In all of my travels, I’ve never been to Texas. So when the opportunity arose for me to attend Facebook’s Blueprint Live session in Austin, TX (the in-person Facebook education event for advertisers and marketers) — you might say I was excited.

Really, though, I’m not sure there’s a word to describe my getting to go to on a work trip to the live-music capital of the world. Stoked, maybe? Amped? Blueprint Live-d Up?

I was ready.

Facebook Blueprint Live: What Is It?

I knew Blueprint Live is a one-day educational session that aims to help digital marketers get the most out of the entire Facebook ad offering.

On its website, Facebook describes the day-long event as the following:

Blueprint Live is a full day of discovery and teamwork for agencies and advertisers who are familiar with Facebook and Instagram, and ready to build real strategies. Work with diverse teams and learn from your peers.

A week before the trip, I took the recommended eLearning course prerequisites, in addition to some other Facebook Blueprint classes that piqued my interest.

Finally, it was time to travel to Texas. The day began early with breakfast and finding our class materials at the tables. Attendees were part of medium-sized groups of about five tables each, with around five or six people per table.

Bonus points to the organizers for setting up a Blueprint Live event specifically for automotive marketers!

What We Learned

From Client Brief to Campaign Launch

What I liked most about Blueprint Live was that it took you from concept to creation — from first client brief to final campaign launch.

Many of the case studies presented at the event not only showed why certain Facebook ads worked, but also explained how different creation types can be used for different purposes. Major ?.

There was also a lot of discussion about best practices when it comes to storytelling. For example: Carousel ads are best for driving online sales. Photo ads or video ads are best for promoting brand awareness.

Remembering the Big Picture

When you’re working as a digital marketer, most of your decisions are motivated by data. It’s an easy thing to lose sight of: What story are you telling?

It’s no secret that inbound does best when it focuses on content your audience wants. I was happy to see that notion in practice at Facebook Blueprint Live.

A large portion of the day was this type of learning — following case studies. It was fun to talk strategy and dream about what we would do differently if the client was ours.

Facebook Blueprint Live Swag

Bringing It All Together

Table groups were given a practice scenario involving a luxury brand automotive client. We received a client brief covering budget, brand wants, and client needs.

The final section of our Blueprint Live session was bringing what we had learned throughout the day and marrying it with our pretend client in a meaningful way. Through a final presentation, our table group walked through our client campaign and thought process, while being graded by judges from Facebook.

We discussed why we allocated our budget how we did, why we made changes in targeting to reach the correct demographic, pitched drafts of creative, and explained how we planned on measuring the ad’s success.

It was exciting to see our multi-company group of strangers place second in the competition.

Workshop Objective Recap

1. Identifying client business challenges and how to measure success (ROI)
2. Creating compelling creative
3. Finding the right audience and segmenting strategies for targeting
4. Executing and analyzing campaign performance through KPI solutions

After Blueprint Live

Facebook Certification

One thing we were encouraged to do at the end of our session was get Facebook Certified.

The Blueprint Certification is a program for professionals who want to show a comprehensive understanding of the Facebook offering and set themselves apart from other agencies. Facebook even made practice exams to help you study!

Facebook eLearning and Studying

If you haven’t had a chance to take any of the Facebook Blueprint eLearning courses, block off some training time.

There are different classes for different areas of speciality. Want to know about targeting? More about creative that works? It’s all there.

9 Clouds is a firm believer that Facebook will take over automotive digital marketing in 2017. We have a lot of Facebook learning materials we’ve written, plus an endless calendar of webinars to engage in while we watch trends.

Join in the fun!