Advertising on Meta can be a great way to reach cold audiences and nurture existing audiences. But if you’re not setting yourself up to succeed, then you’re wasting money and losing out on those opportunities to convert. 

When clients come to us having already tried marketing on Meta platforms, there are some mistakes we often find in their Facebook ad accounts which have held them back from achieving the success they wanted. Here are 5 mistakes we’ve seen and how we’d fix them.

1. Lack of audience exclusions

It’s easy to think that audience targeting is all about narrowing down who you want to see your Facebook ads. That’s certainly a big part of it. But it’s important not to forget about excluding audiences, too. 

These exclusions are going to depend on the intent of your ad. If your messaging is aimed at a cold audience that has never engaged with your brand or product before, it’s less likely to be effective with those who have shown interest in the past. Using Custom Audiences to exclude audiences based on behaviours is your best friend when it comes to making sure that you’re getting the right messaging to the right people. 

Excluding web viewers, social media engagers and purchasers from the past 14, 30 or 60 days is effective when your ad is targeting a cold audience. If you’re promoting a lead gen form for your email newsletter, you’ll want to make sure existing subscribers don’t see that ad – it’s wasted on them. 

2. Too many ads in ad sets 

You want to test different ads and formats – good stuff. But, if you’re using a regular campaign setup (rather than an Advantage+ Shopping Campaign), you should avoid putting too many ads into each of your ad sets. Why? If there are too many in there, you’re going to limit the algorithm’s ability to find and optimise the best ones. 

We find that the most successful setup is having 3-5 ads per ad set. This will allow Meta’s algorithm to pick out winning creatives and formats, which you can then continue to build upon by testing out similar ads to optimise further. Turn off any poor performers so that they’re not taking up space that could be used for fresh ads.

Speaking of which…

3. Not refreshing creative

If you’ve got an ad that’s been working well, it’s tempting to sit back and hope it will continue to carry you. But if you want your ad account to continue performing, relying on the same creatives won’t get you far. Meta’s algorithm doesn’t work favourably for accounts that aren’t regularly refreshing their creatives. This is because there’s only a finite amount of people it can show the same ad to before it inevitably runs its course. 

If an ad is performing well, consider how you can vary that creative further and test versions together in an ad set. Small tweaks to the copy and visuals can help with optimising your ads to find the most effective combination. 

We also like using Advantage+ Shopping Campaigns to test creatives. Unlike regular campaigns, having more than 5 ads live in the ad set isn’t an issue. You can also launch multiple ads at once without sending the ad set back into the learning phase. If we find that an ad performs well in the ASC, we can then look at launching it into non-ASC ad sets with audience targeting.  

4. Bad pixel integration 

The Meta Pixel is a section of code you can add to your website, which tracks user actions after they’ve clicked on one of your Meta ads. This is useful for two main reasons: you can find out which ads are pushing the audience towards conversions on your site, and it provides data that can be used to display Facebook retargeting ads to audiences based on actions such as add to cart.  

Failing to correctly set up your pixel will mean that Meta won’t be able to accurately pull data from your website and vice versa. Following Meta’s best practice guide for the pixel should help you avoid some of the common errors. 

5. Using the wrong budget ratio between prospecting and retargeting campaigns

Facebook and Instagram are great platforms for reaching cold audiences, but it’s just as important to nurture those customers further along in their buying journey to nudge them towards a purchase (or re-purchase). 

However, allocating too much budget towards your retargeting campaign puts you at risk of having a high frequency, meaning that the average person will see the same ads repeatedly. It can come across as pushy and invasive, putting people off more than encouraging them to buy. 

The sweet spot is a 70:30 split between prospecting and retargeting campaigns. This allows the majority of your budget to go towards finding new customers, while serving just the right amount of Facebook retargeting ads to previous engagers. 

Still feeling stuck on how to get the most out of your paid social? Get in touch with us today, we’d love to chat!