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Campaign Outcome

Strike Social effectively reduced ad costs while enhancing reach and engagement through precise campaign management and strategic execution. By fine-tuning targeting strategies, the team ensured smarter ad spend allocation, reinforcing its expertise in optimizing Facebook video ads for maximum performance.

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See other Facebook ad case studies.

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Campaign Outcome

By strategically optimizing video and carousel ads for the right audiences, the campaign achieved higher engagement rates. With Strike Social’s expertise, the brand’s Valentine’s campaign effectively captured audience attention and delivered strong results throughout the season.

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See other Facebook ad case studies.

Facebook Ads Made Simple: A Beginner’s Guide for Businesses

By 2025, Facebook’s advertising reach in the U.S. is projected to surpass 250 million users, climbing to over 260 million by 2028. Far from being just a social networking site for sharing updates and connecting with loved ones, Facebook has become a vital platform for businesses, with 52.8% of its users actively following or researching brands and products on the platform.

Whether you’re a business just starting with Facebook ads or looking for a clear refresher to sharpen your strategy, this guide by Strike Social will walk you through everything you need to know to create, launch, and manage effective campaigns.

What Are Facebook Ads?

Facebook ads are a powerful tool for businesses to engage with their target audience directly on Facebook and across the Meta ecosystem. These ads allow advertisers to connect with users through various platforms, including Instagram, Messenger, and WhatsApp, all under the Meta advertising network.

Ad Specs, Formats, and Safe Zones for Facebook Ads

Because there are plenty of ways to get audience reach and engagement through Facebook ads, we’ll give a quick rundown of the different advertising formats available:

• Single image ads: Eye-catching static visuals designed to highlight promotions, brand offers, or deals in a simple and impactful way.
• Video ads: Dynamic content that captures attention through high-quality videos, suitable for feed, Stories, or Reels placements.
• Carousel ads: A swipeable series of images or videos displayed as individual ‘carousel’ cards. Each card within a Facebook carousel ad is linked to a specific product or service page.
• Collection ads: Interactive ads powered by Meta’s Instant Experience, allowing users to explore multiple products directly within the ad.

Facebook Ad Creative Guidelines

To ensure your ad creatives display perfectly across placements, it’s essential to follow Facebook’s ad size requirements. Ad formats are available in 1:1 (square), 9:16 (vertical), and 16:9 (horizontal) ratios, each designed to optimize visibility and engagement. 

Pay attention to the Facebook ad specifications so your ads fit seamlessly on your audience’s devices without being obscured by UI elements.

Another key consideration when designing your Facebook ad is the “safe zone.” Keeping essential elements like calls-to-action (CTAs) and key messages within this area ensures they remain fully visible to your audience.

Additionally, text limitations for Facebook ads vary depending on the format and placement. Make sure your ad copy aligns with these requirements:

Available Campaign Objectives for Facebook Advertising

Facebook ads offer advertisers flexibility, allowing businesses to target audiences at every stage of the customer journey—from awareness to conversions. This makes them a powerful tool, especially during peak advertising seasons like Mother’s Day, the 4th of July, or Q4 holidays.

For example, Q4 holiday ad trends suggest launching awareness campaigns as early as September, followed by post-engagement campaigns through October to December, to maximize results during the busiest shopping season.

To make the most of your Facebook ad strategy, here are the key campaign objectives available:

Advantage+ Features from Meta Ads Manager

Meta’s Advantage+ suite was introduced as part of Facebook’s effort to leverage AI technology and enhance the advertiser experience. Initially launched for Shopping campaigns to improve the discovery of e-commerce ads and boost sales, it has since expanded to offer more solutions for Facebook advertisers:

Advantage+ Audience: This feature extends your audience targeting beyond the parameters you initially set, using Meta’s AI to discover and engage with new, highly relevant users.

Advantage+ Placements: For targeted campaigns, manual placements allow precise control over where your ads appear. As for broader reach, Meta Advantage+ Placements automatically optimizes your ads to appear in the most engaging placements across the Facebook app and the Meta Audience Network.

When you run Facebook ads, your Facebook video ads and image ads can appear selectively or across all of the following placements, depending on which placements work best:

Advantage+ Creative: At the ad level, Advantage+ offers tools to enhance creative assets, ensuring they resonate with audiences. These include:

• Image templates
• Image brightness and contrast
• Music
• 3D animation
• Image expansion
• Image animation

Advantage+ App Campaigns: Designed for app install campaigns, this feature streamlines ad delivery by minimizing inputs for Facebook targeting, campaign creation, and management.

Advantage+ Shopping Campaigns: The pioneering feature of the Advantage+ suite, this tool is tailored for Facebook Shops and e-commerce businesses. Advertisers have reported a 17% decrease in CPA (cost per action) and a 32% increase in ROAS (return on ad spend), proving its effectiveness as an AI solution for advertisers.

Preparing for Your Facebook Ad Campaign

Now that you’re familiar with the fundamentals of Facebook advertising, it’s time to focus on the essential preparations for a successful campaign. While the Meta Business Suite and Facebook’s AI tools simplify the process, understanding the finer details is key to maximizing ad performance.

Proper preparation ensures that your campaigns are effective and aligned with your business goals. Let’s examine the key steps before launching your Facebook advertising campaigns.

Audience Insights and Targeting

As of early 2024, Facebook has over 190 million users in the U.S., and this number is expected to grow by 9% year-over-year through 2025. But with such a large audience, it’s crucial not to target everyone. 

Wasted Facebook ad budget is a real risk if you don’t properly define and target your audience. Know the tools within Facebook Ads Manager to help you identify and target the right people.

Know your current audience with Audience Insights

Rather than relying on guesswork, start by using Facebook Audience Insights to gather data on your current audience. Here are the three key sections to explore on the Audience Insights page:

• Demographics: This section reveals key details such as age, gender, and location of your current audience. For example, if your content resonates with users primarily in Chicago, and you’re a local retail brand, you’ll want to focus on targeting Chicago and surrounding areas for better ad relevance.

• Trends: This tab helps identify organic engagement patterns. You can see when engagement spikes, such as during a specific promotional period, such as the Super Bowl. If you notice a seasonal uptick in Q1, for example, you might adjust your strategy by ramping up your budget from Q2 to Q4 for more impactful campaigns.

• Potential audience: This section shows broader audience segments who have not yet engaged with your brand but could be a good fit for your ads. If you’re currently reaching the 35-44 age group but want to expand to younger audiences like 18-24-year-olds, the potential audience data will help you determine whether this demographic is worth targeting. While not an exact prediction of success, it provides valuable insights to help guide your targeting decisions.

Reach previously engaged audiences with Retargeting tools

One of the strengths of social media advertising is the ability to retarget audiences who have already interacted with your brand. With the Facebook retargeting feature, you can reach these users based on specific actions they’ve taken across various platforms:

• Visitors to your website or specific landing pages
• Users who added items to their cart but didn’t complete the purchase
• Engagement with your Facebook page content
• Existing customer database (uploaded as a file)
• Lookalike audiences: New users who share similar characteristics to your existing customer base

Facebook Cost and Bidding Optimization

Facebook advertising costs can escalate quickly if not carefully managed. While Advantage+ provides a convenient, automated solution, relying exclusively on Meta’s technology for auction bids may not always yield the most effective outcomes.

Here’s how to better optimize your bidding strategy:

Campaign budget optimization (CBO) vs. manual bid adjustments

With Campaign Budget Optimization (CBO), Meta’s AI automatically allocates your campaign budget across different ad sets based on real-time performance.

How to calculate the cost of Facebook ads?

Facebook ads cost can vary based on your campaign goals, and understanding how to measure these costs is essential for optimizing efficiency. Here are some of the core Facebook cost metrics and how to compute them: 

Campaign objective	Core Facebook cost metric	Explained	Formula
Awareness – Reach	CPM (Cost-Per-Mille)	Measures the cost for every 1,000 impressions your ad receives.	CPM = (Facebook Ad Spend / Impressions) x 1000
Engagement – Video Views	CPV (Cost-Per-View)	The cost incurred for each view of your video ad.	CPV = (Ad Spend / Views)
Traffic – Link Clicks	CPLC (Cost-Per-Link Click)	Indicates the cost for each click on your ad’s link.	CPLC = (Total Facebook Spend / Link Clicks)
Leads – Instant forms	CPL (Cost-Per-Lead)	The cost associated with acquiring a lead through a form submission.	CPL = (Leads campaign spend / Leads collected)
Sales – Conversions	Purchase ROAS (Return on Ad Spend)	Evaluates the revenue generated for every dollar spent on ads.	ROAS = (Revenue generated / Amount spent on sales campaign)

Cost and Performance Benchmarks for Facebook Ads

It’s important that before you fully curate your media plan for your 2025 Facebook campaign, you have a set of benchmarks against which to measure your performance. Understanding industry standards and comparing them to what your ad agency can deliver ensures you maximize your ad spend efficiently.

We analyzed our US campaigns using Strike Social’s in-house proprietary tool, Campaign Lab, to give you the latest cost and performance benchmarks for Facebook ads. See the varying trends based on each campaign objective from our Facebook campaigns:

Campaign goals	Cost benchmarks (range)	Performance benchmarks (range)
Impressions	CPM: $2.78 – $9.60	Engagement rate: 2.90% to 14.40%
Video views	CPV: $.0045- $.01536	View rate: 44.81% to 88.92%
Clicks	CPC: $0.14 – $0.72	Click-through rate: 1.07% to 3.29%
Link clicks	CPLC: $0.28 and $1.03	Link click rate: 0.75% to 1.85%
Event response/participation	CPER: $0.35 to $1.53	Event response rate:  0.64% to 0.83%

While these benchmarks represent typical Facebook performance year-round, be mindful of seasonal spikes—particularly during Q4 holidays or U.S. election years, when political ad spending can drive up auction prices. To avoid these price surges, we recommend launching awareness campaigns earlier, especially during peak advertising periods.

Maintaining Brand Safety in Facebook Ad Campaigns

One of the biggest risks in Facebook advertising is having your brand associated with harmful or explicit content. This can damage your brand’s reputation and undermine the effectiveness of your ads.

In addition to optimizing ad performance and costs, advertisers must ensure their ads aren’t displayed alongside inappropriate or exploitative content. This is where brand safety on Facebook plays a vital role.

Brand safety and suitability controls

Inventory filter: Facebook’s inventory filter is the first layer of brand safety. Similar to YouTube’s inventory types, it offers three options: Expanded, Moderate, and Limited inventory.

The recommended and default setting is Moderate inventory, which ensures ads only appear in safe content. Expanded inventory, while still filtered to comply with Facebook’s Content Monetization Policies, allows for a broader reach.

Publisher block lists: You can create a block list to exclude specific Facebook and Instagram pages, profiles, and apps from showing your ads. These lists can be uploaded as .csv or .txt files, with a maximum of 10,000 publishers per upload. However, do not overly narrow your list, as excluding too many publishers could limit your ad reach.

Content type exclusions: You can exclude your ads from appearing on non-partnered pages or profiles that have not signed up for Facebook’s monetization program. Your ads will only be shown on content produced by registered, vetted Facebook partners, subject to more stringent oversight. Content type exclusions can apply to live videos, in-stream ads, and Facebook Reels ads.

In addition to these advertiser controls, Facebook also enforces brand safety through its Community Standards and Guidelines, Content Review Teams, and quarterly Community Standards Enforcement reports, another measure the platform takes to maintain a safe advertising environment.

Facebook Campaign Guide from Setup to Publish

All set with the Facebook ads preparation! Here are the steps from start to finish to successfully launch and publish your Facebook campaign:

1. Register your Facebook page as a business account. Then, set up your Business Manager account and Ad Account to proceed.

2. Visit Facebook Ads Manager and login to your account.

3. Click the +Create button to start a new campaign.

4. Choose the appropriate campaign objective that aligns with your goals (e.g., Awareness, Traffic, Conversions), then click Continue.

5. Under the Campaign level setup, configure the following:

• Campaign Name: Use an organized naming convention for easy identification (e.g., [Campaign Duration – Objective – Product], such as “Jan-Dec 2025 – Impressions – Sleepwear”).
• Special Ad Categories (Optional; As applicable)
• Advantage+ Campaign Budget: Toggle this for automated budget management or leave it off for more manual control.
• A/B Test (Optional; As applicable)

6. On the Ad Set level, you can create multiple ad sets under one campaign. Here are the details you need to set up:

• Ad Set Name: Make it easy to identify (e.g., “2-Piece Pajama Sets – Images” if your ad set uses image creatives).
• Performance Goal: Set your desired campaign objective (e.g., clicks, impressions, conversions).
  • Facebook Page and/or Instagram Account: Choose the page or profile that will display your ads.
  • Cost Per Result: Set your auction bid if you have a target CPM or cost benchmark.
  • Frequency Cap (for Awareness campaigns): Control how often your ad is shown to each unique user.

• Dynamic Creative (Optional; As applicable)
• Budget & Schedule:
  • Budget: Select either a daily or lifetime budget for your campaign.
  • Schedule: Set a campaign start and end date.
  • Budget Scheduling: If applicable, adjust budget settings for specific times or dates to boost performance.
• Audience Controls:
  • Locations
  • Age
  • Audience list exclusions
• Advantage+ Audience: Use Meta’s AI to add audience segments based on interests, behaviors, and demographics. Click on Save audience to reuse the same audience segment for other campaigns.
• Placements:
  • Advantage+ Placements: Let Meta decide where to show your ads across Facebook, Instagram, and Messenger.
  • Manual Placements: If you prefer control, select specific placements like Facebook feed or Messenger.

7. Lastly, under the Ad level, you can now set up the ad creatives. Here are the items to set up:

• Ad Name
• Partnership Ad: Toggle this on if you are partnering with influencers or content creators to use a branded content ad.
• Identity: Verify the Facebook page under which your ad will appear.
• Create Ad: Choose your ad creative. Upload existing content or create a new one, ensuring it meets the recommended Facebook ad sizes.
• Languages (Optional; As applicable)
• Tracking: For ads with landing page redirects, implement UTM tracking via Facebook Events Manager.

8. On the right side of the screen, view a preview of your ad to check that it appears correctly across your selected placements on Facebook and Instagram.

9. Once everything looks good, click Publish to launch your campaign.

The ad review process typically takes up to 24 hours but can be faster. Review common reasons for ad rejection to avoid delays and make sure your campaign goes live without issues.

How a Facebook Ads Agency Can Help Manage and Optimize Your Campaigns

Trust us, setting up and launching the campaign is the easy part. What can be excruciating and require tireless work is monitoring and optimizing your Facebook campaigns as they run. 

Ad spending can inflate, performance can slow down, and audience targeting may need to be refined. These tasks require watchful eyes 24/7, and a Facebook ad agency is just what you might need.

Integration with Meta API via Campaign Lab

Campaign Lab is a powerful tool that supports our team’s optimization efforts. Powered by AI, it provides real-time performance insights and optimization alerts, but the expertise of our media buying team remains essential to make the best use of this data.

With Campaign Lab’s alerts, we quickly identify areas for improvement, whether it’s adjusting bids or refining performance. Thanks to 24/7 optimization by the Strike Social team, we can immediately implement these changes so your campaigns achieve the best results at the most cost-effective rates.

Success in Facebook Ad Campaigns

To demonstrate how a Facebook ads agency can drive effective campaign management and optimization, nothing illustrates this better than tangible results. Here’s how our team applied tailored strategies to lower costs and boost engagement:

Your 2025 Facebook Ads Strategies in One Place

Looking for all the essential insights for your 2025 Facebook ad campaign in one place? Strike Social’s blog covers everything from Facebook ads to strategies for other social media platforms. Stay up-to-date with the latest trends, data, and guides on Facebook advertising by subscribing to our newsletter.

Ready to start your 2025 Facebook campaign? Download our Facebook Ad Sizes Guide here to get a head start.

Did you know that Facebook ads with a higher relevance score can lower your cost per result and improve the click-through rate? To create impactful ads, it’s crucial that they attract interest, resonate with your target audience, and drive engagement. Facebook’s Ad Relevance Score plays a key role in determining the success of your campaigns.

Introduced by Facebook to help advertisers optimize their campaigns, this score influences not only how often your ads are shown but also how much you pay for each impression or click. Ads with higher relevance are rewarded with better visibility and lower costs, leading to a more effective and efficient campaign.

Comprehending the significance of the relevance score and discovering effective ways to enhance it can lead to improved performance, reduced advertising expenses, and ultimately, a greater return on investment.

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What is Facebook Ad Relevance Score?

Previously, Facebook’s relevance score was a single score between 1 and 10 that provided a general sense of how relevant your ad was to the audience you targeted.  Later, Facebook upgraded this metric by dividing it into three key components: Quality Ranking, Engagement Rate Ranking, and Conversion Rate Ranking. Each of these sub-scores offers a detailed understanding of your ad’s performance and aids in identifying areas for enhancement.

• Quality Ranking: This measures how the quality of your ad is viewed in relation to competing ads aimed at the same audience.
• Engagement Rate Ranking: This evaluates the anticipated level of engagement your ad will receive compared to others.
• Conversion Rate Ranking: This assesses how likely your ad is to achieve conversions compared to other ads with similar goals.

While each ranking plays a distinct role, they all work together to show how effectively your ad meets the expectations and desires of your target audience.

Whether you want more engagement, clicks, or conversions, boosting your relevance score is key to getting better results.

Why is Facebook Ad Relevance Score Important?

A high Facebook relevance score can significantly benefit your advertising efforts in multiple ways:

• Lower Costs: Facebook rewards ads with a higher relevance score by lowering your cost-per-click (CPC) and cost-per-impression (CPM). This means that ads performing well will be cheaper to run.
• Better Reach: Ads with higher relevance scores tend to be shown more frequently to your target audience because Facebook prefers to show content that users are likely to engage with.
• Increased Engagement: An ad that resonates with your audience will naturally generate more clicks, shares, and conversions. The relevance score helps ensure that you’re delivering ads that matter to your audience.
• Optimized Campaign Performance: With a better understanding of your ad’s performance based on the relevance score metrics, you can adjust and improve future campaigns, leading to more effective results over time.

How to Improve Your Facebook Ad Relevance Score

Enhancing your Facebook Ad relevance score can lead to improved ad performance, a wider audience reach, and lower expenses. Here are some effective strategies you can implement to elevate your score:

Improve Quality Ranking

This is important for improving how your audience sees the quality of your ad compared to other ads aimed at the same people.

Your visuals should be relevant to your message and reflect the essence of your brand. Consistent branding through colors, fonts, and imagery can also reinforce your brand identity and make your ads more recognizable. Since Facebook is a highly visual platform, investing in professional or well-designed visuals can significantly improve your quality ranking.

Maintain Ad Consistency with the Landing Page

You must ensure that your ad delivers a consistent experience. This means that the messaging and design of your ad should align with the landing page it directs users to. If your ad promotes a specific offer or product, your landing page should reflect the same offer or product without any surprises. 

A smooth transition from ad to landing page helps maintain user trust, reducing bounce rates and improving overall engagement. Additionally, a fast-loading landing page is crucial, as slow speeds can frustrate users and negatively impact your quality ranking.

Enhance Engagement Rate Ranking

An increased engagement rate shows that users are interacting with your ad through likes, shares, or comments, which not only enhances your score but also improves the ad’s visibility.

Target the Right Audience

A highly effective method for enhancing engagement is to make sure your ad is seen by the right audience. You can make use of Facebook’s targeting features to refine your audience by considering factors such as age, interests, behaviors, and geographic location. 

The greater the relevance of your ad to its audience, the higher the chances of engagement. For instance, if you’re advertising a fitness product, focusing on users who are passionate about health and wellness can significantly boost engagement rates.

Personalizing your ads based on audience segments can significantly improve conversion rates. If you have different products for men and women, create specific ads that speak directly to each audience. Personalized messaging resonates more and increases the likelihood of conversion.

This particular brand is targeting luxury, yacht interests, and the top 5% of household income because their products, such as premium boat covers or specialized accessories, are designed for high-end consumers who invest in quality and durability. By focusing on individuals with a strong interest in luxury items and high disposable income, the brand ensures they reach an audience that is more likely to appreciate and purchase their premium offerings, which align with their customers’ lifestyle and purchasing power.

Incorporate Strong Calls to Action (CTAs)

A clear and compelling call to action can significantly increase engagement. Encourage your audience to take specific actions, such as liking your post, visiting your website, or sharing their thoughts in the comments. Clear and compelling CTAs help users grasp your intended action, resulting in increased interaction rates.

Utilize Interactive Content

Incorporating interactive elements, such as polls, quizzes, or questions, can boost engagement significantly. Interactive content invites users to participate rather than passively consume information, making them more likely to engage. For example, asking your audience their opinion on a relevant topic can spark conversation and encourage comments.

Retarget Previous Visitors

Retargeting ads at those who have previously engaged with your brand can increase engagement levels. As these individuals are already familiar with your offerings, they are more likely to interact with your ads again. Create tailored ads that speak to their previous interactions or highlight new products and offers relevant to their interests.

