How to get the most from your ad campaigns

This article walks you through some best practices to help you get the most impact from your ad campaigns.

Campaign split testing

One of the most effective ways to optimize your advertising is through testing different versions of your ad creative, optionally with different audience segments.

You need to test multiple designs and target different demographics to find the right message for the right audience. This can be a time consuming process, but with Legacy Hootsuite Ads you can create and test hundreds of ads with a few clicks.

• On the Ads Design page, you can select the icon to add a new design variation to test. You can test multiple headlines, text, links, images, calls to action, and more.
• On the Audience page, you can select the icon to add more demographics or interest groups to test.

When you select Proceed, Hootsuite prompts you to confirm the elements you want to test. Hootsuite displays the total number of ads to be created as a result of your selections.

For example, if you want to test:

• 2 headlines
• 3 images
• 2 genders
• 4 countries

Legacy Hootsuite Ads creates 48 ad variations (2 x 3 x 2 x 4 = 48) for your campaign.

After your split tests have been running for some time, you can assess which elements are performing better. See Measure the results of your split tests for more information.

What and how much to test

The most common mistake many marketers make when split testing ad campaigns is creating too many experiments right off the bat. Creating too many combinations of ad creative elements can lead to unreliable data if you don't have enough traffic or impressions. A good strategy is to start slow and progressively test more elements.

For example, start by testing two images, two post text variations, and two audiences (for each gender). This results in eight ads, a small enough number to generate some relevant results quickly and reliable, even on a small budget.

Generally we don’t recommend testing more than 20 ads in your first campaign. As you gain more experience, you can create bigger campaigns.

What you should test also depends on the kind of business you're advertising, but here's a brief list in order of the most relevant elements to test.

Design

Test these design elements, in the following priority order:

1. Image
2. Post text
3. Landing Page (this has no impact on the ad CTR but it can make a difference in terms of cost per conversion)
4. Headline

Targeting

Test these target audience elements, in the following priority order:

1. Country
2. Gender
3. Placement (where your ads are displayed)
4. Interests
5. Age
6. Custom Audiences
7. Relationship Status
8. Purchase Behaviors
9. Education Level

With time, you'll be able to test all of these elements.

How much to spend on your campaign

The question of how much to budget for your campaign depends on the performance of your ads and what you are promoting. Ads for products with a lower price point can lead to inexpensive conversions and you'll be able to gather enough data to analyze your experiments on a smaller budget. Ads for more expensive products usually require a bigger budget to drive more conversions.

As a general rule, allocate at least $5 to $10 daily for each experiment you're running. For example, if you are testing 10 different ads, the recommended daily budget would be between $50 and $100 to generate reliable results within a week. Smaller budgets require more time to collect reliable results.

The more experiments you run in parallel, the more budget and time you need.

Budget minimums

Facebook has minimum daily budget values for certain actions, or billing events. These are minimum amounts per adset, and differ depending on whether autobid is used. See Facebook’s documentation for the current budget minimums.

If your campaign's budget does not meet Facebook’s requirements and fails to publish, edit the budget and republish the campaign.

Edit your campaign budget

1. On the Legacy Hootsuite Ads home page, select Your campaigns, and then select Select a campaign, and then select See all campaigns from the list.
2. Under Campaign Status, select the Failed box and then select Filter.
3. Locate the failed campaign, and select its name. You should see an error explaining the reason for failure.
4. Select Edit campaign.
5. Go to the Budget & Bidding page, increase the budget or reduce the length of the campaign.

Legacy Hootsuite Ads videos

Watch our YouTube playlist of Hootsuite Ads educational videos to learn more.