You may be familiar with existing best practices for Facebook ad auctions, understand how they work, and know how to efficiently optimize your campaigns. The only constant is change, however, and maximizing success on Facebook auctions is no exception.
As Facebook improves their algorithmic solutions and the ad auction becomes more competitive, here are a few bits of advice for ensuring optimal performance.
Optimize to the highest revenue possible.
Bid on the item that’ll help you achieve this goal. Yes, it’s great to bid on the item that generates the most volume. However, if your goal is purchases and you’re optimizing for link clicks, you won’t get the most out of your campaign.
Set fewer constraints to the delivery system.
Let Facebook’s algorithms look for better results. Although you want to be as precise as possible with your targeting, applying too many constraints (such as demographic targeting on lookalikes and custom audiences) will limit the number of people you can reach for lower cost. Plus, your cost per action will grow.
Ensure a great user experience.
Optimize your landing page. Your ad creative, optimization, and targeting are very important; however, if your landing page isn’t providing the best experience—for example, it isn’t optimized for mobile—then you won’t win conversions.
Improve speed.
Minimize redirects, plugins, and shortened links; compress files to decrease rendering time; and improve server response time. Although these can have their own benefits, people won’t wait for a slow site to load.
Focus on the winning format.
Look at where the volume is. Some formats may not work for all advertisers, but you can at least test winning formats per objective—such as direct response formats like video, image, and collection ads. This may lead to great results.
Test format combinations.
Include an image and a video in one ad set. Maybe you tested video and it doesn’t perform as great as an image does. However, by including video and image in the same ad sets, Facebook algorithms have more flexibility to get you the best results, since some people may like video more than image and will decrease the overall cost per action.
Reduce duplicates and attribute well.
Look at cross-channel/cross-platform. Yes, your attribution model may be the best for you. However, make sure you're not double-counting the conversions and remember it may take multiple steps to get the final event.
Don’t try to outsmart the system.
Allow the Facebook algorithm to work for you. This is especially true during the learning phase. It may seem like you just launched the campaign and your performance is fluctuating, so you want to make changes. However, Facebook’s algorithm is still learning. It has to test and meet certain thresholds in order to properly deliver your ads. Therefore, avoid making changes for at least 24 hours and until you reach 50 optimized conversions.
Learn and adapt.
What worked last month may not work this month. You’ve likely tested and identified creative and targeting best practices. However, remember to test again and again once you see delivery decline, as the Facebook ad auction is a fast-paced environment.
Continual Improvement
It’s always possible to continue optimizing and improving performance. On top of trying out different best practices and recommendations, find what works for you, stay patient, and don’t be afraid to experiment with your campaigns.