A well-known brand like SealSkin that sells car, truck, boat, and patio covers relies on retargeting as a key strategy. By using online ads that specifically showcase the benefits and features of their covers, such as durability and protection, retargeting reminds potential customers about the product and encourages them to complete their purchase. This method helps increase conversions by reaching out to individuals who have already shown interest but need an extra nudge to make a decision.

Encourage User-Generated Content

When your audience shares their experiences with your brand, it can actually create a great positive impact. Encourage customers to post photos or reviews, and consider featuring this content in your ads. User-generated content not only increases engagement but also builds trust and authenticity around your brand.

Boost Conversion Rate Ranking

This aspect is crucial for enhancing your Facebook Ad relevance score, as it reflects how effectively your ads are driving users to take actions such as completing purchases or signing up. A higher conversion rate means your ads are reaching the right audience and encouraging them to act.

Optimize Your Landing Page

Your landing page should provide a seamless experience that aligns with your ad’s promise. Make sure that your landing page’s content, design, and messaging align with what users anticipate after clicking your ad. 

A landing page that is well-optimized, with a straightforward call to action, can greatly improve conversion rates. You must also ensure the page loads swiftly and is compatible with mobile devices, as slow-loading pages can drive users away.

Offer Incentives

Providing incentives such as discounts, limited-time offers, or free trials can effectively encourage conversions. Highlighting these offers in your ads can capture attention and prompt users to take immediate action. Make sure the incentives are clearly visible in your ad and easily accessible on your landing page to maximize their impact.

Monitor and Analyze Performance

Regularly monitoring your ad performance and analyzing conversion data can help identify what’s working and what isn’t. You can use Facebook Ads Manager to analyze important metrics, including:

• Click-through rates
• Conversion rates
• User interactions on your landing page

Analyzing this data allows you to make the necessary adjustments to your ads, targeting, and landing pages to enhance overall performance.

Final Thoughts

Your ad should deliver on what it promises. If users click on an ad expecting one thing and receive something else, it can hurt engagement, lead to negative feedback, and lower your quality ranking. Clickbait headlines may grab attention but often result in poor user experience. Facebook penalizes ads that use these tactics, which can drop your score.

Facebook wants to prioritize content that delivers value to users. Ads that spark positive engagement (likes, comments, shares) are often considered higher quality. Consider engaging your audience by posing questions, conducting polls, or encouraging them to share their experiences in the comment section. However, avoid engagement baiting (e.g., “Like this post if you agree”), as it can lead to penalization.

Facebook advertising success doesn’t happen overnight, but by consistently optimizing your ads based on relevance score metrics, you’ll be well on your way to achieving sustainable, high-performance ad campaigns.

Have some great content up your sleeve? We invite you to reach out to us. We are excited to collaborate with talented writers and feature high-quality content on our blogs.

Maximizing Q4 2024 Holiday Ad Results with Facebook Engagement Campaigns

The 2024 holiday season is all about reconnecting with audiences through fun, engaging content. After the intensity of U.S. election ads, Thanksgiving and Christmas campaigns focused on post engagement are a refreshing way to re-engage viewers from their Facebook feed. Shoppers are primed to engage, with Meta’s data showing that 55% of holiday buyers reported Meta technologies helped influence their purchases, and 77% of Cyber Five shoppers credit Meta ads for inspiring their purchases this season.

This peak holiday advertising season is the perfect time to move audiences down the funnel and boost conversions. Facebook engagement campaigns are a key strategy for transforming your brand’s reach and visibility into deeper interactions and conversions, making this holiday season your most effective yet.

Post Engagement Ad Formats for Your Q4 and Q5 Holiday Campaigns

Strike Social’s data reveals that Q4 post engagement campaigns achieve engagement rates between 8% and 12%, which is at the upper end of our previous benchmarks of 2.90% to 14.40%. Q4 holiday ad trends indicate an extended shopping period, creating the perfect opportunity to captivate audiences with memorable, interactive campaigns that not only drive purchases but also keep your brand top-of-mind for the holiday season.

Here are the top ad formats we recommend to maximize your Facebook post engagement campaigns this season:

Reels + Carousel Holiday Ads

What better way to increase your audiences’ engagement than to be both on the consideration and conversion funnel at the same time? Using both formats together can create a powerful mix of brand storytelling and user interaction.

Nest Commerce’s Q4 2023 report indicates that brands advertising on Meta experienced a 35% increase in return on ad spend between October and November. Throughout Q4, conversion rates rose by 28%, peaking at 52% during Black Friday. This success is attributed to engaging audiences through awareness campaigns and subsequently guiding them to lower-funnel, conversion-based campaigns during the Q4 holiday peak periods.

By utilizing these post engagement-driven ad formats, you can fully maximize your brand’s performance, as 57% of holiday shoppers clamor online for their holiday shopping.

Cost and Performance Insights for Your Q4 2024 Facebook Engagement Ads

Data is the best backup to demonstrate the effectiveness and efficiency of utilizing a post-engagement objective as we approach the peak 2024 holiday campaigns. To help you establish benchmarks for this year’s holiday advertising, we have compiled key cost and performance metrics for Q4.

Cost-per-Engagement (CPE) and Engagement Rates (ER%)

In our Q4 2023 analysis, we observed a notable spike in CPE beginning in October, coinciding with the start of holiday advertising. Last year, key retail events such as Target, Prime, and Walmart launched promotions throughout early to mid-October, contributing to this trend.

As we transitioned from November into December, Facebook post engagement campaigns gained traction. We noted a downward trend in CPE alongside an upward trend in engagement rates. For Q4 2024, you can expect to align your holiday ad campaigns against Strike Social’s Facebook ad cost benchmarks, which range from $0.013 to $0.057 in November and decrease to as low as $0.012 to $0.038 by December.

Cost-per-View (CPV) and View Rate (VR%)

Video ad formats, particularly Facebook Reels ads, tend to have a higher view rate with lower costs compared to other formats, making them ideal for engagement during Q4. While view rates saw a slight decrease of 40% in December, they still remain elevated compared to October, reflecting sustained interest from engaged audiences throughout the Christmas season.

This year, Meta is testing a new ad feature that allows brands to showcase promotions and discounts directly within Reels ads. This innovation capitalizes on high shopping intent as viewers consume video content during the Q4 holidays. By highlighting promotions, brands can streamline the journey from consideration to conversion, making it easier for audiences to act on their interest.

Cost-per-Click (CPC) & Click-Through Rate (CTR%)

Click-based campaigns, like Carousel ad formats, provide solid performance metrics throughout the year. Q4 holiday trends indicate that these formats can drive high click engagement while maintaining lower costs. Although CPCs generally trend downward, we anticipate a slight increase of about 5% in December compared to November 2023 as more brands compete for ad space to get traffic and conversions.

To capitalize on this trend, your best strategy is to start your campaigns early. Target shoppers who begin their holiday shopping 1 to 2 months in advance to build momentum. By leveraging click engagement campaigns starting in October and November, you can position your brand effectively, ensuring you capture the attention of eager holiday shoppers before the competition heats up.

Cost per Link Click (CPLC) & Link Click-Through Rate (LCTR%)

Optimizing for lower-funnel conversions during Q4 becomes easier with well-targeted and engaging post engagement ads focusing on link clicks. Ad auctions can get a bit challenging towards November as there is competition around Black Friday and Cyber Five in particular; thus, we can see quite a spike in CPLC at this time.

Maintain an always-on approach, as costs tend to decrease in December, aligning with predictions from the NRF that 58% of consumers complete their shopping during this month. By focusing your post-engagement campaigns on link clicks that drive conversions, you position yourself well for success during the Thanksgiving and Christmas holiday advertising periods this Q4.

Driving Strong Results with Post Engagement Campaigns for Q4 and Q5 Holidays in 2024

As Q4 intensifies, the key to holiday success is not just reaching audiences but engaging them. Post engagement campaigns on platforms like Instagram and Facebook empower brands to foster meaningful interactions that can lead to conversions. With increased competition and shifting consumer behaviors during the holiday season, prioritizing post engagement allows brands to scale efficiently, harness Meta’s extensive audience, and enhance performance through cost-effective, high-engagement ad formats.

Are you looking to quickly scale your campaigns this holiday season? Reach out to our team for a personalized walkthrough of our AdTech solutions and discover how you can achieve greater results while saving on your Facebook engagement campaigns.

This case study for a luxury watch brand’s Facebook advertising campaign highlights an achieved CPLC 34.69% lower than the guaranteed rate, showcasing the effectiveness of strategic budget allocation and ad format selection. This initiative successfully introduced the brand’s new product line as part of its anniversary collection, reaching a significantly wider audience. With the client’s endorsement, Strike Social confidently utilized Facebook Reel and Carousel advertisements to reinforce the brand’s strong reputation for offering stylish, durable automatic watches at competitive prices.

Optimized Approach to Campaign Execution

Strike Social boosted the success of this campaign through daily optimization, including efficiently allocating the advertising budget across multiple Facebook ad formats. The campaign maximized engagement while controlling costs by dividing spending between Reels and Carousel ads.

Smart Budgeting & Ad Format Selection

Strike Social allocated 40% of the total budget to Reels due to their higher engagement potential, contributing to 77% of the campaign’s reach and impressions. Reels effectively expanded the brand’s visibility and proved 10% more cost-efficient regarding Facebook Cost Per Link click (CPLC) than other ad formats. These dynamic ads engaged users interested in video and static content, driving significant traffic at a lower cost.

Meanwhile, despite receiving only 38% of the budget, Carousel ads delivered 56% of the total landing page views. This format allowed the client to present multiple watch models visually engagingly, building a compelling product narrative that resonated with the audience. Finding the balance between Reels and Carousel ads was critical in achieving reach and conversion targets.

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Strike Social’s ongoing optimizations—over 1,300 adjustments—pushed the campaign to deliver 39.79% more additional link clicks vs. client guaranteed and achieve a 34.69% cost efficiency improvement. These campaign outcomes highlight how continuous monitoring and agile strategy adjustments, even with competitive platforms like Facebook ads, lead to remarkable outcomes.

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Improve Facebook ROAS Results With Expert-Led Ad Agency Solutions

You’re often presented with Facebook ROAS data when it’s time to make critical financial decisions and projections. While you trust your social media team or external agency to manage the day-to-day, ensuring optimal results requires constant oversight and real-time campaign adjustments.

Partnering with a dedicated social media ad agency allows you to focus on strategic decision-making while experts handle the intricate details of campaign optimization, paving the way for higher returns and lower advertising costs.

How Ad Agency Expertise Can Improve Your Facebook Ad ROAS

Identifying the reasons behind subpar Facebook ROAS can range from straightforward issues, such as faulty Meta Pixel tracking, to more complex challenges rooted in campaign optimization. While technical glitches can often be resolved with relative ease, underlying optimization problems require a deep understanding of campaign dynamics and strategy—something that heavily relies on the expertise of your Facebook campaign manager.

An advertising agency’s expertise can significantly enhance your Facebook ad ROAS through targeted specialized skills and strategies. Here are key factors through which an expert-led ad agency can improve Facebook ROAS while effectively managing your campaigns:

Quick Turnaround & Communication

When working with an external advertising agency for your brand’s social media promotions, timely and proper communication is possibly the most basic and number one requirement. 

Campaign Activation

Rapid communication facilitates quick turnarounds, allowing your campaigns to launch without delay. Speed is of the essence when it comes to social media advertising campaigns; the sooner your campaigns are launched, the sooner the platform can optimize ad delivery and performance.

Our team is equipped to review and prepare your Facebook ad setup within 48 hours for a swift activation process.

Campaign Management

Without consistent communication, you might miss significant successes, such as increased clicks and purchases. Even worse, if your campaigns are not meeting your expected Facebook ROAS, you may only realize this after the campaign has concluded—making it challenging to pinpoint the source of the issue and implement timely adjustments.

For example, if your target ROAS is 4x and you initially achieve 5x, it may seem like a win. However, further analysis could reveal that the purchase value reported in Meta Ads Manager is lower than anticipated. This discrepancy may be due to the Meta Pixel tracking purchases for a different product, leading to an inflated ROAS figure.

When such issues arise, a responsive ad agency can quickly recalibrate the campaign. While the Meta Pixel tracking is being resolved, budgets can be redirected to properly configured ads or campaigns, allowing for efficient recovery once the issue is fixed.

This rapid communication and adaptability between the ad agency and client can significantly impact the success of your Facebook conversion campaigns.

24/7 Campaign Monitoring

Knowing that your Facebook ads are being managed is one thing; having a dedicated team actively monitoring your campaigns’ costs and performance is another. Your ads operate around the clock, which is why 24/7 campaign management and monitoring are essential for maximizing your Facebook ROAS.

At Strike Social, our teams operate in shifts to ensure continuous oversight of your campaigns. This constant vigilance enables us to implement optimizations and updates in real time, whether adjustments are necessary on the platform or require immediate communication with you. Our proactive monitoring allows us to quickly identify anomalies, such as sudden drops in engagement or unexpected spikes in costs, enabling swift action to maintain optimal performance and improve ROAS for your ad conversion campaigns over time.

Media Buying Expertise

Your advertising agency’s experience and expertise in managing and optimizing social media campaigns are critical to achieving optimal ROAS. Beyond simply understanding how various social media platforms operate, they must possess the analytical skills to evaluate each campaign and ad in detail. This ensures they can identify when your ads perform well or if something is amiss.

For instance, if there are issues with pixel setup that lead to inaccurate Facebook ROAS tracking, these problems often remain hidden when only monitoring purchases and costs on Facebook. A media buying expert will investigate all potential avenues of the issue. If the problem isn’t related to the creative content, clicks, or the overall campaign strategy, they will look into the technical aspects, such as Meta pixel tracking and setup.

Strike Social’s media buying experts have duly earned clients’ trust, empowering us to be flexible and take the lead in implementing necessary optimizations that improve campaign performance.

Advanced Machine Learning Technology

Digital advertising is fundamentally driven by technology. While dedicated oversight of your campaigns is essential, it’s equally important for an ad agency to use intelligent ad tech that can notify when issues arise—and especially when your Facebook campaigns meet the desired metrics.

Proficiency in platforms like Google Ads Manager and Meta Ads Manager is basic, but having a unified technology that an advertising agency can use to monitor and manage your campaigns can further enhance campaign management.

Strike Social’s proprietary tool, Campaign Lab, leverages over 10 years of historical data from successful campaigns, allowing us to effectively engage your audiences through hyper-targeted strategies. The advanced features of Campaign Lab include automated data reports, internal alerts, and a pacing and optimization dashboard, all continuously refined by our data science team to improve integration with our media buying efforts.

As an example, our media buying teams receive internal alerts to promptly address any issues and avoid delays in campaign optimization. If an alert requires client intervention, it is quickly forwarded along with our optimization recommendations.

A case in point involved a financial services provider, where Campaign Lab triggered an alert indicating that the Meta pixel required attention. Our assigned media buying team quickly investigated the issue and informed the client, making sure no data was lost while the pixel setup was being properly configured.

Proper Campaign Pacing

Expert ad agencies excel in pacing campaigns by analyzing performance data and adjusting spending based on real-time outcomes. For example, if you have a $20,000 budget for a three-month campaign, it shouldn’t be fully utilized within the first month after achieving a target of 1 million impressions. Instead, the budget should be evenly distributed throughout the campaign, taking into account any expected spikes in engagement, such as during Halloween week.

The chart illustrates that, despite some low and high peaks in ad conversions—specifically purchases—these conversions consistently remained within the 80 to 100 range each day. This consistency demonstrates our team’s ability to effectively manage campaign pacing, highlighting Strike Social’s expertise in this area.

Strike Social’s Expertise in Improving Facebook ROAS and Ad Performance

We’ve outlined the advantages that advertising agencies bring in optimizing Facebook ROAS and enhancing overall campaign results. Now, let’s look at the tangible outcomes of our successful Facebook advertising campaigns, demonstrating how we deliver efficiency and effectiveness for brands and agencies alike.

Improving Reach & Sign-Ups with Facebook Campaigns

One of our major Facebook campaigns for a health and fitness brand focused on increasing membership sign-ups across various locations nationwide. By implementing precise DMA geo-targeting and strategically pacing the budget week by week, we effectively boosted the campaign’s performance.

To ensure accurate Facebook ad metrics, we meticulously configured the Facebook Pixel and linked each club’s specific location page to its corresponding ad. This alignment guaranteed that each campaign reached the right audience and directed potential members to the right website pages.

As a result of our media buying expertise, we were able to achieve the following outcomes:

Increasing Facebook Ads ROAS through Constant Optimization & Pixel Monitoring

A leading financial services provider’s objective for their Facebook advertising campaign was to increase leads and conversions. Given the campaign’s large scale, which included both awareness and conversion efforts, meticulous attention was essential to ensure seamless conversion tracking and budget optimization.

Despite managing multiple campaigns and nearly 60 creatives, our team at Strike Social prepared and launched the campaigns within 48 hours, arranging a swift go-live for the client’s Facebook conversion ads. We prioritized accuracy by ensuring the Meta Pixel was correctly configured on all relevant website pages to which audiences were directed. This proactive approach and ongoing monitoring enabled us to refine audience targeting, adjust bidding strategies, and optimize the campaign effectively.

Through the implementation of these strategies, we successfully attained the following results:

What Strike Social Delivers

We don’t just provide results; we deliver cost-effective solutions backed by over a decade of expertise and advanced technology to help maximize the impact of your Facebook advertising campaigns.

• Campaign Scaling Expertise: Whether you need support for a quick seasonal campaign or a year-long running Facebook advertising strategy, we’re here to help. Our team of experts has extensive experience in scaling campaigns effectively to reach wider audiences and drive better results. We can provide the resources and knowledge needed to expand your campaigns while maintaining consistent performance metrics like clicks, views, and budget throughout the campaign duration.

• Predictive Advertising Solutions: Using our proprietary tool, Campaign Lab, we apply over 10 years of campaign data alongside machine learning to fine-tune audience targeting and optimize campaign performance. Campaign Lab evaluates key inputs like ad platform, format, budget, and target metrics to identify the most effective audience segments and budget allocations.

• Cost-Effective Pricing Model: Our focus is to get your campaigns to achieve the desired results at lower costs. We operate on a margin pricing model, where our profit is the margin between what we spend on ads and what we charge you. This means we only make money if we save you ad costs while achieving your campaign objectives.

Drive Better Facebook Outcomes with the Right Ad Agency

Achieving a strong return on ad spend (ROAS) on Facebook requires more than periodic campaign reviews. It demands continuous optimization, real-time oversight, and swift adjustments to performance shifts. The right agency will handle this seamlessly, so you can focus on other aspects of your business.

By partnering with an expert ad agency like Strike Social, you gain access to round-the-clock campaign management, rapid execution, and cutting-edge technology. Our approach ensures your Facebook ads are continually optimized to deliver the best possible ROAS. To learn more, contact us for a personalized walkthrough of our SWAS (Software with a Service) and ad tech, so you can see how it works firsthand.

Running Facebook ad campaigns for financial services requires more than creativity but precise execution and real-time campaign management. In this case study, Strike Social worked with a leading financial services provider and helped overcome several challenges. From the campaign setup, identifying top-performing campaigns across audience segments and keeping a close eye on Facebook Meta Pixel tracking to ensure accurate data collection were a few situations where Strike Social delivered the utmost service to maximize ad spending and eventually achieved a remarkable 28x return on ad spend (ROAS).

The Importance of Vigilant Campaign Management

For any digital campaign, with media buyers becoming proficient in targeting audiences, vigilant campaign management is critical to success. Managing a large-scale Facebook ad campaign for a global brand, both awareness and conversion effort, came with inherent complexities, requiring close attention to detail and constant monitoring to maximize performance.

This level of vigilance was significant given the following key challenges:

Complex Ad Setup and Execution

The campaign involved nearly 60 distinct creatives, each targeted at different audience segments across retargeting (RT) and lookalike (LAL) campaigns. With such a high number of Facebook ads, managing the initial setup was time-intensive and prone to errors, potentially delaying the campaign launch or misaligning creative execution.

Identifying Top-Performing Ads

With various audience segments and creative formats in play, tracking which ads resonated with specific audiences became critical. Our proprietary tool has enabled our media buying experts to keep campaign pacing on track. Additionally, comparing the performance of creatives across different ad sets and campaigns required diligent, real-time analysis to ensure that the best-performing ads received the highest priority, and our technology and system allow us to stay on top of everything essential.

Pixel Monitoring and Conversion Tracking

Using Meta pixels was essential for tracking conversions and optimizing bidding strategies. Any malfunction or misconfiguration in pixel tracking could lead to inaccurate data reporting, making it difficult to gauge the campaign’s performance. Having a quick eye for 24/7 that ensures Facebook Meta pixel data is reliable and accurate at all times was vital to avoid wasted ad spend and misinformed decision-making.

Vigilant campaign management—through ongoing performance analysis, agile troubleshooting, and constant optimization—was essential to helping achieve 28x Facebook ads ROAS.

Data-Driven Campaign Precision and Agile Execution

To address these challenges effectively, Strike Social implemented solutions focused on streamlining processes, improving real-time monitoring, and making quick, data-informed decisions.

