Social media advertising is now an over $130.5 billion dollar market. On Facebook alone, recent statistics show Facebook has the highest return on investment than any other social network for advertising. And Instagram recently surpassed 1 million monthly active advertisers, only a year after opening their self-serve ad platform to all businesses. As people interact more and more with ads across social networks, the ability to monitor and engage with comments on ads—similar to how you would on organic posts—is essential to a successful brand strategy.

Sprout is excited to announce our integration with the Facebook Ad Manager to bring Facebook and Instagram Ad Comments into the Smart Inbox. Sprout users can now monitor and engage with Ad Comments on both their Facebook and Instagram sponsored posts alongside other messages in the Smart Inbox.

Simplify Social Efforts in the Smart Inbox

Sprout’s Smart Inbox enables teams to effectively monitor and engage with social conversations across profiles and networks to ensure you never miss a message that matters to your business. This unified stream of incoming messages provides collaboration, response management and productivity tools to ensure smarter, faster and more personal social communications. With the introduction of Ad Comments as a new message type, Sprout users can streamline their response efforts and minimize time spent outside the Smart Inbox.

Facebook and Instagram Ad Comments in the Smart Inbox

Sprout users can also view their brand’s messaging history with a specific customer inside the Instagram and Facebook Contact Views. With the addition of Ad Comments, social media and community managers can better understand the full customer relationship—whether they’re responding to a comment on an organic post or a piece of sponsored content. Access to contact details, message history and social CRM tools within the Facebook and Instagram Contact Views enables teams to engage personally.

Instagram Ad Comments

Getting Started With Ad Comments Inside Sprout

To begin monitoring and engaging with Facebook and Instagram Ad Comments in the Smart Inbox, you will first need to connect a Facebook Ad Account to Sprout. You can connect your Facebook Ad Account just as you would any other social profile—from Users & Social Profiles or by clicking the Connect a Profile button. Note that Facebook Ad Accounts will not count against your profile limit.

It’s important to note, a Facebook Ad Account and a Facebook Page are required to run ads on Instagram. Connecting your Facebook Ad Account will enable Instagram Ad Comment moderation within Sprout.

Connecting an Ad Account

Better Engage With Customers Inside Sprout

As brands become more strategic with their social objectives, investing in social ads has become essential to broadening reach and increasing visibility and conversion. Ad Comments in the Smart Inbox enable brands to monitor and engage with comments on paid posts alongside all other message types. This gives teams visibility into the activity on their paid social efforts so they can quickly respond to customers who engage with their ads.

Stay tuned for more paid social updates inside Sprout.