When you hear the terms ‘Facebook Pixel,’ ‘code,’ and ‘installed correctly,’ you may start to panic thinking that setting up your very own Facebook Pixel is like sending a rocket into space.
But it’s not.
Facebook customers are businesses of all sizes, from Fortune 500 companies that have a team of marketing experts, to mom and pop shops who aren’t as aware of how to market their business or even run ads.
As a result, Facebook has made using their platform and installing their Facebook Pixel easy as pie.
In this article I’ll show you how:
- to install your Facebook pixel,
- to check your Facebook Pixel is installed correctly, and
- having a pixel will ensure your Facebook ad’s success.
How to install your Facebook Pixel
To install your Facebook Pixel you’ll need to have already set up a Facebook Ads account.
Once you have this then you’ll need to head to the Pixel tab or you can just click here.
Click the ‘Set up your Pixel’ button and the following pop-up will appear:
If your website is hosted on one of the e-commerce platforms listed underneath the ‘Use an integration or tag manager’ options, then simply follow the steps listed.
In this example I’ve selected Shopify as the store. Facebook then provides me with three more steps I need to follow that include simple video tutorials to follow.
Your second option is to install the code yourself. This involves you copying and pasting the Pixel code and placing it in the header of your website. It’s critical that you place the Pixel code in the header and not the body of a page, as the header appears on every page and allows you to later re-target website visitors across your entire site.
If you place your Pixel code in the body copy, it will only fire on the page you inserted the code.
Once you add the Pixel code to your website, you can check to see if your Pixel is working by using their test in section three.
If your Pixel does not fire, then I’ll show you how to troubleshoot your Pixel further on in this article. Keep in mind that it can take up to 24 hours for Facebook to register your Pixel.
The easiest way to install your Facebook Pixel is to email the instructions to your web developer. Your web developer will know where to place the code, and Facebook even provides them with a tutorial within their email should they need help.
These are the three ways you can install your Facebook Pixel. You don’t need to pay someone to install it for you; all of the methods above take fewer than five minutes.
Note: You only need to place your Pixel on your website once.
How to check if your Pixel is working correctly
To see if your Pixel is firing correctly, visit your website and click on a few pages.
Then head to your Pixel dashboard to see if your Facebook Pixel has recorded any activity.
In the image above, we can see that the Pixel last fired one minute ago and has recorded 21.9k events. This is a working Pixel.
If your dashboard shows no activity, then I suggest you download the Facebook Pixel Helper (only works on Chrome Browser) and run it on your website.
If your Pixel is not loading, it will reveal the problem and you can attempt to fix it.
The most common issues with incorrectly installed Pixels is that you either inserted the Pixel on the wrong section of your website (not in the /head tags) or you didn’t copy and paste the code correctly.
Why you need a Facebook Pixel
If you’re running Facebook ads to your website without a Pixel installed, you won’t be able to run successful ads – it’s really as simple as that.
In 2017 it’s impossible to scale ads without the use of a Pixel. This one line of code is able to track everything, including pages that users visit, items they add into their cart, and how much they spend per order after clicking one of your ads.
Through using the Pixel you’ll also be able to create custom audiences that allow you to re-target people who visited your website. This means you can create audiences of people:
- who visit your website;
- who bought a product;
- who opted-in to your newsletter;
- who made a specific action (added to cart, clicked a button, viewed a specific category etc.); and
- who spent the most time on your site.
It’s through using these audiences that you’ll be able to scale your ads, add more complex layers to your funnel, and actually see positive results from your Facebook ads.
Get started
Before you run a single campaign on Facebook, you need to install your Pixel code and make sure it works. Remember, it can take up to 24 hours before Facebook starts recording activity from your Pixel, so if you don’t see anything right away, give it time.
Are you having trouble with your Facebook Pixel? Leave a comment below and I’ll do my best to help.