Here’s a quick overview of the team’s approach that helped improve ROAS on Facebook ads and drive the campaign’s success:

Agile Execution Through Vigilant Monitoring

Strike Social achieved agile execution by diligently monitoring campaign performance and swiftly implementing data-driven optimizations. Continuous tracking of conversion trends, cost-per-acquisition (CPA), and other crucial metrics enabled us to promptly detect inefficiencies, such as increasing CPAs or decreased engagement. This agile approach empowered us to fine-tune audience targeting, adjust bidding strategies, and optimize the campaign in real-time. Our constant monitoring ensured that high-performing ads were maximized while minimizing wasted ad spend, thus maintaining the campaign’s trajectory for maximum impact.

Through these strategies, we achieved the following results:

• 66% more impressions than guaranteed
• 2x more link clicks than expected
• 66,000 leads generated and 7,000+ purchases through Facebook ads
• A total of $1.5 million in revenue, translating into an impressive 28x ROAS

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In this Facebook ad case study, vigilant monitoring and agile execution highlight how these procedures can drive exceptional outcomes for conversion campaigns. By staying on top of real-time campaign execution, making rapid optimizations, and leveraging a data-driven approach, Strike Social helped our global leader client in the insurance industry achieve a remarkable 28x Facebook ROAS and $1.5 million in revenue.

Whether you’re managing a complex campaign with multiple creatives or prioritizing Facebook ad pixel monitoring, Strike Social’s expertise can help you stay ahead. Our team delivers the precision, speed, and insight necessary to maximize your advertising spend.

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How to Fix Facebook Ad ROAS Errors

The first step in effectively addressing inaccurate Facebook ad ROAS is identifying the root cause of the issue. Once you pinpoint the problem, you can implement the necessary fixes to restore reliable and accurate ROAS tracking.

One of the initial indicators that you need to fix Facebook ROAS tracking is when you calculate your revenue generated divided by your ad spend, and the result displayed on the Meta Ads Manager or your campaign dashboard does not match. Let’s take a moment to clarify how your Facebook advertising costs, particularly ROAS in Facebook ads, is calculated:

How is Return on Ad Spend (ROAS) on Facebook Calculated?

To compute your ROAS from Facebook ads, use our calculator below:

This formula is a basic approach for computing your Facebook ads ROAS, particularly for a straightforward e-commerce business where only revenue and ad spend need to be considered.

Example: A fitness apparel brand launches a Facebook ad campaign to promote its new line of workout gear, priced at $100 per unit. The campaign leads to 30 sales.

• Total Revenue: 30 sales × $100 = $3,000
• Ad Spend: $1,000

Without using the Facebook ROAS calculator, the calculation is as follows:

ROAS = Total revenue generated / Ad spend
ROAS = $3,000 / $1,000
ROAS = 3:1 or 3x

In this case, the brand’s ROAS is 3x (or 300%), meaning it generates three dollars in revenue for every dollar spent on Facebook advertising.

For other campaign objectives, the formula for calculating Return on Ad Spend can differ:

Purchase ROAS

• If your e-commerce shop is directly implemented in your Meta platforms, such as Shops, Marketplace, Pages, or Messenger, you should calculate your ROAS based on purchases. 
• The computation for Purchase ROAS should be the purchase conversion value divided by the amount spent on this specific campaign. The purchase conversion value is simply the total amount of purchases generated from sales you acquired on the aforementioned Meta apps. 
• Try out this Facebook ROAS calculator for direct purchases and compare the numbers shown in the Facebook Ads Manager to check for accuracy: 

Example: A footwear brand utilized the Collection ad format with Instant Experience to directly attribute sales from their Facebook ads. They launched a sustainable footwear line, pricing each pair at $95. The ad campaign resulted in 50 sales within one week.

• Total Revenue from Meta Sales: 50 sales × $95 = $4,750
• Ad Spend: $500

Here’s how Purchase ROAS is calculated:

Purchase ROAS = Total revenue generated from Facebook sales / Ad spend
Purchase ROAS = $4,750 / $500
Purchase ROAS = 9.5:1 or 9.5x

For this brand, the Purchase ROAS is 9.5x, meaning they earned 9.5 times their ad spend in revenue from the 7-day run of their Facebook campaign.

Website Purchase ROAS

• If your Facebook ads direct audiences to your website for purchases, then the ROAS formula is based on the total value of website purchases (acquired from the specific Facebook ads or campaign) divided by the ad or campaign spending.
• This requires setting up a Meta Pixel or Conversions API to ensure Meta Ads Manager properly records the correct value associated with each website purchase from your campaign. 
• To determine if you need to fix Facebook ROAS tracking, use this calculator to compute your Website Purchase ROAS:

Example: An eyewear brand uses multiple social media networks for advertising, including Facebook, Twitter, and Snapchat. To accurately track sales and traffic from each platform, all ads are directed to the website using proper UTMs. Based on their tracking system, the following website purchases were generated from Facebook ads over a 30-day campaign:

• Total Revenue from Website Purchases: 425 sales × $150 = $63,750
• Ad Spend: $10,890

Using the Website Purchase ROAS calculator, here’s how the return is calculated:

Website Purchase ROAS = Total revenue from website purchases / Ad spend
Website Purchase ROAS = $63,750 / $10,890
Website Purchase ROAS = 5.85:1 or 5.85x

This means the eyewear brand achieved a Return on Ad Spend (ROAS) of 5.85x, generating $5.85 in revenue for every dollar spent on Facebook advertising during the campaign.

Mobile App Purchase ROAS

• For app advertisements on Facebook that don’t directly attribute sales, you can still track ROAS through in-app purchases.
• Meta refers to these as “shared items,” which are products or services shared between businesses to create ad campaigns. Instead of focusing on clicks or views, the emphasis is on actions taken with purchases of specific in-app items originating from Facebook ads.
• This will be recorded by connecting the mobile app through the Meta SDK, mobile measurement partner, or other third-party API connections, allowing Facebook Ads Manager to accurately calculate the value from ad conversions.
• To compute this, you need the total value of ad conversions from in-app purchases (acquired from your Facebook campaign) divided by the ad/campaign spend. Use the Facebook ROAS calculator below to see if your data matches: 

Example: A video editing app is advertising through Facebook Reels ads. While the app is free to download, it’s offering a discounted 3-month subscription for new sign-ups, which allows access to professional features. The discounted subscription is $99, and 280 users signed up by clicking on its Reels ads:

• Total Revenue from In-App Purchases: 280 subscriptions × $99 = $27,720
• Ad Spend: $3,800

Using the Facebook ROAS calculator, the Return on Ad Spend is calculated as follows:

Mobile App Purchase ROAS = Total revenue from in-app purchases / Ad spend
Mobile App Purchase ROAS = $27,720 / $3,800
Mobile App Purchase ROAS = 7.29:1 or 7.29x

This means the brand achieved a ROAS of 7.29x, effectively earning 7.29 times its ad spend by promoting the app subscription through paid ads on Reels.

Common Reasons Why Your Facebook Ad ROAS Might Be Inaccurate

Now that you understand how Return On Ad Spend is computed, you should have a clearer vision of your ideal Facebook ROAS figure. If it’s significantly off from your expectations, consider these common reasons why your Facebook reports might not be providing the results you desire:

Discrepancies Between Facebook and Your Site

One of the most common issues affecting your Facebook ROAS occurs when the purchase value reported on Meta Ads Manager does not align with the actual value recorded on your website. Resolving this requires thoroughly comparing data across multiple platforms to ensure consistency. Here are some steps to identify and fix these discrepancies:

• Cross-check Facebook Conversion Value vs. Actual Purchase Price on Your Website: Compare the conversion value reported by Facebook Ads Manager with the actual purchase amounts posted on your website.
  • Example: You previously promoted a product with a 20% discount during your back-to-school sale and now with a 30% discount as indicated in your current ads. Your website may show the purchase value based on the original price of $100, reflecting the 30% discount, which makes it $70. If Facebook Ads Manager still lists the conversion value as $80 (20% discount), this will lead to a $10 discrepancy in your ROAS computation.

• Compare Facebook Conversion Value with E-commerce Platform Reports: If your site runs on platforms like Shopify or WooCommerce, verify that the revenue figures reported there match what Facebook is tracking.
  • Example: Say you’re offering a product for $50 on your Shopify clothing store's website, but you’ve applied a custom field for a bundled discount. This will effectively reduce the price to $45. Facebook may still record the full $50 as the conversion value if the discount wasn’t communicated through the API, skewing your ROAS calculations by $5 per transaction.

• Cross-check Facebook Conversion Value with Google Analytics or Other Analytics Tools: If you use tools like Google Analytics or other third-party systems for conversion tracking, cross-reference these reports with your Facebook data.
  • Example: For your Amazon Prime Day campaign in October, you promote a $120 product at a limited-time offer of $100. Facebook Ads Manager shows 30 purchases at the discounted price, reporting $3,000 in revenue. In contrast, Google Analytics reports only $2,700 in revenue for the same period.
  • Upon investigating, you discover that Google Analytics attributes some purchases to direct traffic, while Facebook claims them under the ad campaign. This $300 difference could be due to the differing attribution models used by Facebook (last-click or view-through) and Google Analytics (last-non-direct click).

Improper Meta Pixel Tracking

Further investigation is needed if the error isn’t apparent in the reported conversion values. One of the first essential steps when running Facebook ads is to confirm that events such as website visits, clicks, and submissions (like contact forms or purchases) are tracked accurately. If the pixel is not installed correctly or the events it tracks are misconfigured, reported ad conversions and ROAS discrepancies can occur.

Incorrect Conversion Value Reporting

In addition to correctly setting up the Meta Pixel, the conversion value for each sale or purchase must also be properly configured. While this primarily falls on the website developer, knowing which codes should be installed alongside the Meta Pixel is helpful for correctly recording purchase amounts as they are processed.

Delayed Conversion Reporting

77% of marketers today believe that last-click attribution, while the easiest, is not the most effective way to track campaign performance. However, for conversion tracking and calculating Facebook ROAS specifically, you must monitor attribution windows to avoid missing purchases that occur during your campaign period (even during the campaign cooldown period).

Facebook's default attribution window (7 days click, 28 days view) may not capture all conversions, especially for longer sales cycles. Users may click on an ad but complete their purchase days or weeks later, leading to an underreported ROAS if the attribution window is not appropriately set.

By extending the attribution window, you can capture more conversions that occur after the initial ad engagement.

Example:

High-end electronics are usually not purchased within the same day after a user clicks on an ad. For instance, a potential customer clicks on your Facebook ad for a $1,000 laptop but doesn’t immediately make the purchase. Instead, they spend several days comparing options before finally completing the purchase 12 days later. 

In this case, Facebook’s default 7-day click window is insufficient for capturing the delayed conversion. The solution is to extend the attribution window to 28-day click to make sure purchases made up to four weeks after the ad click are counted.

Steps to Prevent Issues in Facebook ROAS Reporting

While we’ve outlined common causes of inaccuracies in Facebook ads ROAS, it’s important to recognize that occasional discrepancies are inevitable. However, with the right measures, you can achieve 90% or higher accuracy in conversion tracking and reporting. 

Here’s how you can proactively prevent significant issues in your Facebook ROAS calculations:

Ensure Proper Tracking Setup

• Make sure Meta Pixel and Conversions API (if applicable) are implemented correctly to track customer actions from different touchpoints, providing more accurate attribution of sales and conversions. Familiarize yourself with the Facebook Events Manager and Conversions API Gateway so you can occasionally touch base at the ROAS computation and tell right away if it needs to be fixed.
• For advanced tracking setups, integrating your tracking tools with Google Tag Manager (GTM) offers greater flexibility and granularity, helping capture every action that leads to conversions.

Getting Accurate ROAS on Facebook Ads For Informed Decision-Making

The Facebook ROAS might appear as just another line in your report or presentation, but it’s a key factor in determining whether your ad spend delivers value. It helps you make informed decisions about your advertising budget, including how much to allocate to Facebook and what conversions you can expect based on this data.

Strike Social specializes in reducing costs while delivering outstanding results. To learn how our SwaS (software with a service) innovation can produce measurable outcomes for your campaigns, contact us for a personalized walkthrough of our technology and services.

What Are the Basic Metrics in Facebook Ads That Advertisers Should Know?

To determine the effectiveness of your Facebook advertising efforts, you must know the different Facebook ad metrics available on the platform. Whether you are doing organic posts or paid Facebook advertising, you should be able to differentiate which Facebook metrics you should be tracking.

What Are Facebook Ad Metrics?

Before we get into the details of which Facebook ad metrics you should keep an eye on for your campaigns, let’s establish a clear understanding of the definitions:

Facebook Metrics: These are all the measurable data points on Facebook related to your Page, posts, and ads. They provide insights into your Facebook presence, audience, and overall performance.

Facebook Engagement Metrics: These focus on audience engagement with your posts, such as likes, comments, and shares. You can find these within your Facebook profile’s dashboard.

Facebook Advertising Metrics: These are the Facebook KPIs to note when running paid ad campaigns on Facebook. These can be found within the Meta Ads Manager.

Dissecting the Different Facebook Advertising Metrics

Engagement Metrics 

Paid ads on Facebook appear on users’ feeds, similar to regular posts. Users can also interact with them via reactions, comments, and shares.

These metrics focus on how users interact with your ads, indicating their level of interest and responsiveness. While similar to the Facebook engagement metrics we mentioned earlier, these are specifically related to your paid ads. These are the Facebook ad metrics included in this view:

For Facebook ad formats with video ads, here are the video engagement metrics you should monitor:

Conversion Metrics

These metrics correlate directly to your campaign objective and are ideal for evaluating Facebook campaigns aimed at generating leads or sales. They help determine if your ads achieve the desired outcomes and if your ad spend is cost-effective. 

Common Facebook ad metrics in this view include:

Cost Metrics

Cost metrics focus on the financial aspects of your Facebook ad campaign, helping you understand your spending and the efficiency of that spending. These metrics allow you to analyze cost rates at various levels. 

For example, you can analyze CPM against reach and frequency for Awareness, CPC against link clicks or website visits for Traffic campaigns, and CPA against leads or website actions for Leads campaigns. Key cost metrics include:

The Right Facebook Ads Metrics for Different Campaign Objectives

By discerning what each Facebook ad metric corresponds to, what it represents, and which category it belongs to, you’re on the road to identifying which metrics align with your campaign goals. 

Let’s explore various Facebook advertising objectives and the metrics you should focus on to optimize your campaigns accordingly.

Facebook Ad Metrics FAQs

Importance of Aligning Your Campaigns with the Right Facebook Ad Metrics

As media buyers, it is imperative to acknowledge the different perspectives to consider when learning about Facebook ads reporting and the relevant metrics. While we have detailed the fundamental Facebook ad metrics to track based on your campaign objectives, it is equally important for you to align your reports with the team to whom you are presenting them.

For example, sales teams may prioritize results and purchases, whereas advertising teams may focus on costs and efficiency. With a clear understanding of which Facebook ad metrics matter and how they are interrelated, this aspect of your reporting should become clearer.

Get expert campaign management and efficient reporting with Strike Social. With over a decade of successful paid social media advertising and our proprietary tool, Strike Social reaches your target audiences precisely and optimizes campaigns around the clock. As industry leaders in paid social media advertising, our seasoned media buying teams help brands achieve their objectives, enhancing performance while reducing costs.

Discover how our technology can deliver better results for your brand. Fill out the form below for a personalized walkthrough from one of our sales team members. Smarter media buying starts today.

This post was updated in May 2025 to provide you with the latest information.

Display Your Ads Suitably with the Right Facebook Advertising Formats

With so many different Facebook ad formats, deciding which is right for your brand can be tough. You might be tempted to try them all, but each Facebook ad campaign objective has specific formats best suited for it. With this guide, you won’t have to second-guess your choices. Below are the different types of Facebook ad formats you should know to help you explore and utilize them effectively for your campaign objectives:

Selecting the Optimal Facebook Ad Format for Your Campaigns

If you’re familiar with the Instagram advertising formats, you might assume Facebook’s are similar. However, Facebook offers a much wider range of ad formats you may not have noticed while browsing your news feed or Messenger. Let’s take a closer look:

Facebook Feed Ads

• These ads are prominently displayed within the user’s news feed, blending with organic content. They can be presented in various ad formats, including images, videos, carousels, or collection.
• Feed ads are one of the most common ad placements utilized on Facebook.

Facebook In-Stream Video Ads

• Like YouTube in-stream ads, these are 5-15-second video ads that can be played before, during, or after a video is played within the user’s feed.
• These ads can also be showcased during live streams of selected Facebook partner creators.

Facebook Video Feed Ads

• The Video Feed is a distinct section within the Facebook app on mobile that allows users to explore an array of video content (separate from the Reels feed). Akin to the Facebook home feed, ads featured within the Video Feed are integrated alongside organic video posts presented to users.

Facebook Marketplace Ads

• To distinguish them from promoted Marketplace listings, Facebook Marketplace ads are an alternative placement for ads displayed in the Feed when the Marketplace search is pertinent to the product, and the user is a target audience.
• When a user searches for a product in the Facebook Marketplace, a paid ad placement in the Marketplace will resemble a listing but will include a “Sponsored” tag.

Facebook Stories Ads

• While navigating through the Stories of your friends or followed pages, Facebook Stories advertisements will appear in between. These are specifically designed for all Facebook campaign objectives and are intended to direct engaged users to a designated landing page or shopping link provided by the advertiser.

Facebook Search Results Ads

• Similarly to Facebook Marketplace ads, these are displayed within Facebook Search Results and will appear when relevant to the search terms entered by the user. 
• These ads are designed to integrate with the specific search results, assuming a similar tile format as other search results but featuring a distinct “Sponsored” label to differentiate them from other results.

Facebook Reels Ads

• While browsing the Facebook Reels feed, Reels ads will appear alongside Reels posted by your Facebook friends and other content creators. These ads can appear post-loop or immediately after an organic Reel is done playing.
• As with any Reels content on Facebook, audiences can comment on, like, view, share, and/or skip them.

Facebook Reels Overlay Ads

• Ads can also appear in Facebook Reels as Overlay Ads. These ads show up during the playback of an organic Reel on a user’s device, presenting as clickable banners that, upon interaction, redirect users to a predetermined landing page or link associated with the advertiser.

Facebook Business Explore Ads

• Facebook Business Explore ads are displayed whenever a user engages with an organic post from a business entity and subsequently scrolls to view additional posts from businesses operating within the same category or industry.
• In this view, users are presented with various unsponsored posts and sponsored Facebook ads from businesses similar to the post initially clicked upon.

Facebook Right Column Ads (Desktop Only)

• When your audience scrolls through your Facebook feed on the desktop website, they will see an image ad on the right side of the screen, along with their contacts and, if applicable, any Facebook Pages they manage.

Facebook Groups Feed Ads

• Furthermore, ads can also be displayed within the news feed for Facebook Groups.
• This feature is compatible with video and carousel ads, allowing your Facebook ad campaigns to be presented to groups with relevant demographics, interests, and behaviors following the targeting specifications you selected for your advertising campaigns.

Messenger Stories Ads

• Apart from the Facebook platform itself, another ad placement opportunity exists for brands within Messenger. At present, Messenger Stories advertisements are exclusively accessible for the following campaign objectives:
  • Conversions
  • App installations
  • Traffic
  • Awareness

How Do These Ad Formats Appear on Facebook

To get a better idea of what these different Facebook ad types look like within the Meta advertising network, here are some visual examples:

Image Ads

Video Ads

Carousel Ads

Collection Ads

Choosing the Best Facebook Ad Format for Your Campaign Objectives

Not all Facebook ad formats may be compatible with and align with your target audience’s preferences when they seek your product or service on the platform. Consequently, we have demonstrated how these formats appear on Facebook’s desktop or mobile application. 

Now that you are aware of the distinctions, the following are the ideal Facebook advertising formats based on the campaign objective and the intended outcome of your Facebook advertising campaigns:

Facebook Media Buyer FAQs

Getting Acquainted with Facebook Advertising Formats

Now that you’ve gained insight into how various Facebook ad formats align with campaign objectives and platform placements, you can appreciate the diversity of advertising options on Facebook. Each placement caters well to selected ad types on Facebook, which can provide a better user experience to audiences, leading to better ad performances for your campaigns. 

It’s time to move to the next part of our Facebook advertising guide: understanding the correct Facebook ad sizes and specs. This will ensure that your ads look their best when they appear on people’s screens.

This post was updated in February 2025 to provide you with the latest information.

Optimize Your Facebook Ad Spend with Meta Advantage Campaign Budget (CBO)

Beyond your Facebook advertising metrics — the traffic to your website, the leads generated — another critical aspect to monitor closely is your Facebook ad spend. The challenge lies in allocating your campaign budget not just evenly across your ad groups and their respective ads, but more importantly, towards those showing superior performance. Traditionally, this has been a manual task for media buyers, requiring constant oversight.

The introduction of Meta Advantage campaign budget (formerly campaign budget optimization) feature aims to alleviate this task from the shoulders of advertisers and media buyers. This brings us to a crucial inquiry: Can we trust Meta’s AI to manage our budgets effectively? More importantly, how can media buyers maintain a level of involvement and control in this automated process?

