engine such as Google or from a Facebook Page) or through a paid source (such as Facebook or Instagram advertising) .

Example of a traceable event: A visitor registers via a contact form or adds an item to their cart. When it comes to event tracking, you have two options, standard events or custom events.

Custom Events

A custom event will most likely only be relevant for you to add if you run an e-commerce company and would like to measure, for example, when people are buying a men’s shoe of a certain color for a certain amount.

Read more about custom events here.

Standard Events

For most companies, implementing one or a few of the standard events available as default is more than enough, without need for manual configuration. Examples of these are listed in the image above. 

To see what these events can look like in code, you will find more information here.

Lastly an important note:

You may be using a different version of the Facebook Business Manager so the print screens might look a little different in our guide above VS how the different steps actually looks for you.

However, there shouldn’t be a major difference from version to version so you should be able to understand what to do if you follow our guide. 

We have now gone through the basics of what a FB pixel is and how to set up a fb pixel to your site. 

If you’d prefer us to set the FB pixel up for you, just let us know and we’ll sort it out for you in no time. Check out what else we can help your business with here.

If you have any questions at all or just want to give us feedback please comment below.

And don’t forget……

If you would like us to send you the guide as an infographic in either English or Swedish please email us at hello@flinkdigital.com or comment your emailadress below and we will send it over in a sec!