Solo Ads vs. Google Ads vs. Facebook Ads: What’s the Best Value for Money?

In this Solo ads vs. Google ads vs. Facebook ads comparison, you will find out the advantages and disadvantages of each one and which advertising network to use for your next paid ad campaign.

Traffic is the blood of your business. Not only should you have the right amount of traffic to survive, but also the targeted traffic too.

One of the biggest mistakes many marketers make is not qualifying traffic. In other words, most immature advertisers go for the cheap option.

Like everything in life, not all cheap things are cheap, really. What you should focus on instead is the best value for money.

There are many different traffic sources for advertisers and media buyers to purchase millions of traffic every day. Here are some:

  • PPC ads
  • Native ads
  • Media Buying ads (aka banner ads)
  • Solo Ads
  • Social media ads (ex: Facebook ads, Twitter ads, LinkedIn ads, and Tiktok ads)
  • Popup ads
  • Domain traffic
  • Push notification ads
  • Interstitial ads
  • Newsletter ads
  • Text marketing ads (ex: Whatsapp ads, SMS ads)
  • Local marketing or offline marketing techniques such as billboard advertising

Among those ad types, Google ads and Facebook ads are popular among most advertisers. In fact, there are over 7 million advertisers on Facebook and over 4 million advertisers on Google. Those big companies make a significant portion of their income through advertising.

Also, there is another paid advertising method that not many people utilize for some reason. It’s Solo Advertising.

In today’s article, I will compare Solo Ads vs. Google Ads vs. Facebook ads and assist you with the reasons for which advertising method or network is best for each scenario.

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Pros and Cons

Solo Advertising

Solo advertising is promoting your offer on another person’s email list. Mostly solo ads traffic comes in CPC (Cost-per-click) model with guaranteed clicks. So, to buy solo ads, you should know someone willing to sell ads for you.

Not only that, the niches should relate. Like always, untargeted traffic is not worth it.

Read: What are solo ads?

Pros of Solo Ads

  • Get started for a low price
  • Targeted traffic
  • Pre-warm-up ability (Since each visitor is reading an email message, you can warm up the traffic deeply)
  • Tap into different solo ads traffic sources by buying clicks from several marketplaces and vendors
  • A/B test different providers or lists to identify the best traffic for your offer
  • Ability to scale as you need
  • Conversion tracking

Cons of Solo Ads

  • You cannot pause ads or revert once the order is set
  • The traffic quality of each seller may vary
  • It is harder to find quality traffic vendors, so you might need a larger budget to get on track.
  • You cannot use interest targeting, audience age targeting, etc., But you can target based on geographic locations.

Google Ads

Buying traffic from Google search is known as Google advertising. Previously known as Google Adwords, it now allows you to buy traffic from the leading Google ads platform, YouTube, and other third-party websites.

Since Google ads are so popular, dedicated services to ads management and even spying on competitors’ advertisements like Semrush Display ads have been born.

Pros of Google Ads

  • Keyword targeting
  • Pixel targeting
  • Scalable
  • Location targeting up to the zip code
  • A/B testing ads
  • Conversion tracking

Cons of Google Ads

  • Depending on your niche, CPC (Cost per click) could go higher that you cannot break even in your marketing campaigns.
  • High competition for placements. You might engage in a bidding war where your budget would vanish.
  • Google ads policies. You cannot advertise on Google if your offer is not compatible with Google’s ads policies.

Facebook Ads

Advertising on Facebook is also popular among many advertisers because it allows you to target based on multiple criteria in addition to the high amount of traffic available. After all, Facebook owns WhatsApp and Instagram.

Pros of Facebook Ads

  • Target audience based on interests, status, behavior, and other criteria.
  • Pixel targeting
  • Creating a custom audience based on the behaviors of another set of users.
  • Upload custom contacts and target on Facebook (ex: Target your email newsletter subscribers on Facebook)
  • Scalable
  • Ads scheduling and frequency setup
  • A/B testing
  • Conversion tracking

Cons of Facebook Ads

  • The low attention span of users. You will have to get the attention of users to increase CTRs
  • CPC can go higher based on different aspects such as your ads, Quality Score, etc.
  • Need a bigger budget to get started compared with Google ads and Solo ads
  • Facebook ads policies. Your offer may be rejected, and sometimes the ads account might be closed based on different reasons!