Common Mistakes When Managing Facebook Campaign Budgets

Media buyers are responsible for overseeing ad costs to ensure that the ad spend is effectively channeled towards the most successful ad groups and ads. This strategy also prevents poorly performing ones from consuming the entire budget for Facebook ads.

Given that media buyers cannot monitor campaign budgets and ad spend 24/7, certain errors commonly occur when budgets are not adequately supervised:

Setting fixed budgets across all ad sets regardless of performance

• Initially allocating ad budgets evenly across all ad sets is a reasonable strategy at the start of your Facebook campaigns.
• However, once the campaigns begin to show results in terms of conversions or website traffic — typically around the two-week mark or the Learning phase — it becomes essential to redistribute the budgets for Facebook ads towards the better-performing ones.

Lack of data analysis for budget reallocations

• An important consideration in setting up a Facebook campaign is deciding which key metric to focus on, depending on your campaign’s goal. For objectives related to website reach and awareness, the CPM (cost-per-thousand impressions) should be your primary metric.
• Budget adjustments made without considering the appropriate metrics, such as focusing on CPC (cost per click) instead, may not support the campaign’s objectives effectively.

Disregarding pacing and optimization features

• Advertising platforms, including Facebook, offer various features that allow for a more transparent view of how your budget is being spent. Facebook Ads Manager provides recommendations and alerts to help you enhance your budget and ad performance.
• These notifications should not be ignored; they are valuable resources that, when utilized effectively, can significantly improve the efficiency of your ad spend.

How Meta Advantage Campaign Budget Works

With Meta Advantage Campaign Budget (Facebook campaign budget optimization), advertisers have the ability to establish a single, unified campaign budget. This budget is then dynamically allocated across various ad sets to prioritize those showing the best performance, all in real-time.

Through Meta’s advanced AI technology, the system continuously evaluates the performance of each ad set. It then dynamically redistributes the campaign budget, prioritizing ad sets that are delivering the best results. This process happens automatically, relieving media buyers from the task of manually adjusting Facebook ad budget allocations across different ad sets.

By ensuring that a larger portion of your budget is spent on ad sets that are performing well, Facebook CBO maximizes the ROI of your advertising efforts. This automated optimization process allows businesses to achieve better campaign outcomes, requiring minimal manual intervention.

Advantage Campaign Budget In Action

To offer a clearer understanding, let’s examine how Meta Advantage campaign budget allocates your ad spending and the importance of individual optimization for each ad set.

(Note: This example is purely illustrative. All numbers are fictional and do not reflect any real campaigns.)

For example, your brand will launch an Awareness campaign to introduce a new product and gauge market response. You decide to activate three ad sets for the campaign, organized by ad format:

• Image ad set
• Video ad set
• Carousel ad set

With an allocated budget for the campaign at $1,000 for 1 month, you set up a lifetime budget and turn on the Advantage campaign budget option.

With your ads under Facebook’s campaign budget optimization, the system initiates a learning phase for your ads. During this phase, it assesses each ad set’s performance and determines the optimal budget distribution.

For instance, should the Carousel ad sets outperform the others by the second week, Facebook CBO might adjust the budget distribution to:

This redistribution reflects CBO’s ability to allocate budgets dynamically based on ongoing performance analysis. However, if the Video ad sets initially underperform, it’s advisable not to deactivate them prematurely. CBO continues to monitor and analyze all ad sets throughout the campaign duration. 

For example, if after four weeks, the Video ad sets start performing better, CBO might then adjust the budget to enhance their reach:

This example underscores the intelligence of Facebook CBO in managing ad spend. It dynamically reallocates budgets based on performance, ensuring no opportunity for optimization is missed, even with ad sets that may take longer to show their full potential.

Make Budget Allocation Effortless with Facebook CBO

Eliminate the worry of needing to constantly monitor your campaigns for fear that ad performance might dip in your absence. The essence of Facebook campaign budget optimization is to lift this burden from advertisers, allowing you to concentrate on broader strategic objectives such as data analysis and campaign performance decisions.

Rather than seeing it as giving up control, consider campaign budget optimization as a sophisticated tool working on your behalf. This approach doesn’t mean you’re stepping back entirely; instead, you remain an integral part of the decision-making process, guiding the AI rather than being sidelined by it.

A committed and expert advertising partner is crucial for the success of any digital campaign. Engage with Strike Social‘s Facebook advertising professionals and experience the difference that expert insight and strategic use of tools can make. Let us show you how Strike Social can be a valuable ally in your advertising strategy.

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Campaign Outcome

Strike Social’s Facebook strategy drove strong results by allocating budget across diverse locations, each with unique audience behaviors and demands. This localized approach not only accelerated membership growth but also showcased scalable, hyper-targeted media execution.

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See other Facebook ad case studies.

Are you new to Facebook marketing and seeking a one-stop resource for the Facebook ad glossary? We’ve got you covered. Here’s an all-inclusive compilation of essential Facebook marketing terms, from the basics of ad creation to the intricacies of pixels and conversions. Find all your Facebook ad terms conveniently gathered in one accessible resource.

Mastering the Basics of Facebook Marketing with the Facebook Ad Glossary

Venturing into Facebook advertising can be intimidating without a grasp of the basics. That’s why we’ve crafted this Facebook ad glossary for advertisers eager to explore Facebook advertising but still determining where to begin. With ad experts anticipating a robust year in 2024, projecting up to $55.77 billion in revenue, aspiring brands should quickly secure their share of this lucrative market.

As you familiarize yourself with the ideas and concepts, you’ll better understand how Facebook advertising operates. Like other paid social media platforms, you’ll find it easier to piece together the puzzle as you delve into the process.

See the Facebook marketing terms in alphabetical order below. You can also click from the sections above to jump on the Facebook glossary ad term you are looking for.

2-second continuous video plays: The count of instances where your video ad played continuously for at least 2 seconds, with at least 50% of the video pixels in view.

3-second video plays: The tally of instances where your video ad played for at least 3 seconds.

Account currency: The currency is utilized to settle costs within an ad account.

Account ID: A distinctive identifier assigned by Facebook to an ad account.

Account name: The designated name for an ad account.

Account spending limit: The maximum allowable spending for an ad account.

Accounts Center: A centralized tool designed for the oversight of ad accounts across various Facebook apps and services.

Ad account: An individual account established for the administration of advertising activities on Facebook.

Ad creative: The content of an ad, encompasses images, videos, and text.

Ad frequency capping: A control mechanism to manage the number of times you reach your audience. Useful when aiming to avoid excessive exposure to the same individuals.

Ad library: A searchable database containing all active and inactive ads on Facebook and Instagram.

Ad set budget: The overall amount of money allocated for a particular ad set, comprising a group of ads with a shared budget, schedule, and target audience.

Ad set delivery: The method employed to distribute ads within an ad set, including standard delivery or accelerated delivery.

Ad set name: The designated name for an ad set to facilitate easy identification within an ad account.

Ad set optimization: The process of defining specific objectives for an ad set, like link clicks, impressions, or daily unique reach, to assist Facebook in delivering ads to individuals most likely to take the desired action.

Ads API: A tool enabling the creation and management of ads programmatically.

Age: A demographic targeting option defines your ads’ audience within a specific age group.

Age and gender: Demographic targeting options specify the age and gender of the audience, as indicated in their Facebook profiles.

Attribution model: The rule or set of rules determining how credit for conversions is assigned to touchpoints in conversion paths.

Attribution setting: The method through which conversions are attributed to your ads.

Audience: The group of people you aim to reach with your ads.

Audience Network: A network of approved mobile app publishers displaying ads in their apps on behalf of Facebook.

Audience targeting: The act of fine-tuning the audience for an ad based on specific criteria, such as demographics, interests, or behaviors.

Auto-refresh impressions: The number of times an ad is displayed to the same individual due to automatic refreshing of a webpage or app.

Awareness objective: A campaign designed to enhance people’s awareness and recognition of your business.

A/B testing: A method of comparing two versions of an ad to determine which one performs better.

Backup payment method: A secondary payment method is used when the primary payment method fails.

Bid strategy: The approach is employed to determine the maximum amount you’re willing to pay for the desired results.

Billing summary: A report detailing the expenditure on an ad account during a specific period.

Billing threshold: The amount that must be spent on an ad account before payment is required.

Budget: Total budget allocated depending on the ad level (campaign, ad set, or ad level).

Campaign budget: The overall budget allocated for a specific ad campaign.

Campaign budget optimization (now Meta Advantage campaign budget): A feature that autonomously distributes your campaign budget among ad sets to attain optimal results.

Campaign ID: An exclusive identifier assigned by Facebook to a campaign.

Campaign lifetime budget: The overall sum allocated for spending on a campaign throughout its duration.

Campaign name: The designated name for a specific campaign.

Campaign objective: The intended goal for a campaign, whether it’s brand awareness, conversions, or another objective.

Campaign spending limit: The highest allowable amount of spending for a particular campaign.

Carousel ads: An ad format allowing multiple images or videos within a single ad unit.

Clicks: The total number of times users clicked on your ad.

Click-through rate (CTR): The percentage of individuals who viewed your ad and executed a link click.

Content views: The total number of times users viewed your content, whether video or image.

Conversion lift studies: A tool measuring the impact of Facebook ads on offline sales.

Conversion tracking: The process of monitoring and measuring the actions users take after clicking on your ads.

Conversions: The count of instances where individuals completed a desired action after clicking on your ads, such as making a purchase or signing up for a newsletter.

Cost per acquisition (CPA): The average cost paid for each conversion.

Cost per click (CPC): The average cost incurred for each click on your ad links.

Cost per impression (CPM): The average cost for every 1,000 ad impressions.

Cost per lead (CPL): The average cost paid for each generated lead.

Cost per view (CPV): The average cost paid for each view of your video ad.

Custom audience: A target audience created from existing customer data, such as email addresses or phone numbers.

Daily Active People (DAP): The count of unique individuals taking an action on your ad or Page within a specific day.

Daily Active Users (DAU): The number of unique individuals taking an action on your ad or Page within a specific day.

Daily budget: The average amount earmarked for an ad set or campaign every day.

Dark posts: Unpublished Page posts utilized as ads.

Demographic targeting: Targeting ads to a particular audience based on demographic factors like age, gender, education, and employment.

Dynamic ads: Ads automatically displaying relevant products to individuals who have shown interest in your website, app, or elsewhere on the Internet.

Dynamic product ads: A type of ad automatically promoting products to people who have expressed interest on your website, in your app, or elsewhere on the Internet.

Engagement campaign: This campaign objective aims to stimulate interaction with your content, facilitating increased likes, comments, shares, and event responses to your posts.

Engagement rate: The percentage of individuals who viewed and engaged with your ad (clicked, liked, commented, shared, or expanded it).

Engagement targeting: Targeting individuals who have previously interacted with your content or Page.

Estimated audience size: An approximation of the number of people in your target audience.

Facebook algorithm: The set of rules and calculations employed by Facebook to determine the ads shown to specific users.

Facebook Feed: The main section of the Facebook app or website where people see posts and ads from friends, family, and Pages they follow.

Facebook pixel: A specialized Facebook tool was aiding in tracking conversions, optimizing ads, and constructing targeted audiences.

Impressions: The total count of times your ads were displayed on the screen.

Instant form: A type of Facebook ad allowing users to fill out a form without requiring them to leave the platform.

Interest targeting: Targeting ads to a specific audience based on their interests and hobbies.

Landing page: The webpage users are directed to after clicking on an ad.

Lead generation campaign: A campaign that aims to collect contact information from potential customers by prompting individuals to complete a form with their contact details.

Lifetime budget: The total amount designated for a campaign throughout its full duration.

Lookalike audience: A target audience is fashioned based on the characteristics of an existing audience.

Lookalike audience refinement: The process of refining a lookalike audience based on specific criteria, like location or interests.

Meta Ads Manager: The platform for creating and managing Facebook and Instagram ads.

Meta Advantage campaign budget (formerly campaign budget optimization): A feature automatically distributing your campaign budget across ad sets to achieve optimal results.

Meta Business Suite: A tool where businesses can manage their Facebook and Instagram presence across multiple platforms.

Meta Business Tools: A suite of tools designed to help businesses manage their Facebook and Instagram presence.

Meta Pixel standard events: A predefined set of actions tracked using the Facebook Pixel, like adding an item to a cart or making a purchase.

Monthly Active People (MAP): The count of unique individuals taking an action on your ad or Page in a given month.

Monthly Active Users (MAU): The number of unique individuals taking an action on your ad or Page in a given month.

Multi-product ads: An ad format where brands can showcase multiple products within a single ad unit.

News feed: The primary section of the Facebook app or website where users view posts and ads from friends, family, and followed Pages.

Placements: The locations where your ads appear, such as Facebook, Instagram, or Audience Network.

Post engagements: The total number of times people engaged with your post, including likes, comments, or shares.

Reach: The total count of individuals who saw your ads at least once.

Retargeting: Displaying ads to people who have previously engaged with your business.

Retargeting window: The timeframe within which you can show retargeting ads to individuals who have interacted with your business.

Sales objective: A campaign targeted for people to take valuable actions on your website or app, such as event registration, adding items to the cart, or making a purchase.

Saved audiences: Audiences saved for future use in your Facebook ad campaigns.

Traffic objective: This particular campaign objective directs people to your website or app, assisting in garnering more clicks by optimizing for link clicks or landing page views.

Video views: The total count of times your video ad was viewed for 3 seconds or more.

Website click conversion: The number of individuals who clicked on your ad and subsequently completed a desired action on your website, such as making a purchase or filling out a form.

Your Handbook to Facebook Advertising: Access the Facebook Glossary of Ad Terms

Mastering the fundamentals of Facebook advertising is crucial for anyone looking to make the most of their marketing efforts on the platform. From understanding the various terms and concepts to delving into the intricacies of ad setup, targeting options, and metrics, a solid grasp of these elements can significantly impact the success of your campaigns. 

While other paid social media advertising platforms may share similar terms, their applications can differ. We aim to construct this Facebook ad glossary to cater to new advertisers and experienced media buyers. Memorization is not mandatory, but keeping this guide accessible for your Facebook marketing terms can prove valuable.

Expand your expertise. Browse Strike Social’s latest blogs here:

• 
  Father’s Day Advertising with Meta Advantage+: Tips for Smart Audience Targeting
• 
  Smarter Paid Search with Google’s AI Max for Search Campaigns
• 
  Google Marketing Live 2025 Recap: Key YouTube and Google Ads Updates for Advertisers
• 
  Marketing to Gen Z: Social Media Strategies for Performance-Driven Brands
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  TikTok News and Updates Q1 2025: What Advertisers Need to Know
• 
  YouTube Shorts Views Are Changing: How You Can Adapt Your Paid Ads Strategy

Facebook ad rejection reasons can stem from something as innocent as including “CBD” in your ad. Your ad can be flagged and stopped even when it refers to “Central Business District” and not the drug. While you may have confidence in your ads, Facebook’s ad review process can result in unexpected rejections or account suspensions. Even if your ads initially gain approval, there can still be instances where ads get rejected mid-campaign.

In this guide, we’ll troubleshoot Facebook ad rejection reasons and equip you with the knowledge to tackle these hurdles confidently.

Crack the Code to Avoid These Common Reasons for Facebook Ad Disapproval

When you advertise on Facebook, there is more than just the regular review process you should be concerned about. Your ads might undergo random reviews to ensure they align with Facebook’s Advertising Standards. The catch? You won’t know about this review until you are notified that your ads stopped.

So, why let the uncertainty of potential Facebook ad rejection loom over your campaigns? Why fret about the ad rejection reasons when you can be absolutely certain that your ads comply with the guidelines? In this blog, we’ll show you how to ensure that ad disapproval becomes a thing of the past.

• What are the most common reasons for Facebook rejecting ads?
• How can I appeal a Facebook ad rejection?
  • How to resubmit an ad denied on Facebook?
  • How to resolve ads incorrectly rejected by Facebook?

What are the Most Common Facebook Ad Rejection Reasons?

Facebook’s ad platform provides an extensive range of options for reaching your target audience. However, it also comes with its guidelines that advertisers must strictly follow. There’s nothing more frustrating than receiving an email from Facebook support only to discover that your ad has been disapproved. Therefore, understanding the common reasons for Facebook ad disapproval can help streamline the often tedious ad appeal process.

Prohibited and restricted content

Facebook maintains a stringent stance on what it considers restricted and prohibited content within advertising. Restricted content may receive approval but with specific conditions, often influenced by regional regulations. Prohibited content, including hate speech, violence, and illegal products or services, is unequivocally off-limits.

Examples of prohibited content span a wide spectrum, including:

• Nudity or other sexually suggestive content
• Hate speech, credible threats or direct attacks on an individual or group
• Content that contains self-harm or excessive violence
• Fake or impostor profiles
• Spam

Personal attributes

Another example of Facebook ad rejection reasons are instances when ads directly assert or subtly imply personal attributes. These include but are not limited to race, ethnicity, religion, age, or sexual orientation. Be cautious not to target or discriminate against users based on these characteristics inadvertently.

Unrealistic claims

Facebook takes a strong stance against ads that make exaggerated or unattainable claims. If your ad promises something unrealistic or impossible, it’s likely to be rejected. For instance, claiming a whitening lotion can quickly lighten skin tone in two days would not meet Facebook’s standards.

Maintaining integrity in your advertising is essential to offering achievable and credible promises to your audience.

Special ad categories

These categories encompass credit, employment, and housing-related ads and come with specific guidelines that advertisers must be aware of. 

One notable feature of Special ad categories is their more limited audience targeting options compared to standard ad categories. Age targeting, geographical targeting, exclusions, and lookalike audiences are all subject to stricter limitations under Facebook ad compliance guidelines. Advertisers can create specialized saved audiences designed to focus solely on their desired database or audience.

Ad rejections beyond ad content

It’s not just about the content and images within your ad; the destination of your links plays a critical role. Facebook assesses the legitimacy and security of the links you provide. Ads that direct users to non-secure or unsafe domains will likely fail the Facebook ad review process.

Facebook ad guidelines on external links

You may get your ad denied on Facebook if your links commit any of the following infractions:

• Misleading links that deceive users
• Landing pages lacking transparency and trustworthiness
• Distribution of fake news
• Inconsistent domains where the displayed URL doesn’t match the actual destination
• Broken links leading to frustrating user experiences

Media buyers must recognize that the adjustments needed for each ad can differ significantly. Dig deeper into Facebook’s terms and guidelines to determine the specific reasons why your ads were not approved. By closely examining these factors, you can identify precisely why your ads may be rejected on the platform.

How Can I Appeal a Facebook Ad Rejection?

How to Resubmit an Ad Denied on Facebook

Now that you have uncovered the Facebook ad rejection reasons, it’s time to address the issue and make the necessary corrections.

1. Start by going to Ads Manager.
   
2. Select the ads you wish to edit by checking the boxes.
   
3. Select the Edit option. This opens a side panel where you can make the necessary adjustments to your ad. Your edits will vary depending on the specific reason for the rejection (related to a Facebook advertising policy or standard).
   
   You can make changes to:
   • Ad names
   • The Facebook Page associated with the ad
   • Images or videos used in the ad
   • If needed, you can also customize images or videos for specific ad placements within the ad set.

4. If all required changes have been completed, click on Publish. This makes sure that the edits you made are active.
   
   Your ad will again undergo the Facebook ad compliance check, and it will go live upon approval.

How to Resolve Ads Incorrectly Rejected by Facebook

If you believe your ads were wrongly rejected on Facebook, an ad appeal process is in place to address such issues. 

1. First, go to Business Support Home.
   
2. Identify the account or catalog containing the ads that were rejected.
   
3. Choose the specific ads, ad sets, or campaigns you believe were incorrectly rejected.
   
   
4. Click on the information (i) icon to access a detailed explanation of why your ad was rejected.
   
   
5. If you firmly believe your ad should not be rejected, click Request Review. This is your opportunity to provide additional context and information that supports your claim, explaining why your ad should go live.
   
   After supplying the necessary details, click Submit to request a review officially.
   

You can keep tabs on the status of your review request within Business Support Home. If Facebook reevaluates and reverses its initial decision, your ad will align with the status of your campaign. If your campaign is active, your ad will automatically resume delivery. 

However, you cannot request another review if you receive another Facebook ad disapproval. The ad will then remain in a rejected state.

Requesting a review for your rejected ad offers a unique advantage. Unlike the initial ad review, reevaluation requests undergo a more thorough assessment by teams of human reviewers. This process aims to rectify errors and ensure fairness in ad approvals.

It’s worth highlighting that seeking a review will not adversely affect your association with Meta. Instead, it signifies a standard practice promoting transparency and fairness within the Facebook ad review process.

Your Complete Guide to Resolving Facebook Ad Rejection Reasons

From the onset, we emphasized the importance of proactive compliance with Facebook’s strict standards. When advertising, in general, compliance with the platform’s exacting standards is non-negotiable. Random ad reviews require vigilance to prevent Facebook ad rejection reasons that can halt your campaigns unexpectedly.

Get yourself armed with a deep understanding of the rules, the ability to make crucial adjustments, and the knowledge to effectively maneuver Facebook’s ad review process. 

Expand your expertise. Browse Strike Social’s latest blogs here:

• 
  Father’s Day Advertising with Meta Advantage+: Tips for Smart Audience Targeting
• 
  Smarter Paid Search with Google’s AI Max for Search Campaigns
• 
  Google Marketing Live 2025 Recap: Key YouTube and Google Ads Updates for Advertisers
• 
  Marketing to Gen Z: Social Media Strategies for Performance-Driven Brands
• 
  TikTok News and Updates Q1 2025: What Advertisers Need to Know
• 
  YouTube Shorts Views Are Changing: How You Can Adapt Your Paid Ads Strategy

MediaOcean’s 2023 Outlook Report highlights that 40% of marketers feel uneasy about the escalating prominence of brand safety issues. With an upsurge in awareness among social media advertisers about potential risks, they understand the necessity for vigilant monitoring and scrutiny of ad placements. However, the issue persists, and the imperative to safeguard your online reputation is as important as ever.

How Can Facebook Brand Safety Defend Your Digital Presence

Facebook stands as the go-to platform for advertisers, boasting an impressive global ad reach of 2.08 billion individuals. This positions it as a vital platform for marketers striving for substantial growth. However, the broad user base and far-reaching influence of Facebook provide both unparalleled opportunities and potential pitfalls for businesses and advertisers alike.

Therefore, it’s a top priority for brands to steer clear of associations with unsuitable content. From fraudulent accounts and harmful content to ad scams and ill-suited ad placements, advertisers need to be cognizant of these hazards and take preventative measures to counteract them.

• Why Is Brand Safety Important?
• How Far Do Facebook Brand Safety Tools Go?
• Exploring Facebook’s Brand Safety Tools And Features
• What Happens When My Facebook Ads Appear With Inappropriate Content?
• Strike Social: Your Ally in Safeguarding Your Ad on Facebook
• Building Trust: The Key Role of Brand Safety on Facebook

Why Is Brand Safety Important?

Regardless of the company’s size or the popularity of its Facebook account, there are a multitude of reasons why brand safety should be prioritized above all else. 

• Preventing advertisers from the potential harm of having their ads displayed alongside unsuitable content;
• Helping maintain consistency and relevance, ensuring that ads are displayed in environments that align with the brand’s values, and resonate with the intended target audience;
• Avoiding ad placements on websites with a high likelihood of producing counterfeit or fraudulent clicks.

Given Facebook’s diverse spectrum of content being disseminated every feed’s refresh, it necessitates diligent attention towards digital brand safety. For businesses, securing a safe brand persona on Facebook is indispensable as it directly impacts customer perception and trustworthiness. Consequently, if ads are exhibited alongside objectionable content, it can lead to detrimental associations and diminish the brand’s credibility.

In a period where social media outrage can proliferate rapidly, a minor lapse in brand safety can escalate into a full-scale crisis, inflicting considerable financial and reputational damage.

How Far Do Facebook Brand Safety Tools Go?

Facebook’s brand safety tools work diligently to shield your ads from appearing adjacent to content that may not align with your company’s principles or desired image.

However, while this tool offers clear benefits to brands eager to avoid controversy, it doesn’t guarantee universal advantages. The decisions made by Facebook, particularly concerning political advertisers, have sparked controversy, especially amongst digital strategists and advertisers. Stringent adherence to Facebook’s content guidelines becomes vital for these businesses to circumvent account suspension.

Yet, it’s essential to remember that brand safety isn’t solely about advertisers. It is also intended to protect Meta users. By suppressing harmful content, Facebook strives to cultivate a safer, more engaging experience for all its users. Shielding viewers from encountering offensive material is a fundamental part of Facebook’s commitment to maintaining a positive user environment.

As a leading social advertising platform, Facebook understands the significance of balancing brand protection with individual responsibility. The platform recognizes the need to tactfully navigate these aspects to foster a harmonious and beneficial digital space for all its users.

Related article: Everything You Need to Know About TikTok Brand Safety and Suitability Tools

Free Gift: Grab your copy of the Facebook Brand Safety Tools Guide and be equipped with the essential knowledge to proactively manage your ads on this vast platform. Gain insights into the powerful brand safety and suitability tools offered by Facebook and learn how to avoid unsuitable ad placements that could undermine your campaign’s effectiveness.

Exploring Facebook’s Brand Safety Tools and Features

A range of tools is now available to advertisers, designed to fortify Facebook’s brand safety and suitability, ensuring advertisements are shown in appropriate contexts. Here are some key brand safety features offered by Facebook:

Please note: The availability of these features may be progressive; they may not be visible to all users immediately.

1. Manual Placements: This feature of Facebook’s brand safety suite lets advertisers select precise locations where they want their ads to appear across Meta Platforms: Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, and Audience Network. If there are particular environments on these platforms where you prefer not to display your ads, you can opt out of Meta Advantage+ placements by deselecting those options.

Source: Social Media Examiner

2. Content Exclusions: With the help of content exclusion controls, prevent your ads from being showcased next to specific types of content, such as Crime and Tragedy, News & Politics, and Social Issues.

3. Inventory Filter: The Inventory Filter on Facebook allows advertisers additional control over sensitive content for select ad placements, including Facebook in-stream video, Ads on Facebook Reels, and Audience Network. This feature empowers advertisers to dictate the nature of content their ads will be positioned alongside.

Please note: To qualify for these placements, publishers must adhere to Facebook’s policies.

4. Delivery Reports: Advertisers have access to delivery insights that deliver transparency on ad delivery locations. This granular data aids in monitoring ad placements, identifying potential brand safety threats, and making data-driven decisions for their campaigns.

5. Brand Safety Partners: Facebook has joined forces with reliable brand safety partners to consistently enhance brand safety controls and tools, addressing the ever-evolving needs of advertisers. These partnerships highlight Facebook’s commitment to transparency, control, and equipping advertisers with the necessary tools to optimize ad placements. Partners include:

• Zefr
• DoubleVerify
• Integral Ad Science
• OpenSlate

It’s important to remember that although these tools and controls aim to enhance Facebook’s brand safety, no system is foolproof, and occasional glitches may still occur. Therefore, advertisers should regularly review and update their brand safety settings to ensure their advertisements align with their preferred standards.

Related article: Guide To TikTok Inventory Filter: Safeguarding Brand’s Presence

What Happens When My Facebook Ads Appear With Inappropriate Content?

Facebook has encountered issues in guaranteeing brand safety, leading to detrimental consequences for advertisers. A significant instance of this took place in 2020 when numerous key advertisers, including renowned brands like Starbucks and Diageo, joined a boycott in response to concerns about Facebook’s handling of misinformation and hate speech. This collective action spotlighted the escalating concerns among marketers regarding Facebook’s effectiveness in ensuring brand safety.

Such instances underscore the challenges Facebook grapples with in preserving brand safety. They also accentuate the importance for advertisers to consistently supervise ad placements, leverage content exclusion tools, and collaborate with platforms to avoid associating their ads with unsuitable or harmful content.

Here are some potential consequences when your ads are shown next to inappropriate content:

1. Brand Damage: Displaying ads next to offensive or inappropriate content can harm the associated brands’ reputation and image. Users may link the brand to the harmful content, forming negative perceptions, which could lead to a loss of trust and potential customers.

2. Negative User Experience: Users who see ads adjacent to unsuitable content might find it offensive, distressing, or irrelevant. This can cause a poor user experience, frustration, and a negative perception of both the content and the advertiser.

3. Loss of Ad Effectiveness: Users are less likely to interact with or click on ads displayed alongside objectionable content. This can lead to reduced click-through rates, conversions, and overall slowing down return on investment for advertisers.

These negative effects emphasize the importance of proactive ad monitoring and taking responsibility for brand safety. By strategically employing Facebook’s brand safety tools and ensuring you’re leveraging their full potential, you can protect your brand’s reputation and ensure your ads are shown in appropriate contexts.

Strike Social: Your Ally in Safeguarding Your Ad on Facebook

At Strike Social, we prioritize your brand’s safety on Facebook by offering comprehensive campaign management tailored to your advertising initiatives.

Our approach involves managing your account meticulously and consistently monitoring all activities. Our vigilant monitoring enables us to respond immediately to potential incidents and pause ads or campaigns when necessary. This swift action mitigates potential risks, thereby protecting your brand’s reputation.

Our devoted team of professionals strives to manage your account with the highest level of diligence. We aim to provide more than just optimization – we ensure every element of your campaigns runs seamlessly. Our stringent monitoring processes allow us to closely track your ads’ performance and address any issues as soon as possible.

Photo by Brian Jones from Unsplash

We consistently enhance our brand safety process to align with the ever-evolving advertising platforms’ rules and policies. Request a personalized walkthrough today and explore how our cutting-edge brand safety solutions can safeguard your digital business landscape.

Additionally, due to the high volume of campaigns we’ve managed on Facebook and other advertising platforms, we’ve been assigned a dedicated support team for each campaign. We aim to provide personalized support and expert guidance on your brand safety journey on Facebook.

Building Trust: The Key Role of Brand Safety on Facebook

Regardless of a company’s size or industry, Facebook’s brand suitability and safety tools are accessible to all advertisers. Even if you solely utilize Facebook to promote your business, investing in the platform’s tools and measures is always wise.

The importance of Facebook brand safety cannot be emphasized enough. By prioritizing digital brand safety, businesses can cultivate consumer trust, uphold a positive image, and foster enduring success on the world’s most comprehensive social media platform. As social media keeps evolving, maintaining a proactive and vigilant stance in safeguarding brand safety on Facebook is key to thriving in the digital world.

Since its inception in 2019, Facebook’s Inventory Filter has played a crucial role in fortifying the platform’s commitment to brand safety. Meta, the company formerly known as Facebook, introduced this innovation as a strategic response to the rising concerns about hate speech, offensive content, and misinformation proliferating in News Feeds.

As part of a comprehensive approach, the Inventory Filter serves a vital purpose: to ensure that your advertisements are displayed solely within or adjacent to content deemed suitable and safe for advertising.

A Comprehensive Guide To Mastering The Facebook Inventory Filter

• What Is The Facebook Inventory Filter?
  • How Does The Inventory Filter Work?
  • Inventory Filter Guidelines: Content Exclusions and Inclusions
• Setting Up The Facebook Inventory Filter
• Best Practices for Facebook Brand Safety and Suitability

Designed to align with brand suitability, the Facebook Inventory Filter places your ads only in contexts that meet advertising standards. The Facebook Brand Safety Toolkit automatically weeds out content that may be overly contentious or offensive – whether it’s explicit nudity, excessive violence, terroristic activities, or misinformation flagged by third-party fact-checkers.

But the capabilities of this feature extend beyond these basic safeguards. The filter allows you to refine your ad placements further, ensuring they align with content that resonates with your brand values. This degree of control allows you to foster a brand-safe environment, enhancing both the integrity of your brand and the trust of your customers.

This comprehensive guide aims to explore the intricacies of the Facebook Inventory Filter. Learn its benefits, and provide valuable insights to help you master this brand safety tool.

What Is The Facebook Inventory Filter?

Regarded as an instrumental tool for brand safety, the Facebook Inventory Filter provides advertisers with a robust mechanism to control the sensitivity level of the content where ads are displayed. This brand suitability and safety tool ensures that ads are displayed only in suitable contexts, minimizing the chance of your ads being juxtaposed with controversial or inappropriate content.

To fully understand the functionality of this feature, it’s important to explore the two key ad formats where you can customize your Facebook inventory filter settings: 

• Feed ads: These ads integrate seamlessly into users’ browsing journeys, enabling marketers to reach the target audience as they scroll through their social media feeds.

• In-content ads: These ads present an exciting opportunity for advertisers to engage audiences across a range of formats, such as in-stream videos, Facebook Reels, and the Audience Network.

Related Article: What Happens When My Facebook Ads Appear With Inappropriate Content?

How Does The Inventory Filter Work?

The Facebook Inventory Filter offers a considerable level of customization based on their desired level of sensitivity. With this brand safety feature, digital media buyers have the flexibility to choose from these three Facebook Inventory Filter settings:

Expanded Inventory (Full inventory): Ideal for advertisers seeking broad exposure. This setting maximizes ad reach, running the ads to a wider audience. It also allows the ads to be displayed on all content that complies with Facebook’s Content Monetization Policies.

Moderate Inventory (Standard inventory): This option strikes a balance between broad reach and brand safety. By choosing the Moderate setting, you can ensure that your Facebook ads are displayed in a context that aligns with your brand values while still maintaining a significant level of reach. 

Limited Inventory: Provides the highest level of content sensitivity and brand safety. The limited setting is particularly suitable for advertisers who prioritize brand reputation and want their ads to be displayed only in the most strictly curated and controlled environments. While this option reduces the campaign reach and may incur higher costs, it offers a heightened level of control of suitability over the content with which your brand is associated.

By default, Facebook has pre-set inventory settings for different ad placements. For In-content placements, the default setting is Moderate, ads are displayed in a context that is appropriate for most audiences. For Feed placements, the default setting is Expanded, allowing maximum audience reach.

Related article: A Detailed Guide to TikTok Inventory Filter Tiers for Improved Content Suitability

Inventory Filter Guidelines: Content Exclusions and Inclusions

The functionality of the Facebook Inventory Filter varies depending on the ad placement type, be it in-content and Feed ads, or those within the Audience Network. Each type follows specific guidelines to ensure proper content alignment. Let’s explore the filtering mechanisms for each category.

For enhanced control over brand presence within Facebook Feed and Instagram mobile feeds, advertisers can adjust the Facebook Inventory Filter at the ad account level. Media buyers can fine-tune the content alongside which their ads appear. Aligned with the Global Alliance for Responsible Media (GARM) framework, these filters assure a responsible and brand-safe advertising environment.

Here’s a breakdown of the guidelines for what each filter includes and excludes:

When it comes to ads placed within the Audience Network, Facebook employs a different approach. Apps within the Audience Network undergo a thorough review process and are labeled based on their primary use or function. This classification enables Facebook to ensure content adherence to the Audience Network Policy and Community Standards. By default, any content that violates these policies will be excluded from ad placements.

Let’s take a closer look into the specific content categories and the inclusion and exclusion associated with each setting of the Facebook Inventory Filter. 

Setting Up The Facebook Inventory Filter

Facebook provides two main avenues for configuring your inventory filter settings: 

• Brand Safety and Suitability Controls; and
• Ads Manager.

Let’s explore these options in detail to help you effectively configure the Facebook Inventory Filter for your advertising campaigns.

Brand Safety and Suitability Controls

1. Go to Ads Manager.

2. Click on All tools, and go to Brand Safety and Suitability.

3. Under Controls, you will see the default setup for the Facebook inventory filter. To update these settings, click on the Edit or the pen icon on the right side of the screen.

4. By clicking on Edit for Facebook in-stream videos, and Ads on Facebook Reels, you can update the settings to Full (Expanded) inventory or Limited inventory, or keep it to default [Standard (Moderate) inventory].

5. If you click on Edit for Audience Network, a checkbox will appear if you would prefer to have the same setting as you have on Facebook in-stream videos and Ads. You can uncheck this if you want to set up a different setting for your ads on the Audience Network.

Ad Manager

To access the Facebook Inventory Filter, navigate to the Ads Manager platform and create a campaign as you would regularly.

1. Click on Create to start a new campaign.

2. Proceed with the usual steps of the ad creation. Once you get to the Ad Set level, scroll to Placements. Then click on Show more options.

3. You will see your default Facebook Inventory Filter settings is currently applied (Standard Inventory). To update, click on Edit.

4. Select the inventory filter you wish to apply to your current Ad Set.

5. Continue with setting up your campaign as usual.

Best Practices for Facebook Brand Safety and Suitability

As a digital media buyer, taking advantage of the Facebook Inventory Filter is essential to maximize ad reach while maintaining brand safety. To help you navigate and optimize this feature, here are some best practices to consider:

• The Facebook Inventory Filter controls the type of content the ads are placed alongside. However, it doesn’t block specific publishers. If advertisers aim to block certain publishers for the in-content ads, consider using block lists and content exclusions for further customization.

• For ads within Facebook’s in-stream videos, be mindful of these options: 
  • Limited Inventory Setting: By default, all live videos are automatically excluded.
  • Moderate or Expanded Inventory Setting: Media buyers can exclude all live videos or only those from publishers that did not opt for monetization.

• While Facebook implements brand suitability controls to maximize compliance, it’s worth noting that not all content and publishers may perfectly align with your brand’s suitability standards. Consider downloading a list of your ad placements to get a detailed overview.

• Facebook regularly updates its advertising policies and guidelines, including those related to brand safety and suitability. Staying informed about these updates and compliances allows media buyers to make necessary pre-campaign setup adjustments. Advertisers must regularly review Facebook guidelines about brand safety and suitability in managing the platform’s brand safety toolkit.

Take Control Of Your Ad Placements With Facebook Inventory Filter

Now that you have a comprehensive understanding of the Facebook Inventory Filter and its impact on your advertising campaigns, it’s time to put this knowledge into action. Implement the strategies outlined in this guide, monitor your results, and adapt your approach to your Facebook ad campaigns.

Stay updated with Facebook’s brand safety updates and continue testing and refining your campaigns for ongoing success. Embrace the power of the Facebook Inventory Filter and elevate your advertising endeavors to new levels of effectiveness and efficiency.

Since 2016, Meta’s commitment to providing utmost Facebook ads protection has steadily increased, with the progress being particularly notable in 2023. Acknowledging the pressing need for brand safety, Facebook has taken remarkable strides. Mediaocean 2022 Market Report and 2023 Outlook reveal that at the end of 2022, over half of the marketers surveyed indicated that their concerns about brand safety and suitability have improved compared to Q1.

Boost Ad Protection And Online Reputation On Facebook

Facebook’s transformation from a mere social media platform to a nearly $117 billion advertising company has been nothing short of innovative. To maintain its growth, responding proactively to the escalating concern for brand protection in the digital space keeps advertisers’ money on the platform. This continuous refining of its brand safety tools aims to provide a positive user experience and align with the transformation of content creation and user behavior.

Consequently, working towards transparency and trust within the advertising ecosystem, Facebook provides advertisers with the peace of mind they need. By prioritizing brand safety, Facebook has ensured advertisers continue building strong, positive, and meaningful connections with their audience.

This article will help gain insight into amplifying ad protection and enhancing the brand’s reputation on Facebook.

• Facebook Brand Safety and Suitability: Updates and Developments
• Exploring The Risks And Concerns In Facebook Advertising
• Steps to Protect Brand Reputation When Advertising on Facebook
• How Can Facebook Protect My Brand From Safety Issues?
• Facebook’s Commitment to Keeping Brands and Businesses Safe

Facebook Brand Safety and Suitability: Updates and Developments

Facebook’s unwavering dedication to developing and improving its ad protection tools epitomizes its focus on brand safety and suitability. Over the years, the platform has continuously evolved, tirelessly combating harmful and inappropriate content from appearing alongside ads and enhancing brand safety on Facebook.

But how exactly has Facebook’s approach to brand safety evolved? To better understand this journey, let’s travel chronologically through the key updates and developments that have shaped their ad protection policies. These milestones underscore Facebook’s unrelenting pursuit to refine ad placement controls, making the platform safer and more dependable for advertisers.

Exploring The Risks And Concerns In Facebook Advertising

Capitalizing on new advertising trends or less-explored ad formats opens a treasure chest of opportunities for brands. These new ad formats often deliver high engagement rates and can be quite appealing to advertisers. Take, for instance, Facebook Reels. As a significant focus of Facebook’s strategy, Reels offers access to an ad audience of 697.1 million people, signifying a promising avenue for exploration. With Facebook leaning hard into Reels, advertisers who establish a solid strategy can gain a competitive edge by leveraging this relatively new ad placement option.

Nevertheless, it is essential to approach these new ad formats with caution and prioritize brand safety. When launching ads across various formats on Facebook or any other platform, advertisers must be aware that not all content aligns with their brand values. Therefore, brands must proactively construct and implement strategies to protect their reputation. It’s essential for advertisers to maintain vigilance against potential reputational damage while exploring these enticing opportunities.

Steps to Protect Brand Reputation When Advertising on Facebook

Are you concerned about how to protect your brand on Facebook? Free yourself from worries. With Facebook’s in-app brand safety tools, advertisers have greater control to safeguard their brand. However, striking the balance between campaign efficiency and brand protection requires a strategic approach. Below, our team details important steps to attain campaign success without compromising safety and suitability.

• Implement Content Moderation: By filtering and reviewing comments before they go public on the Facebook page, marketers can prevent spam, offensive language, or harmful content from being displayed. This proactive step helps maintain a clean and positive brand image.
  
• Leverage Ad Placement Controls: Facebook allows media buyers more control over where ads should appear. Choose specific ad placements and exclude categories or types of content that may threaten brand image.
  
• Optimize Audience Targeting: Sharpen ad campaigns by refining audience targeting. Use demographics, interests, behaviors, and other parameters to reach the right audience, maximizing campaign effectiveness and avoiding wasted impressions.