Solo Ads vs. Google Ads vs. Facebook Ads Compared

Every one of these advertising methods can be advantageous based on the offer and customer stage. Here is the comparison of Solo ads, Facebook ads, and Google ads.

Solo Ads vs Google Ads

  • Google ads allow keyword targeting, while Solo ads allow niche targeting
  • Google considers the user experience, while solo advertising doesn’t. For example, you cannot use popups in Google advertising. But, you can use popups to collect more leads and reduce CPL (Cost per Lead). Additionally, you can use some out-of-the-box tricks and grey-hat methods to increase the conversation rate of your solo ads squeeze pages.
  • Google has a scoring system to qualify ads, while solo ads do not have these metrics.
  • You can qualify and quantify traffic in Google ads based on the bids you place. In solo advertising, it’s a fixed price. You can buy more traffic packages to increase the volume.

If you are running an affiliate offer promotion, Google ads might not be the best option because it does not allow affiliate promotions on its network. However, with solo advertising, you can pre-qualify in the subject line, pre-sell in the email message body, and scale up to thousands of traffic per day while predicting how much you will make.

However, solo ads are limited in terms of niches, and it is a bit difficult to find a good solo ads seller for your offers. Some email lists react differently to different offers too.

If you are a local business owner and marketing manager for SaaS and other businesses, Google ads would be the best choice here. With a good keyword strategy for PPC, you cannot go wrong. Make sure you are not involved with a bidding war if it comes to. Budget management and offer optimization in contextual advertising are keys.

Google Ads vs Facebook ads

  • Facebook allows more targeting options such as interest than Google.
  • Since you are targeting based on keywords that the people are searching in Google advertising, the traffic is more warmed up than Facebook ads. In other words, Google ads deliver high-quality traffic.
  • You can split-test in both ad networks. But Facebook lets you use visuals such as graphics and videos.
  • Both networks allow CPM (Cost per mile or cost per 1,000 impressions) and CPC advertising types.
  • CTR and ad quality are significant factors in both networks
  • High competition for specific niches; hence the CPC could be expensive.
  • Because of the high starting bid or minimum bid, ordinary people and advertising agencies could not compete with others with a huge budget.
  • Making a good offer + ad copy combination is a challenge. Hence, you will have to master every aspect of Google Ads and Facebook Ads to get an edge over tens of thousands of advertisers who has the same or higher budget as yours.

Like any business, the competition in these two networks is higher. Therefore, you will have to become a master of it to dominate a niche. For example, big brands hire PPC ad agencies to manage Google ads alone. Same for Facebook ads. Therefore, having a significant budget for getting started is a must.

Facebook ads can be very lucrative for eCommerce site owners because you can target them based on their interests. Also, since both allow pixel targeting, you can reduce the CPC dramatically.

I recommend using a tool like Replug to retarget people who click your marketing messages. Learn more in our Replug review.

Solo Ads vs Facebook Ads

  • Facebook has many audience targeting options compared to solo advertising
  • You can target both desktop-only and mobile-only traffic
  • Facebook advertising is very competitive, while it’s the solo ads provider’s duty to get more clicks. However, depending on the niche and the solo ads seller, your solo ad traffic cost could vary.
  • Facebook has restrictions on what offers can be run on the platform, while you can run almost any legal offer by using solo advertising.

Facebook ads are very diverse and can be used for promoting any kind of offer, including Print-on-demand. Many business owners use Facebook ads over solo ads because of the targeting options, retargeting capabilities, segmentation, and scalability.

But, solo ads are used by and for particular niches such as IM, MMO, MLM, Cryptocurrency, and Biz Opps.

Solo Ads vs Google Ads vs Facebook Ads: Which is better for what?

What’s best for the money you spend?

Which traffic source will give you a better ROI?

Well, it all depends on your offer and the audience. Also, since the policies of Google and Facebook ads, your offer might have a limited number of options.

Affiliate marketing business

Promoting affiliate products in Google and Facebook ads is usually forbidden. However, you could promote some CPA offers via Facebook.

Solo advertising is affiliates-friendly. In fact, many affiliate marketers utilize solo ads to promote affiliate products while building an email list.