Source: Facebook

• Monitor Ad Performance: Regular checks on Facebook ads’ performance are media buyers’ important role during campaign flight. If there are placements that might not align with advertisers’ brand value or underperforming ads, consider adjusting the targeting strategy or excluding certain parameters.
  
• Stay Informed on Facebook’s Advertising Policies: Get familiarized with policies and guidelines for Facebook advertising compliance. These policies cover aspects such as prohibited content, ad creative guidelines, targeting restrictions, and more. Adhering to these policies will help marketers avoid ad disapprovals or other penalties.

How Can Facebook Protect My Brand From Safety Issues?

Advertisers from businesses of all sizes often seek assurance on how Facebook can provide safety to their brands while advertising. Facebook offers several layers of protection, ranging from extended control through Facebook Inventory Filters to the implementation of community standards across all app users. These content safety guidelines work towards creating an appropriate environment for advertisers to enhance users’ ad experiences. Whether running ads across In-Stream Video or Instant Article placements, advertisers have the flexibility to tailor their efforts according to user needs and intentions.

Let’s explore some of the ways Facebook protects brands:

• Facebook’s Community Standards and Instagram Community Guidelines: These policies serve as the benchmark for ad content, aligning it with community expectations and maintaining Facebook’s core values.

• Community Standards Enforcement Report: Released quarterly by Facebook report shares metrics across various policy areas, such as hate speech, terrorist propaganda, and fake accounts, providing transparency about Facebook’s policy enforcement.
• Content Review Teams: With a global team of over 15,000 dedicated content reviewers, Facebook diligently reviews and removes harmful content from the platform. This proactive approach helps combat hate speech, ensuring a safer experience for users and businesses alike.

Related article: How Can Facebook Brand Safety Defend Your Digital Presence

Facebook’s Commitment to Keeping Brands and Businesses Safe

In order for Facebook to win advertisers, the platform prioritizes Facebook ads protection to prevent any safety issues. The giant advertising company has implemented a comprehensive range of measures to create a secure advertising environment. This commitment stems from the recognition that brand safety is crucial for businesses seeking to maintain their reputation and establish trust with their audiences. By prioritizing brand safety and suitability, Facebook aims to provide advertisers with the peace of mind and confidence they need to promote their products or services on the platform.

To fully utilize Facebook ads protection and ensure that your ads are refrained from being shown with malicious content, you can take advantage of the following strategies and tools:

Ad Placements

During the ad creation process, you can select specific placements or opt out of certain environments if you prefer not to have your ads displayed there. This allows you to customize your ad placements according to your preferences.

Publisher Lists

Facebook provides a comprehensive publisher list that details the URLs where your ads could potentially be placed on Audience Network, Facebook in-stream videos, Ads on Facebook Reels, and Ads on Instagram Reels. You can download and review this list to identify suitable publishers. By using this list, you can choose specific URLs to add to your block lists or publisher allow lists, giving you granular control over your ad placements.

Block Lists

If there are specific websites or URLs where you don’t want your ads to appear, this Facebook ads protection feature allows you to upload a list of those URLs. This prevents your ads from being delivered on those particular platforms.

Our dedicated team is actively implementing this brand safety feature, extending to all aspects of our ad ecosystem. To ensure seamless ad management, we take care of identifying the block list at the ad account level. By doing so, we guarantee that this setting is optimized for all upcoming campaigns.

Inventory Filter

By default, content that is excessively controversial or offensive, such as full nudity, excessive violence, terrorist acts, and misinformation flagged by third-party fact-checkers, is automatically excluded from ad placements. The Facebook Inventory Filter allows you to take brand safety a step further by giving you control over the specific types of content your ads appear with.

Content Type Exclusions

This Facebook ads protection tool allows you to customize where your ads appear on in-stream videos. For example, you can prevent your ads from appearing in live videos or videos from publishers that have not signed up for monetization.

Delivery Reports

Facebook’s delivery reports offer impression-level data at the publisher and content levels, allowing you to understand where your ads appeared. This level of transparency enables you to assess the performance of your ads and make informed decisions about future placements.

Related article: Addressing brand safety measures for Google advertising

Stay Informed To Protect Your Facebook Ads

Protecting your ads on Facebook goes beyond just relying on the platform’s built-in features. It calls for a proactive and comprehensive approach, involving the implementation of various strategies and best practices. It’s important to stay informed about brand safety updates and adapt your strategies accordingly. This way, you can stay ahead of potential risks and maintain the effectiveness of your Facebook ads protection and brand safety measures.

By upholding high standards of brand safety and aligning your ads with relevant content, you create a more engaging and enjoyable experience for users. This, in turn, maximizes the impact of your advertising efforts and drives meaningful results for your business.

Social media evolution has dramatically influenced the behavior of the modern marketplace. From product discovery to brand loyalty and seamless fulfillment, social media’s convenience has changed the e-commerce market. And now, Facebook is taking social commerce to new heights with the Facebook Product Catalog.

Young consumers are bidding goodbye to mundane shopping transactions and prefer to undergo a full brand advertising experience. A report made by Influencer Marketing Hub shows young online consumers ages 18-34 have purchased products on Facebook and Instagram. With the Facebook Product Catalog, marketers can elevate the end-to-end customers’ advertising experience. 

Use this guide to transform your digital storefront to reach new audiences and position your brand ahead of the curve.

Transform Your Digital Storefront with Facebook’s Product Catalog

1. How To Set Up Facebook Product Catalog
2. Facebook Catalog Requirement Pre-requisite
3. How To Add Items On Facebook Product Catalog
4. Guide On Choosing Which Facebook Catalog Management Method Works For You
5. Best Practices in Product Catalog Listing
6. The Path to Achieving Social Commerce Goals with Facebook Product Catalog

How To Set Up Facebook Product Catalog

Say no to the tedious task of learning codes and scripts, and hello to an effortless product showcase with Facebook Product Catalog. This innovative tool is designed to simplify your digital advertising journey, making it easier to reach your target audience and boost your sales.

With just a few clicks, Facebook Product Catalog can select the best product for each Facebook viewer based on their interests and behavior, giving you the power to create a truly personalized shopping experience.

And that’s not all! After uploading your inventory files, you can take advantage of a range of proven-effective ad formats offered by Facebook. From increased clicks to conversions, Facebook ad units have a proven track record of success.

Now, let’s begin. 

Facebook Catalog Requirement Pre-requisite

Here’s what you’ll need to get started on setting up your Product Catalog:

• Facebook Business Page.
• Create a Facebook Business Manager account and make sure you’re an administrator.
• Business Commerce Manager to organize your catalog.

Facebook recommends using only one catalog for all your items. 

Step #1: Creating Product Catalog using Facebook Commerce Manager

a.  Log in to your Facebook Commerce Manager account

b.  Choose to Create a Catalog:

b.1 If this is your first catalog: Create a Catalog > Get Started

b.2 If you have at least one catalog: +Add Catalog to create a new one

c. Select the inventory you want to use > Next 

d. Select the Business Manager Account you want your catalog to be associated with

e. Name your catalog > Next

How To Add Items On Facebook Product Catalog

The foundation is set, the building blocks are in place, and it’s time to light the fuse and ignite your sales with Facebook Shop and Product Catalog. You’ve taken the essential first steps in creating a robust digital storefront. Now it’s time to maximize the potential of this dynamic duo.

Choose Which Method In Adding Items

With your shop and product catalog in place, you’re ready to reach new audiences, engage with potential customers, and turn your brand vision into a reality. Whether you’re an e-commerce veteran or new to the platform, Facebook Shop and Product Catalog give you the tools you need to succeed.

Here’s a quick guide to the 5 different methods to upload and maintain your inventory in Commerce Manager:

1. Manual Upload: Add items one by one using a form provided by Meta. 
2. Product Data feed: You can create a data feed in a spreadsheet format that contains all the details of your products. This feed can be uploaded to the Facebook product catalog through Business Manager. Download the product feed template here.
3. Partner Platform: Integrate your online store to Facebook Shop and automatically upload your products to the Facebook product catalog. This integration makes it easier to manage products and orders on both Facebook and your e-commerce platform.
4. Facebook Pixel: You can use the Facebook Pixel and Catalog Manager to track events on your website, such as product views and purchases, and use that data to create ads that automatically update based on customer behavior. 
5. Batch API: If you have a technical background, you can programmatically use Facebook’s Graph API to add products to your Facebook product catalog. This method is ideal for businesses with many products to upload and want to automate the process.

Related article: ​​Unlock The Power Of Facebook Reels: A Marketer’s Must-Read Guide

Guide On Choosing Which Facebook Catalog Management Method Works For You

Facebook has published a guide to help you choose which catalog management method is best for your collection. The guide considers how often you add new items, the size of your collection, and the number of people who work on it.

	Manual	Product Data Feed	Facebook Pixel	Batch API	Partner Platform
Inventory size	Small	Medium to large or changes often	Medium to large or changes often	Large and changes often	Any size
Inventory type	Products, flights, hotels, destinations, vehicles	Products, flights, hotels, destinations, vehicles, home listings	Products only	Products, flights, hotels, destinations, vehicles, home listings	Products only
What you need	Item details and images	Data feed file with correct specifications File hosting site (optional)	Pixel installed, Microdata tags on product pages, Recent website activity	A developer with experience in API	Inventory hosted on a partner platform
Technical effort required for setup	Low	Medium	High	High	Medium
Effort require to maintain	High: Update items manually	Medium: Update file as needed	Low: Updates automatically	Medium: Update as needed	Low: Updates automatically

Adding Items Using Product Data Feed 

A data feed can upload items to your catalog using a spreadsheet file. You can upload a file once or set up a schedule to update your catalog automatically regularly.

Download this Facebook product feed template to get started.

a. Log in Commerce Manager > Catalog > Items or Data Sources

b. Click Add Items 

c. Choose Data Feed > Next

d. If you have a file already created, click Yes. If not, follow these steps:

• Choose No. I need a template file.

• Choose the method you want to upload the file (Computer, URL, Spreadsheets)
• Using this template, choose Google Sheets > Paste the link (make sure it’s not restricted) > Next

• Choose how often you want to update your catalog (Hourly, Weekly, Daily)

• Review your settings > Click Save Feed and Upload

To update your items in the future, edit the spreadsheet on your Google account, and Facebook will update your catalog at your scheduled time.

Best Practices in Product Catalog Listing

Facebook offers brands a huge opportunity to showcase their products, but with so many options, it’s important to stand out. These proven best practices will help ensure your product catalog is optimized for visibility and engagement with potential customers.

1. Accurate and complete product information: Ensure that your product catalog contains all necessary information, including product name, description, images, pricing, and availability.
2. Consistent product categorization: Organize products into categories that make sense for your business and are consistent with how you categorize them on your website.
3. High-quality images: Use clear and high-quality images of your products to help them stand out in the Facebook Marketplace.
4. Utilize Facebook’s meta product catalog ads: Utilize Facebook’s meta advantage+ ads to retarget potential customers with products they have shown interest in.
5. Ensure your product links are correct: Make sure your links work and lead customers to the correct item on your website.
6. Monitor your products: Rejected items don’t appear in your ads or shop. Check your items regularly and request a second review if you think one was rejected incorrectly.

The Path to Achieving Social Commerce Goals with Facebook Product Catalog

Facebook has established itself as a crucial player in social commerce by offering businesses two essential tools: Facebook Shops and Product Catalogs. These tools leverage Facebook’s extensive network and targeted advertising capabilities to drive a reach for brands, making it easy for businesses to set up and manage their catalogs. 

Product tagging on Facebook and customizable catalogs can help companies direct traffic to their site, boost sales, and reach their desired customer demographic. By tapping into Facebook’s massive user base, brands can successfully promote their products.

To maximize the benefits of social commerce, advertisers are encouraged to stay informed by subscribing to relevant industry newsletters or seeking advice from industry experts.

For those interested in taking advantage of Facebook, Strike Social is ready to assist with maximizing advertising efforts. Our team of experts is available to help you get the most out of your advertising strategy.

Welcome to the world of Facebook Shops! In today’s tech-driven world, businesses must establish an online presence to expand their reach and drive profits. Keeping up with technological advancements has become a necessity rather than just a preference. And what better way to do so than with a Facebook Shop?

Social commerce has revolutionized how brands sell products, and Facebook Shops has emerged as a powerful tool for businesses looking to expand their discoverability and reach new customers. This guide will explore setting up a Facebook Shop, from creating your account to knowing the best practices. Whether new to social commerce or simply looking to maximize your results, this guide is the perfect resource for anyone looking to sell on Facebook.

Guide to Build Your Social Shop and Start Selling on Facebook

1. Facebook Shops: An Overview of Brands
2. Facebook Shops vs. Facebook Marketplace: Comparison
3. ​How to Set Up Facebook Shops
4. Best Practices to Maximize Facebook Shops Potential
5. Conclusion

Facebook Shops: An Overview for Brands

Facebook Shops provides a solution for brands to keep cadence with social commerce’s evolution, giving them the tools they need to sell their products through these platforms efficiently.

Another exciting aspect of Facebook Shops is the ability to tag products during live streams on Facebook and Instagram. This can drive traffic to your page and encourage customers to make purchases. Overall, Facebook Shops gives businesses a powerful and effective way to reach their audience and increase sales.

Facebook Shops vs. Facebook Marketplace: Comparison

With a massive US user base of 266 million monthly, Facebook provides businesses with a dynamic platform to promote and sell their products engagingly and interactively.

When it comes to setting up your online presence with Facebook, you have the option of using either Facebook Shops or Marketplace. This guide is designed to help you make informed decisions and determine the best choice for your business needs.

	Facebook Shops	Facebook Marketplace
User Interface	An eCommerce-like platform for brands to streamline the buying process without leaving the app	A visual garage-like selling within local communities where an individual can do product listing
Account	Business Page admins can manage the Facebook Shops account	Can sell using Personal Account
Store reach	Products are globally available	Products are locally available for others can browse and purchase items
Boosting	Brands can boost particular products or the entire store using Facebook advertising capabilities.	Same with Facebook Shops, sellers can boost their marketplace listing
Inquiries	Business Page admins can respond to user inquiries as they come in	Inquiries about the product will appear on the seller’s profile
Products Variety	Products are limited to the content of the Page and brands.	Can have a variety and mix of products based on the seller’s preference
Inventory	Brands can either manage their inventory themselves or use third-party technology to track and manage their inventory across multiple platforms.	Sellers can track their product listings without having to keep any inventory.

​How to Set Up Facebook Shops

Facebook Shops Pre-requisite

Here’s what you’ll need to start setting up your Facebook shops.

• Have a Facebook Business page. You can create one while setting up your shop. 
• Make sure you are an admin of the Facebook page.
• Have a business account on Instagram (if you also want to set up a shop on Instagram)
• Comply with Facebook’s commerce policies.
• Make sure your business complies with all local laws and regulations

Please note that this is a general checklist, and there may be additional requirements or steps depending on your specific business and location

Step #1: Setting up your Facebook Commerce Manager

1. Log in to your Facebook Commerce Manager account

2. Choose between Shop and Catalog:

• Create Shop: physical products.
• Create a catalog: sell or advertise goods such as travel, rentals, vehicles, and media

3. Choose your preferred checkout method: 

Several checkout options are available for businesses to use when setting up their store. These include: 

• Checkout on Website: This allows customers to be redirected to the business’s website to complete their purchases.
• Checkout on Facebook or Instagram: This allows customers to purchase products directly from a business’s Facebook/Instagram page using their account information
  • Shop Pay by Shopify: Once toggled on, businesses can integrate their Facebook Shop with their Shopify store, allowing customers to complete their purchases on the Shopify platform.
• Checkout on messaging: This allows customers to purchase products directly from a business’s WhatsApp or Messenger profile using them as purchase channels.

4. Select the Business Page you want to showcase your products to > Next

5. Create or connect with your Business Account > Add Products (if your Business Account already has a product catalog > Next

Take note: If you haven’t previously created a catalog, don’t worry! A catalog will be automatically generated for you within Commerce Manager, with the title “Items for (Name and ID of your Page).” You’ll be able to add your products to this catalog later once your shop is fully set up.

6. Fill out the necessary fields on Shipping destinations. You can still change this setting as you move forward) 

7. Preview and check all your shop details > Review and agree on Seller Agreement > Finish set up

Now you’re done creating your shop. You can manage and market your catalog.

Step #2: Adding Products to your Product Catalog

Facebook Product catalogs easily manage product information and inventory using Commerce Manager tools. You can add products to your catalog in several ways depending on their type, size, and frequency of change.

Related article: Facebook Reels Ads 101: A Complete Setup Guide With Ads Specs

Step #3: How to Advertise your Facebook Shop

With your Facebook Shop now live, it’s time to showcase your products to a vast audience. Utilize a product catalog to advertise your offerings on the platform effectively. And to truly take your business to the next level, consider leveraging Facebook’s paid advertising opportunities to promote items in your catalog. 

Related article: Unlock The Power Of Facebook Reels: A Marketer’s Must-Read Guide

Best Practices to Maximize Facebook Shops Potential

As Meta return to its orbit as the king of social platforms, brands need to make the most out of their presence. According to a report by Insider intelligence, Facebook’s Daily Active Users hit 2.0 billion during the last quarter of 2022. Facebook Shops can be a gateway for businesses to ramp up their promotion and drive more sales.

To help you optimize your Facebook Shops potential, we outline the following best practices:

1. Maintain an Up-to-Date Product Catalog: Ensure that your inventory is consistently updated and in sync with your website by regularly adding new products.
2. Leverage Paid Advertising: Utilize Facebook Shops’ advertising capabilities to drive traffic to your shop and increase sales.
3. Present Clear and Concise Product Information: Display product titles, descriptions, categories, and shipping information straightforwardly and comprehensively.
4. Utilize Product Tagging Features: Use product tags in your Facebook and Instagram posts, stories, and live videos to empower your organic content.
5. Provide a seamless checkout experience: Make it smooth and easy for your customers to purchase your products.

Following these best practices can effectively position your products and increase your sales on Facebook Shops.

Conclusion

Facebook Shops is an effective way to increase brand awareness, boost customer engagement and reach the right audiences through Facebook’s targeting capabilities. It is easy to set up and manage, cost-effective and can give brands a competitive advantage in the social commerce market.

Shops offer a seamless experience for both businesses and customers. Not only does it provide a new way to connect with potential customers, but it also allows companies to expand their reach and increase their sales potential. If you’re an advertiser looking to take advantage of this powerful tool, don’t hesitate to reach out to our team at Strike Social to learn more about how to maximize your advertising efforts, our team of experts is here to help. 

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Imagine connecting with your target audience in a way that feels intimate, authentic, and engaging. Imagine turning the power of video to your advantage and placing your brand in front of consumers already spending their time-consuming organic and paid content. Stop fantasizing and make it real with Facebook Reels Ads!

Getting Started With Facebook Reels Ads

When advertising on Facebook Reels, it’s essential to follow technical specifications to ensure that your ads meet the platform’s requirements and are delivered effectively to the target audience. These specs include the duration of your video length, format, video resolution, audio, file size, and aspect ratio.

Understanding and adhering to Facebook Reels Ad Specs will increase the chances of your ads being approved and help deliver visually appealing, engaging, and effective Reels content.

Facebook Reels Ads Specs

• Duration: Your video can be up to 60 seconds long. It should be in a fullscreen, vertical format.
• Format: It should be in .mp4 or MOV format
• Video Resolution: Uploaded Reels will be capped at 720p after upload, but it is recommended that you upload at least 1080P or 4k if available
• Sounds: We recommend that your video ad creative uses music or sound to fit the Reels placement better. Use royalty-free music from Facebook Sound Collection or original audio/ voiceovers instead.
• File size: max of 4GB
• Dimension size: 9:16 aspect ratio

It’s also important to note that these specifications are subject to change over time. Maximize your ad’s performance by understanding and adhering to Facebook Reels Ad Specs. Increase approval chances and deliver visually appealing, engaging, and effective Reels content.

Step-by-step Guide To Setup Facebook Reels Ads

Boosting Facebook Reels content is a great way to increase awareness and engagement with your target audience. However, creating and scaling success in Reels Ads can be complex, especially if you are unfamiliar with the technical specifications and Ads Manager navigation. 

Here’s a step-by-step guide to provide knowledge and guidance on utilizing Facebook Reels ads.

Running Ads On Facebook Reels

While it’s currently not possible to boost Reels directly, here’s the setup process to supercharge your organic Facebook Reels ads and watch the magic happens.

1. Go to Facebook Ads Manager and select Create.

2. Choose one of the following campaign ad objectives:

• Awareness
• Traffic
• Engagement
• Leads
• App promotion
• Sales

3. Create your ad. Fill in the details for your campaign, budget, schedule, target audience, optimization, and delivery.

4. The default setting for placements is Advantage+. To customize your ads to appear solely in Reels or other vertical video formats, switch to Manual Placements.

5. Under Placements, select the dropdown next to Stories and check the box next to Facebook Reels.

6. Choose your Call to Action and Publish your Ad.

Note: Your ads will be reviewed. Once approved, they’ll appear in viewers’ Instagram Reels. Aside from boosting, advertisers can leverage two ad types: overlay ads and post-loop ads.