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  • Never waste a visitor. Use popups and back-button scripts to increase lead conversion rates. I recommend using an on-site conversion rate optimization tool like Convertful. It has different widget types, such as scratch cards and spin-to-win wheels, to increase conversions. Learn more in this Convertful review. Here’s an example of using Convertful to pass URL and cookie parameters to the autoresponder and UpViral giveaway software. (Upviral offers a free trial, and I recommend checking it out if you are into using giveaways to grow your business. Read this review of UpViral to find out more details.). Here is a complete list of the best online contest software (categorized based on the specialty).
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Ecommerce

The best option of three advertising methods for eCommerce sites and Shopify stores is Facebook advertising.

Why?

  • You can target based on the user’s interests.
  • Retarget people who visited product pages
  • Sync customer data and build a lookalike audience
  • Qualifying traffic through showing product videos that describe the product details and prices

Solo ads are not the best option for eCom product promotions because of the lack of targeting options and traffic scarcity. However, you can use solo ads for eCommerce product promotions if you follow the right strategies. You can get Google ads to work for eCom products, but it can be tricky.

List building

If building an email list is your primary goal, all advertising sources could work tremendously.

However, if you are in one or more of the following niches:

  • Make Money Online
  • Internet Marketing
  • Wealth and wellness
  • Binary Options/forex trading
  • Cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Dogecoin
  • Affiliate Marketing
  • Network Marketing
  • Business Opportunities (Biz Opp)

Solo advertising is the best option.

Why?

  • No restrictions
  • You can tap into lists that your target audience is in
  • Pre-warm up the traffic and can direct for a specific action. (ex: sign up to download the ebook on the next page)
  • Integrate a tripwire offer or an affiliate product on your funnels to make money from solo ad traffic
  • Scale from hundreds of visitors to thousands per day

Get started on Solo Ads

If solo ads are your choice, getting started on solo ads is easy. There are several ways to buy targeted solo ads.

  • Join a marketplace like UdimiUdimi is the best place to buy solo ads. There are thousands of solo advertisers from different niches, and its pricing ranges from $0.40 to $2.00. Check this Udimi solo ads review to learn more about its traffic, pros and cons, and competitors. Since Udimi works as the middle man, you can prevent fraud which typically occurs in this industry.
  • Buy solo ads from vendors – Some professional solo ad sellers have their websites. They sell themselves. Here is a list of ones who sell quality solo ads. Make sure you research before purchasing.
  • Forums and social media groups – Some forums have communities where solo ad vendors list their deals. Warriorforum is one of the most popular ones. Do not buy solo ads from Fiverr, as you could get scammed or get low-quality traffic or bot traffic.

If using solo ads for affiliate marketing is your strategy, make sure the solo ad sales funnel is strong and has the necessary components like tripwire offers, email drip campaigns, and retargeting to maximize the ROI.

Also, ensure that you are receiving Solo email ad clicks not funnel clicks or mixed clicks, and the tiers of the traffic of solo ads are exactly what you want.

Check this Solo Ads Rolodex to get details of over forty best solo ad suppliers. It includes positive to negative reviews, average cost-per-click ratios, and percentages of ‘I got sales’ and tier 1 traffic.

Get started on Google ads

Getting started on Google ads is also easier. Google often provides a free coupon code. Ensure to research online or check your email address associated with Google Analytics for any special Google ads coupons. You would get $150, $100, or $75 vouchers depending on your location.

Sign up for Google ads over here.

Get started on Facebook ads

Like Google Ads, Facebook also provides special promotional codes to try their ads. Do not waste this one-time opportunity to top up your Facebook Business account for free!

Sign up for Facebook ads from here.

Conclusion on Solo Ads vs. Google Ads vs. Facebook Ads

Buying traffic is a different art. Although there are many advantages of paid adverting, you should be aware of the traffic quality of each source.

Even though there are dozens of advertising networks, only a few are popular among the business community. Solo advertising, Facebook advertising, and Google advertising are three popular adverting methods.

The variety of traffic of all those three networks is different. You should be aware of them very well before creating your first campaign. So, what is your verdict on Solo ads vs. Facebook ads vs. Google ads?

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