Facebook Reels Vs. Stories: A Closer Look

Regarding video content on Facebook, brands have multiple placement options, including Reels and Stories. Both options have unique features and benefits. Understanding their differences is essential to make an informed decision on which best suits your campaign needs.

Reels and Stories allow brands to create short-form video content, but there are a few key differences to consider. Reels are a full-screen, vertical video format designed to mimic the look and feel of TikTok. On the other hand, Stories are a full-screen, vertical video format designed to mimic the look and feel of Snapchat.

Here are some other unique features of the two short-form content placements: 

Features	Facebook Reels	Facebook Stories
Format	Video only	It can be a mix of photos, videos, or post from your feed
Length	Max. length of 90 seconds	The video should be no more than 15 secondsPhotos no more than 7 seconds
Placement	Has more Facebook space, increasing views	Limited space; rarely get featured on explore page
Lifespan	Until you delete	Will disappear after 24 hours
Reach	Even people outside your network can see your reels	Followers of the account
Sharing	It can be shared by anyone and does not disappear	It can be shared via messenger and/or as a story, disappears in 24 hrs
Engagement	Through comments	Through Direct Messages (DMs)
Caption & Hashtag	Full captions, hashtag limit up to 30	No captions, hashtag limit up to 10
Audio Options	Soundtracks recorded audio, and other sounds from creators	Soundtracks
Editing	Audio edit, align clips, AR effects, countdown, and timer	Edit filters, layouts, and camera effects
Saves	Can be saved by users	Cannot be saved by users
Drafts	Can save a draft	Doesn’t allow saving as draft

Key Takeaways

Understanding the technical specifications of Facebook Reel Ads will help brands realize the full potential of their short-form video ads. While Stories ad placement has shown efficacies in expanding reach, Reels will offer new dynamics with its longer-form creative. In addition, Facebook Reels ads can capture a wider group of audiences as non-page followers can discover brands’ video promotions on their feeds.    

Adopting new features like Facebook Reels Ads can diversify and enhance an advertising strategy. By following the guidelines outlined in this article, advertisers can expect to see an improvement in the performance of their Facebook Reels Ads campaigns.

Interested To Know More About Facebook Reels Ads?

Meta Reels has seen a 50% rise in daily video plays from six months ago, with 140 billion across Facebook. With such a large audience and the daily time spent by its users, it’s the perfect place to advertise your brand.

Strike Social will deliver you results! We’ll drive traffic and boost your brand awareness with short-form video advertising on Facebook- helping you reach your target audience at the right time. Our experts can optimize your ad campaign to get the most ROI for every advertising dollar spent.

This post was updated in September 2024 to provide you with the latest information.

Facebook Reels let you create short videos that people can watch with sound to capture viewers’ attention. They’re fun, engaging, and easy to scan—so they’re ideal for brands to show their authentic side and make it more receptive to consumers.

This article will show you how to create Facebook reels that attract viewers and tap new audiences.

Getting Started With Facebook Reels

Let us zoom in and look at the features of Facebook Reels and harness its power to supercharge your campaigns. Like TikTok, Reel’s powerful tools allow marketers to edit and enhance short-form videos to capture viewers’ attention. Based on ad results of numerous Facebook campaigns using vertical videos,  bite-sized clips have performed well in connecting with viewers through their visually engaging and entertaining content.

To access Facebook Reels using your mobile phones, you may find the option via your Feed, Groups, and Menu bar.

How to Upload Facebook Reels

Add video to your Facebook posts and updates with one tap. Shoot new clips while you create a reel and show off pictures from your existing photo library. Creating a Facebook Reel can be easy:

• Log into your Facebook account and make sure you have the latest version. Then tap Create or click the Camera icon on the top right part when viewing reels.

• Add video to your Reel: record a video on your phone or choose from the video clips from your phone gallery.

• Add the following to make your Reel stand out:

1. Audio– add audio from the music library or record your own
2. Text– add text overlays 
3. Effects– choose video effects or filters 
4. Stickers– you have the option to add stickers, GIFs, or emojis available 
5. Greenscreen– choose a video background if you want to record on the go. Note: you cannot use video effects and greenscreen at the same time

• Tap Next when you’re finished. Write a description that will catch people’s attention. Add relevant hashtags to expand your reach.

• Set the Facebook reels audience. Reels are public by default, but reels from business or creator pages can only post publicly. You have the option to Share your Facebook Reel on Instagram. To catch new viewers and increase engagement rates, toggle Enable Remix to let other viewers stitch with your Facebook video reels. 

• To publish, tap Share now. 

Clear the Confusion: Understanding the Differences between Facebook and Instagram Reels

Many marketers are also confused about the differences between Instagram and Facebook Reels. Both platforms operate under the same umbrella of Meta and share many similarities. However, there are also key differences, which we’ll answer with the basic Facebook Reels FAQ to find out.

The two platforms are almost the same, except for one big difference that can benefit marketers. Content on Facebook Reels appears on users’ Feeds whether or not they follow you, extending the reach of your video ads to new eyeballs—and letting you reach potential customers who might not have come across your brand page otherwise.

Facebook Reels Tips and Best Practices

There is no magic recipe for making a video that gets noticed on Facebook. However, you can increase your chances of success by following simple tips and best practices.

1. Make it engaging: Entertain your audience with captivating content that compels them to take action.
2. Keep up or start a trend:  Inspire a trend that others can quickly join. Keep an eye on current trends in your industry, then create similar content.
3. Use Facebook creative tools: Add text, filters, and camera effects to make your reels stand out.
4. Use video transitions: Start your video with a hook, and then use transitions to show viewers the before-and-after transformation of your product or service.
5. Use vertical videos. Keep your phone upright when creating your Facebook Reel. Like TikTok, YouTube Shorts, and Instagram Reels which are vertical video platforms, Facebook Reels are set up for vertical video.
6. Incorporate music: Use original or licensed music from Facebook’s library to make your Reel entertaining and easy to remember. You can even join in on trending sounds.
7. Experiment with new ways of creating reels—it could lead you to discover an unexpected style that will help you connect with your audience.
8. Show off your skills with good lighting and video techniques as this can make or break your social media videos. Without good lighting, your content can look dull and unappealing.
9. Don’t forget to put captions and hashtags: Captions aren’t just subtitles. They can highlight a video’s key takeaways and make viewers more likely to remember the most important points.
10. Lead with your brand: Get your brand identity in front of your audience immediately. If you use an existing video, edit it so that your product or brand features early within the first 15 seconds.

Key Takeaways

Awareness campaigns can reach new audiences with visually rich content. Short-form content works best in scrollable and vertical mobile presentation spaces, while long-form campaigns drive deeper insight and more complex concepts. Facebook Reels present an opportunity to showcase your brand in a fun, visual way. They make up more than 20% of video viewers, and it’s forecasted to grow this year. 

Take Your Facebook Advertising Efforts To New Heights With Reels Ads

With 2.9 billion active users, Facebook is currently the world’s largest social media network, offering your brand a huge potential to reach new audiences. Boost your reach, engagement, and conversions by leveraging the power of Facebook Reels ads.

We, the team at StrikeSocial, are experts in Facebook advertising, and we’ll help you succeed. Optimizing your campaigns to maximize performance, helping you succeed in your advertising goals, and making the most of your advertising budget.

Don’t miss out on this opportunity to unlock the great potential of Facebook Reels. Contact us today to learn more about how this powerful advertising platform can help you achieve your campaign targets. 

Gen Z and Millennials can’t get enough in swiping millions of TikTok content, and advertisers are beginning to follow the trail. TikTok ads are becoming advertisers’ solutions in reaching new markets, considering Facebook ads getting deterred with third-party data.

Last Q3 of 2021, TikTok had 138 million Monthly Active Users in the United States, with 87% of the population being 18 years old and above. The short-form video sharing platform has 631+ Billion Monthly video views and an average of 88 minutes daily time spent on the app.

TikTok’s mission is “Inspire creative and bring joy,” this can be the secret formula in winning the mainstream audience. This new kid on the block is constantly evolving into a platform that attracts young viewers and marketers with diverse and relevant content. TikTok ad units are displayed similar to organic posts, allowing advertisers to provide the same experience but look less traditional video ad. 

Tiktok may be the hottest topic on paid social platforms, but how does it compare to the social giant Facebook now known as Meta?

Here’s the real deal about TikTok ads vs. Facebook Ads

Switching some advertising budgets from Facebook ads to TikTok ads comes to mind at agency pitches, client meetings, and marketing strategy sessions. Before pushing the button, here are some things that advertisers should look into.

How much do TikTok ads cost?

TikTok ad costs depend on numerous factors:  target audience, bidding method, campaign objective, advertising budget, etc. To understand further, our team gathered actual data of TikTok Ad Campaigns optimized for impression and compared them with Facebook Ads using the same advertising objective. 

Based on Campaign Lab, Strike Social proprietary tool, TikTok performed well compared to Facebook. Over the last two quarters, CPM for TikTok ads edged Facebook ad campaigns by 17%. 

Another notable observation, during Q4 2021, where bidding is hard-won, TikTok ad campaigns optimized for reach are 22% more cost-effective than Facebook. More than just a new, more expansive set of audiences for reach campaigns, TikToks ads have shown at least 70% higher CTR% than Facebook ads. Users on the platform aren’t hesitant to engage with ads.

Looking into TikTok ad cost, CPM, the platform, has a more manageable price swing than Facebook. TikTok has a gradual cost movement, a 157% increase, from the lowest to the most expensive CPM result. While Facebook might have the lowest CPM output, it has a steep ascend, 1,575% upsurge, to the most costly Facebook ad campaign.

A winning strategy begins with understanding the TikTok Ads ManagerA winning strategy begins with understanding the TikTok Ads Manager

TikTok Ads Manager bidding process looks similar to other paid social platforms. What makes it stand out from the competition is the native organic content that app users produce. 

TikTok ads stand out for two things: TikTok offers unique and engaging ad units such as TikTok Hashtag Challenge and creator-focus TikTok Spark ad. At the same time, Tiktok native content sparks curiosity, inspiration and fun, thus creating a more receptive response when seeing an ad. Based on our team’s observation, optimized TikTok ad campaigns perform well on views and clicks. 

Related: Marketers’ guide to TikTok ad specs

Take a look at the current bidding methods that advertisers’ can see on TikTok Ads Manager: 

• ​CPM / Thousand Impressions (CPM) – Marketers bid for the most ad exposure and possible reach. Having the right target audience and sets of interests helps attain the most cost-effective ad results. TikTok’s recommended advertising objective for CPM campaigns is Reach. 
• ​Optimized CPM / Thousand Impressions (oCPM) Marketers bid for a thousand impressions for audiences with a high possibility of completing a conversion, becoming a lead, or installing an app. TikTok’s recommended advertising objectives for oCPM campaigns are Conversions, App Install, Lead Generation. Currently, TikTok Ads Manager set oCPM as their default bidding method for campaigns setup for Conversions and App Installs.
• ​Cost per Thousand Views (CPV) Marketers are bidding for one thousand 2-second or 6-second video views. TikTok will deliver as many video ads to the target audience as possible within specified ad allocation. TikTok’s recommended advertising objective for CPV campaigns is Video Views.
• ​Cost per Click (CPC) Marketers are bidding for audiences with a high probability of clicking or engaging in an ad. TikTok Ads Manager will attempt to attain target bid cost. TikTok’s recommended advertising objectives for CPC campaigns are Traffic, App Installs, and Conversions. 

Comparing the TikTok Ads bidding process with Facebook Ads, Facebook Ads Manager has multiple Key Performance indicators that marketers can align their advertising objectives. Find out all the Facebook Ads metrics here.  

TikTok Advertising: Great growth opportunity 

TikTok’s unique way to capture the interest is its bite-size, fun, inspirational, and relevant content. Native TikTok content creates a more ad-friendly environment for platform users. TikTok ad’s units are closely similar to the organic content, translating engagement into advertising objectives. 

What’s unique with TikTok ads? The example above showed that reach-targeted campaigns had significantly higher CTR than similar campaigns on other paid social platforms. Another reason why TikTok has been capturing advertisers’ eyes and ad money is because of its competitive ad costs. 

Contact our team to find out how brands can maximize the potential of TikTok ads.

As the share of paid social increases, clients look where to move their ad budget, Facebook ads vs. YouTube ads. Hootsuite Social Trends 2022 Report indicated a 20.1% boost in social media video ad spending, amounting to $24.35 billion. As advertising technology advances, new social platforms and advertising solutions arise. 

Advertisers are taking full advantage of the benefits brought by the competition: Facebook ads vs. YouTube ads. Which of the big social media favorites performed well last year, and where should most ad money go? 

Drawing the line between Facebook Ads and YouTube Ads

Video content creation has been steadily rising for both organic and paid social. Based on Marketingcharts.com, the average view time on B2B content consumption surged to 63% last year. In fact, 35% of marketers choose to produce more video content to keep up with the demand. 

With abundant high-quality inventory available on social platforms, Facebook and YouTube Ads can reach more engaged audiences making social advertising more effective. 

2022 Expectation on Facebook Ads

Apple iOS 14.5 security update might have altered ad targeting capability but businesses of all sizes will continue to count on Facebook advertising. Until now, Meta, the rebranded Facebook, still holds the most users. Based on Statista.com, there are 262 million monthly active users on the platform. Outside having more eyes on Facebook content, here are some things marketers should expect on Facebook ads this year. 

Adapting to Facebook ad targeting changes

Meta had rolled out the changes in their Facebook Ad Manager last January 19. It includes eliminating some detailed targeting options under race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion, political beliefs, and health causes. 

Graham Mudd, Meta’s VP of Product Marketing, stated, “We’ve heard concerns from experts that targeting options like these could be used in ways that lead to negative experiences for people in underrepresented groups.”

Mr. Mudd shared top tips for brands in keeping up with Meta’s ad targeting update.

• Media buyers can maximize “Engagement Custom Audiences” on the Facebook ad manager in reaching out to Facebook users who have shown interest in their content or page.
• Creating Lookalike Audiences from the existing Engagement Custom Audiences will help broaden ad reach. 
• For businesses targeting local consumers, Location Targeting can be an option to increase product discovery through Facebook advertising. 

How’s Facebook Advertising after iOS 14.5 update?

Quick answer, cost-effective. The App Tracking Transparency (ATT) has caused advertisers to scramble to adjust Facebook ad campaigns due to the data restriction. Emarketer’s Behind The Numbers podcast cited only one out of five are opting-in to ATT. 

With Apple hampering third-party data, media buyers lean on Facebook Ad Manager’s ability to target precise audiences through native engagements. Using Strike Social data, Facebook ad campaigns optimized for Views, Engagement, and Followship have been more cost-efficient. 

In aggregate, 2/3 of ad spend on Android devices resulted in underperforming Facebook Ad Impressions, Link Clicks, Page Engagements, and Reach. Improved Facebook Ad Costs are more evident for clients retargeting platform users than tracking activities outside Facebook.

2022 expectations on YouTube ads

In this new age of viewership, popularity, and relevancy rely on the video viewers’ behavior. According to the 2022 Nielsen Advertiser Playbook, 142 million American adults consume media on CTVs or TV devices connected to the Internet. Eyeballs on streaming video have seen a 51% growth over the recent years. Making AVOD and SVOD the primary choice of household viewers. 

YouTube Ads on Bigger Screen 

Related: YouTube vs. Instagram vs. Meta Statistics: Who Wears the Social Media Crown

Brands put a tremendous amount of money into producing video advertising. So how much did the 2022 Super Bowl ad cost? An average cost to air a 30-second TV commercial during the championship event is $6.5 million. Companies are expanding their video advertising through digital platforms through an always-on campaign.

A week before the Big Game, major brands have released their Super Bowl Ads on the top three social media platforms: YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram. YouTube Ads have the most captured viewership among the three mentioned. 

Related: Download the YouTube 2021 YouTube Insight Report

Video advertising on mobile might still have a significant market share, but YouTube on desktop, tablets, and most especially CTV have been gaining traction lately. Using CTV as a comparison baseline, tablet CPMs are relatively similar, and YouTube desktop and YouTube on Tablet video completion rates show a slight difference, regardless of the share of advertising spend. YouTube Ad on Connected TV is the runaway winner: 12% lower than mobile device ad cost, and 5% lower CPM than the handheld gadget. 

Which is more effective: Facebook Ads or YouTube Ads?

There’s no easy answer, but both paid social channels are effective in their own way. Brand’s marketing agility in understanding how and where to reach their audience is the key to unlocking the full potential of Facebook and YouTube ads.

Based on the data, digital ad campaigns looking to leverage reach and impressions perform well on YouTube, thanks to the cable cutters and screen switchers. While Facebook ads gather more post interactions and help produce low CPCs for campaigns optimized for clicks and engagements

Many advertisers view these two platforms as competing paid social channels, but in reality, both are media buyers’ tools in leveraging digital campaigns. Through granular targeting, ad relevancy, and optimization, companies can find new customers, widen brand visibility, and build product loyalty through social advertising. 

Win the next campaign and go from “Facebook Ads VS YouTube Ads” to “Facebook Ads AND YouTube Ads.”

iOS 14.5 is shaping how Facebook campaigns are behaving more than marketers might be aware. Starting in April 2021, iPhone users could opt out and stay anonymous to their apps, websites, or mobile activities. As a result, Facebook campaign performance is erratic due to less data visibility from iOS devices:

Let’s review five major impacts of Facebook media & measurement on iOS Devices:

1. It’s taking longer to leave the learning phase. Everything leading to a website has to be click-based. Facebook and Instagram can only see website sessions that start w a click. There is almost zero View Through conversions for iOS devices.
   
   
2. Almost all conversions will be in the same session. If a user opts out, there is not an attribution window for iOS.
   
   
3. Retargeting off website visitors has largely been eliminated for iOS users. 
   
   
4. Every step on the user journey on the website counts as an ‘Event.’ However, Facebook can only report on one event for iOS users. It’s why event prioritization is necessary.
   
   
5. As a result of Facebook seeing fewer website events from iOS, some direct response campaigns optimize to Android and Desktop. 

iOS vs Android in Direct Response Campaigns

The above chart compares iOS and Android FB spend for direct response efforts reliant on the Facebook Pixel for optimizations. The July numbers show that Android spend was 3x that of iOS.

Skewing Facebook spend is very likely to be the reaction of seeing more website data from Android users than the anonymity of iPhone mobile browsers.

Knowing this, Strike Social Team started down an optimization path to manage efficiency and volume using the same pixel-based solution until better options could be developed.

Comparison of Regional Facebook Direct Response Campaigns

Regional Campaign A uses a broader mix of video and statics to drive to their landing pages. As a result, video Cost Per Click has been more cost-effective and drives more engagements.

Regional Campaign B uses static media but collects all leads within the Facebook environment, allowing the platform to optimize the campaign.

Regional Campaign C is primarily based on statics and drives to a lead form on a landing page.

What We Now Know

Focus On Facebook Integration

After the Apple iOS 14.5 updates, one of the best ways to track, optimize, and achieve a high ROAS (Return On Ad Spend) is to make your campaign native to the platform. For instance, looking at options outside the website pixel will provide more consistency in conversions and spending. At the same time, creating retargeting opportunities native to Facebook compared to the website events will help improve CPL and conversion campaigns.

iOS vs Android – Optimizing Campaign Leads within Facebook

Another approach to bring down acquisition costs within Facebook is greater integration with the platform. Aiming to keep leads and even sales within Facebook as a native activity will be faster to optimize. 

Campaigns optimizing to engagements are often seeing more iOS spend. As an illustration, Strike Social data shows around 70-80% iOS spending on the average day when optimizing lead campaigns on Facebook.

Decreasing Audience Pool and Retargeting Leads

The current setup often over-emphasizes success via the Facebook pixel, including delayed Facebook reporting. Therefore, due to miscalculations, marketers need to verify website transactions via other platforms, affecting the campaign performance and advertisers’ real-time decisions.

On top of this, it also hinders optimization and retrieves few data points. It now creates a chain of reaction that cause to shrink the Facebook retargeting pool to iOS users.

Keeping up with Facebook’s New Rules

Despite shaking the advertising industry with these privacy updates, based on a mediapost.com article, as of early September 2020, only 59% of user acquisition managers have reacted and decided to overhaul their 2021 target KPI’s, while others chose to weather the storm.

Adding a few steps to the process will be a good option rather than stepping away from one of the biggest social media platforms. The Apple iOS 14.5 privacy is just beginning a more pro-consumer direction for these tech companies that significantly impact the digital advertising industry. 

This post was updated in October 2024 to provide you with the latest information.

What are the benefits of carousel ads for Facebook advertisers?

Facebook carousel ads best practices when setting up campaigns

Due to their dynamic and interactive format, Facebook has established specific ad sizes and limitations to ensure carousel ads are displayed well across devices, particularly on the Facebook app. Before launching a carousel ad campaign, familiarize yourself with Facebook’s ad specifications.

Facebook ad specs for carousel ads

​​The Facebook carousel ad specs can vary based on the placements you choose. If you’re using Meta Advantage+ placements, Facebook will automatically select the best placements for your ads, including Facebook, Instagram, and other sites or apps within the Meta advertising network.

If you prefer manual placement selection, you can choose from the following options:

• Facebook Feed
• Facebook In-stream Video
• Facebook Video Feed
• Facebook Marketplace
• Facebook Stories
• Facebook Search Results
• Facebook Reels
• Ads on Facebook Reels (Overlay)
• Facebook Business Explore

To ensure creative compliance, review the table below for the technical specifications and size requirements for Facebook carousel ads across each placement:

How to create Facebook carousel ads

There are two distinct ways to start creating carousel ads on Facebook: from your Facebook page or from the Facebook Ads Manager (now Meta Ads Manager).

From your Facebook page

• Go to your Facebook page and click Create Ads in the left-side menu.
• In the following window, start by selecting your creatives. To ensure your ads display in carousel format, make sure to upload multiple images or videos.
• To capture the audience’s attention, include a headline for each carousel card.
• Choose a call-to-action (CTA) such as “Learn More” or “Book Now.” If you want users directed to your website upon clicking the button, select Website as the Button Destination and enter the specific URL.
  • Depending on the chosen CTA, you can also include a contact form so users can easily submit their information without leaving the Facebook app.
• Proceed with the remaining ad campaign setup, including budget, duration, and audience targeting.
• Before clicking Publish, preview your Facebook carousel ad in the upper right corner of the screen to ensure everything appears as intended. Click See All Previews to view potential placements within the Meta advertising network.
• If everything looks good, click on Publish.

From Ads Manager

• Go to the Meta Ads Manager. You can add a carousel ad at the campaign, ad set, or ad level. For this example, we’ll add a carousel ad at the ad level for an existing awareness campaign.
• Click on your active campaign, then choose the ad set where you want to add the carousel ad. Click on Create.
• Under Ad Setup, select Carousel as the ad format.
• Scroll to Ad Creative and click on Add Cards. Similar to the previous method, you can combine images and videos.
• Enter a headline and description for each carousel card. For the website URL, input it on one card and click Apply on All Cards to automatically copy it to all other cards in the carousel.
• Finish the rest of your ad and campaign setup.
• You can see a real-time ad preview on the right side of the screen as you update your creatives. Before hitting Publish, check how your Facebook carousel ads appear in different Meta network placements.

Additional best practices and tips for carousel ads in Facebook

While there are established strategies for using Facebook carousel ads effectively, there is ample room for innovation and creativity. Here are some key practices to consider:

• Put your strongest image first.
  • The first image in your carousel ad is the one that your audience will always see, whether they swipe through the rest of the pictures or not. So it’s really important that this image stops the viewer’s thumb and encourages them to check out the rest of the ad.
• Use high-quality creatives and visuals.
  • All images or videos must be of high quality and maintain a consistent theme throughout the carousel. Some advertisers opt for a continuous storytelling approach, prompting audiences to swipe to see the complete narrative, while others choose striking visuals to capture immediate clicks.
• Be entertaining and helpful.
  • Even if the purpose of your Facebook carousel ad is to drive conversions, it’s best to avoid being a salesman in people’s Facebook feeds. Focus on entertaining, educating, and getting your viewer’s interest and your carousel ads will get a much better response.

Yet another engaging way to advertise on Facebook

As brands increasingly compete for ad space, particularly during peak advertising seasons, it’s essential to captivate audiences with diverse ad formats—especially the swipeable Facebook carousel ads. These ads offer a unique opportunity to keep your audience engaged.

Curious about how Facebook advertising can boost your engagement and conversions? Click here to explore our Facebook ROAS case study and discover how Strike Social can enhance the performance of your Facebook campaigns.

This post was updated in September 2024 to provide you with the latest information.

An Overview of Facebook Ads Manager

The Facebook Ads Manager is a free tool available to assist you in your advertising efforts. It’s your all-in-one tool for creating ads, managing when and where they’ll be placed and tracking how well your Meta ad campaigns are performing.

You can use it to create, run and tweak the specifications of your ads. Using the Ads Manager allows you to target your ads to the right audiences, set your budget, see which of your ads are working, and view your billing information, payment summary and payment method information—all within the Meta Business Suite. This should not be confused with Facebook Business Manager, which provides a broader view of both organic content and paid advertising.

Are you ready to learn the essential steps to manage your campaigns through Facebook Ads Manager? Let’s jump in.

How to Access the Facebook Ads Manager

You have a few ways of accessing the Ads Manager and they will vary according to the platform you are using.

Desktop

• On your Facebook homepage (facebook.com), navigate to the left-hand side menu and click See More to expand the list of options.

• Once the additional options appear, scroll down until you find Ads Manager. Click on it, and you will be redirected to the Facebook Ads Manager interface.

• If you navigate directly to the Ads Manager site, you’ll be taken to your personal account by default. Switching to a different account is simple:
  • Click on your profile image on the left side of the screen to switch to the correct Business portfolio, or
  • Click on the dropdown menu next to Campaigns, then select See More Ad Accounts to choose the business or ad account you want to manage.

Mobile

• Download the Meta Ads Manager app from the Play Store (for Android devices) or the App Store (for Apple devices).

• If you already have Facebook installed on your device, the app will recognize your account and prompt you to click Continue to link your account to the Ads Manager app.
  • If you want to use a different account, simply click on Not you? to log in with another Facebook account.

• Once logged in, you’ll be prompted to select the ad account you want to manage.

• And that’s it! Your screen will now display an overview of your campaigns, and you can start exploring and managing your ads through the Meta Ads Manager mobile application.

Exploring Meta Ads Manager: Managing Your Facebook and Instagram Campaigns

Your Meta Ads Manager interface is organized into three main tabs—Campaigns, Ad Sets, and Ads. Here’s a closer look at what each tab offers:

Campaigns

This tab allows you to view and manage all your campaigns. You can create, duplicate, and edit campaigns, update campaign names, or change end dates.

It also provides insights into each campaign’s performance, allowing you to export or share results in .csv or .xlsx formats. You can customize the columns and use breakdown options to analyze your campaign data more effectively.

Ad sets

Viewing the Ad Sets tab gives you much of the same options as the Campaigns tab, but focuses on one specific ad set within a campaign. Along with everything mentioned above, it gives you the opportunity to edit your ad set and update not only the name, but also the placement, budget, scheduling and targeting.

Ads

The Ads tab allows you to focus on one single ad within an ad set in a Facebook campaign. In addition to editing the budget and viewing performance, you can use this tab to preview your ad and see how it appears across your selected Facebook ad placements within the Meta advertising network.

Best Practices on Facebook Advertising

• Always use high-quality photos. Whether for business or personal use, only upload high-quality images to social media platforms to ensure your content looks professional and engaging. Make sure your ads fit by learning the Facebook ad sizes.

• Avoid ad fatigue. To prevent your audience from seeing the same ads repeatedly, regularly update your ad creatives. Introduce new ads instead of just modifying existing ones to keep your content fresh and engaging. Keep your ads fresh with the latest Facebook ad formats.

Managing Your Facebook Ads From Inside the Office and Beyond

Now that you know all the benefits of using Facebook Ads Manager, go ahead and use the tool to improve the way you manage your Facebook campaigns.

Remember you can also download the Facebook Ads Manager app to manage your ads from home, the airport or rooftop lounge whenever you feel like it. Take advantage of the inspiration as soon as it strikes, since it doesn’t always happen in the office.

This post was updated in August 2024 to provide you with the latest information.

Improve your Targeting with Facebook Audience Insights

Designed to help marketers learn more about the audience they want to reach, the Audience Insights tool provides relevant data for Facebook advertisers, such as page likes, location, what your target audience’s household looks like, and buyer behavior.

Audience Insights differs from Facebook’s Page Insights because it looks at trends about your current or potential customers across Facebook, whereas Page Insights looks at interactions with your page (e.g., likes, comments, and shares).

As with many Facebook tools, Audience Insights is free and user-friendly. Follow the steps below to improve your Facebook strategy and hone tactics for creating winning social media advertising campaigns time and time again.

How to Use Facebook Audience Insights

Step 1: Access Audience Insights

• Go to the Facebook Business Manager page.
• From the left-hand menu, select Insights to open the full overview.
• To view your Audience Insights data, click on Audience.
• On the Audience Insights screen, you will find three key tabs:

Trends: View metrics like follower count (based on the selected timeframe), post views, and follower engagement.

Demographics: Analyze the age, gender, and location breakdown of your followers.

Potential Audience: Based on your follower and engagement data, Facebook suggests an audience size and demographic, helping you refine your content and advertising strategy.

Step 2: Create an audience

To fully utilize the Audience Insights you have gathered from this tool, start by creating a custom audience.

• Hover your mouse over the left-side menu and click on All tools. 
• Search for “audience”, then click on Audience under Advertise.

• A new window will open, leading you to the Audiences section in Meta Ads Manager.

• Click on Create audience, then select Custom audience. 
• Select your source to begin customizing your audience list.

Once your audience is labeled as Ready, you can start using it for Facebook advertising, targeting based on the data from Facebook Audience Insights.

• When setting up your Facebook ad campaign, go to the Ad Set level.
• First, go to Audience controls and select your target location.
  
  To change the location, hover the mouse over the current location settings and click on the “X” that will appear on the right side of the box. Depending on your suggested potential audience from the Facebook Audience Insights tool, you can target by country or city.

• Scroll to Advantage+ audience. From here, you can segment your audience by age, gender, interests, people connected to your page, and more advanced data such as behavior, language, education, work, etc.
  
  Quick tip: Add your custom audience created in the previous step and create a Lookalike audience to target similar audience profiles from your target country.

After setting up your audience, continue with the rest of your Facebook ad campaign setup.

Step 3: Play with the data

For example, we’ve created an audience in Chicago with both men and women between the ages of 25 and 54. Our audience likes the winning combination of entertainment and TV shows. Let’s follow this audience, as suggested by the Facebook Audience Insights tool.

Quick tip: To refine your target audience, continue adding segments by updating the Detailed targeting section. Notice how the audience size changes as you add or remove parameters.

Step 4: Get granular

It’s time to explore the new Facebook Audience Insights tool by examining the three main tabs that reveal what our audience looks like. Unlike the old Facebook Audience Insights tool with six tabs, the updated tool has streamlined its insights into:

• Trends,
• Demographics, and
• Potential audience.

Tab 1: Trends

The “Trends” tab provides a snapshot of your audience’s behavior on Facebook. It shows the average number of followers and returning viewers, along with engagement metrics like comments, likes, shares, and ad clicks within the last 30 days (or your selected timeframe).

For instance, if you’re tracking follower count as a secondary Facebook metric in addition to your primary goal (e.g., Awareness), this is an excellent way to monitor your progress at a glance.

This tab also highlights the most active times for your Facebook page’s audience. By analyzing the frequency of activity graphs, you can see when your audience is most engaged. For instance, our Facebook Audience Insights suggest that our followers are most active between 12 AM to 3 AM and 3 PM to 9 PM.

Tab 2: Demographics

The “Demographics” tab breaks down your audience by age, gender, and key locations.

For example, our current Facebook audience, primarily based in Chicago, consists of 58.4% men and 41.6% women. Interestingly, the age demographic skews towards 45-54 years old, with a decline in older age segments.

At the top left of this screen, you can view your total lifetime followers and switch between your Facebook or Instagram pages (if applicable) on the right-hand side.

Tab 3: Potential audience

The “Potential Audience” tab reveals how to expand your reach based on your audience’s current behavior. For instance, the data might suggest targeting more women, as they represent a significant portion of your most engaged audience. Additionally, you might discover that your content has a strong reach among the 55+ age group.

Use this data to fine-tune your audience segmentation, boost engagement, and achieve better results for your Facebook advertising campaigns by targeting the right audience.

Step 5: Put your Audience Insights to work

Are you satisfied with your audience? Can you use it to improve messaging and engage with Facebook users? If yes, remember to name and save your audience so you can use it to refine your targeting when advertising on Facebook.

If you plan to create many audience segments, you can do so by returning to the Audience tab in Facebook Ads Manager. There, you can select which audiences to use depending on the ad campaign you are looking to launch.

Conclusion

The Facebook Audience Insights tool can help you improve your ad campaigns and messaging. It ensures that your Facebook ad campaigns reach the right people and get the right engagement and clicks. Experiment with different parameters to truly understand the power of this valuable tool.

This post was updated in February 2025 to provide you with the latest information.

Familiarize yourself with the complete list of Facebook ad formats and their respective specifications and dimensions to ensure your ads adhere to the platform’s guidelines and optimize their effectiveness.

2025 Facebook Ad Types and Sizes

As we introduce the diverse array of Facebook advertising options, we will highlight the various Facebook ad sizes and how you can properly showcase your brand to achieve your campaign goals:

Image Size for Facebook Ads

The average attention span on social media is between 1.7 and 2.5 seconds per piece of content. Thus, top Facebook advertisers capitalize on image ads to capture immediate attention, ensuring audiences quickly grasp the brand’s message. Remarkably, a well-crafted image can be as impactful as a full-length video, delivering the desired results for brands.

To optimize the Facebook ad sizes for your campaigns, here are the recommended image sizes for Facebook ads based on the ad format and placement:

Facebook Feed

Facebook In-Stream Video

Facebook Video Feed Ads

Facebook Marketplace

Facebook Stories

Facebook Search Results

Facebook Reels Ads

Ads on Facebook Reels

Facebook Business Explore

Facebook Right Column

Specs for Facebook Video Ads

Whether long-form or short-form, video ads are an excellent way to connect with your target audience by telling a compelling story, as evidenced by Facebook video ad impressions growing by 31% year-on-year. Moreover, conforming to the correct Facebook video ad sizes can result in 78% greater engagement.

To help you achieve this elevated level of engagement, here are the Facebook video ad specs you should adhere to:

Facebook Feed

Facebook In-Stream Video

Facebook Video Feed Ads

Facebook Marketplace

Facebook Stories

Facebook Search Results

Facebook Reels

Ads on Facebook Reels

Facebook Business Explore

Facebook Right Column (Desktop)

Carousel Ad Specs on Facebook

Carousel ads are a type of Facebook advertising format that allows audiences to engage audiences with swipeable or movable creatives. This format enables businesses to showcase multiple products or services within a single ad space in their Facebook ad feed. Each carousel ad can include up to 10 cards, providing ample opportunity to highlight different product or service aspects. 

For instance, a clothing line brand could create a carousel ad with one card for men’s wear, one for women’s, and one for children’s wear. Better yet, use a single carousel ad dedicated to the whole family’s summer wear!

Continue reading to learn more about the specific Facebook carousel ad specifications for each ad placement available on the platform:

Facebook Feed

Facebook In-Stream Video

Facebook Video Feeds Ads

Facebook Marketplace

Facebook Stories

Facebook Search Results

Facebook Reels

Ads on Facebook Reels

Facebook Business Explore

Facebook Collection Ad Specs

The Collection ad format on Facebook allows you to highlight a cover image or video supported by 3 or more product images. Media buying teams are recommended to use the Instant Experience feature, where users can click on the ad and immediately enter a “shopping experience” without leaving Facebook. Further, collection ads on the Facebook advertising platform can be created using Storefront, Lookbook, or Customer Acquisition templates. 

Here are the Facebook ad sizes and dimensions to prepare your ad creatives for this placement:

Facebook Feed

Facebook Video Feed Ads

Facebook Reels (Post-loop)

Facebook Marketplace

Venture into Facebook Advertising with Ease by Mastering Facebook Ad Specifications

Before worrying about the Facebook metrics and advertising costs, your first order of business is to ensure your ads are visible to audiences. This means eliminating any blockages in your ad creatives and adhering to the prescribed Facebook ad sizes and dimensions.

With this guide at your fingertips, you’ll always have a reliable reference to craft effective Facebook ad creatives. By understanding Facebook’s safe zones and those of other social media platforms like Instagram, getting your ads approved and live should now be effortless. 

Explore our Facebook blogs and case studies here for further guidance on Facebook advertising.

In the world of social media advertising, Facebook is definitely the overall reigning champ.

Almost every type of customer is on Facebook. But, there’s a part of Facebook that has an even higher concentration of users than the platform itself: Facebook Messenger.

Overall, messaging apps now have more users than social networks. Facebook Messenger alone has 1.3 billion monthly users. So it makes sense that Facebook designed ads specifically for its messaging app.

Given the massive potential for reaching customers and starting conversations, you should be using Facebook Messenger Ads.

But watch out. Messenger ads have a few gotchas that standard Facebook ads don’t.

We created this guide to walk you through some of the do’s and don’ts of Facebook Messenger ads and cover some of the basics of setting them up.

But first, some Facebook Messenger Ad basics.

What are Facebook Messenger Ads?

Facebook Messenger Ads have two possible placements:

Click-To-Messenger Ads. These are ads that appear on the user’s timeline and look the same as standard Facebook image, video or carousel ads. However, the call to action button takes users to a conversation with your company in their messenger app.

^{Image credit: AdEspresso by Hootsuite}

Messenger Ads. These are ads that appear in the messenger app itself. They can either start a conversation or take users to a landing page.

^{Image credit: AdEspresso by Hootsuite}

The ads have two primary formats:

Sponsored Messages. These are ads that look exactly like a normal message. The company name on your Facebook page will be displayed as the sender. These ads are designed to start a messenger conversation.

Home Screen Ads. These ads appear between messages on a user’s messenger home screen. Home Screen Ads are essentially standard Facebook ads that display in the messenger app. These ads take users to a landing page.

Each ad type works for accomplishing certain objectives. Here’s what you need to know to get the most from your Facebook Messenger Ads.

How to use Click-To-Messenger Ads

Click-To-Messenger Ads are a great way to build your base of Facebook Messenger subscribers. In Messenger, subscribers are simply people who have messaged you in the past and haven’t deleted the conversation.

Having a conversation with a customer in Messenger gives you an additional channel to communicate with them and offers an opportunity for hyperpersonal interaction.

Additionally, you can broadcast messages to your entire subscriber base with Messenger marketing software. So Messenger can act as a pseudo email list.

Here are the key attributes of Click-To-Messenger ads:

1. Click-To-Messenger Ads work in both Facebook and Instagram, and on desktop and mobile.
2. You can use the same targeting as any other Facebook ads. Target behaviors, interests, custom audiences or anything else you can target in the Facebook Ads Manager.
3. Click-To-Messenger Ads are only available for Facebook campaigns with traffic, messages or conversion objectives. You can’t create Click-To-Messenger Ads in campaigns with other objectives, so you won’t see them in the drop-down menu.

Those are the basics. Now that you’ve got your feet wet, here are some best practices for running Click-To-Messenger Ads.

Related: How to use Facebook Messenger ads to scale your Facebook advertising

Click-To-Messenger Ad best practices

• Make sure users understand what they’re clicking. Since Click-To-Messenger Ads look like standard Facebook ads, it’s easy for a user to click on the ad expecting a landing page to come up.

When a person clicks expecting one thing and gets another, that’s a bad user experience and could hurt conversions.

So use a call to action like, “Start a Conversation” or “Ask Us Anything,” and clarify in the ad copy that they’re clicking through to Facebook Messenger. That way customers know what to expect when they click on your ads.

• Use Click-To-Messenger Ads for remarketing. If a prospect has visited your page or messaged you, but hasn’t made a purchase, there’s a reason.

Often this barrier to buying is a lack of information or understanding. So use Click-To-Messenger Ads as an opportunity to find out what questions or concerns a potential customer has about buying and clarify things for them.

Also, if you use Click-To-Messenger Ads for remarketing, you’ll get better results if you use other marketing channels to build your subscriber list. Include a link to start a Facebook Messenger conversation in your marketing emails and customer service emails to encourage people to message you.

• Ask a question people can answer. This works best if you’re targeting people who haven’t interacted with your brand before. However, it’s totally viable for renewing a conversation with prospects who haven’t contacted you in a while.

The big thing here is to ensure that you ask a question that leads to a sales conversation. Unlike an Instagram poll, which can be solely entertaining, questions in your Click-to-Messenger Ads should help customers express their needs and pain points to you so you can present a solution (your product).

Here at Strike Social, we might ask something like, “What’s your biggest challenge in social media marketing?”

• Use Click-To-Messenger Ads for traffic and messages objectives. Yes, conversions are the end goal of all advertising.

However, until you have a significant number of conversions, Facebook doesn’t have enough data to optimize your ads. This usually means they won’t get shown to enough people to be effective.

Those are the ins and outs of Click-To-Messenger Ads. Remember that many of the fundamentals of standard Facebook ads apply to Click-To-Messenger Ads, since they look and function very similarly.

How to use Messenger Ads

We’ll start with the simpler of the two types of Messenger Ads: Home Screen Ads.

Home Screen Ads are more of a new placement than a new type of ad. Basically, Home Screen Ads are just standard Facebook ads that show in a user’s messenger app.

The same best practices of Facebook ads apply to Home Screen Ads. However, there are a couple of additional considerations.

• Let people stay in Messenger. Unlike the Facebook timeline, people don’t idly cruise their messages. People open messenger to send messages. So they’ll be irritated if your ad takes them to their browser.

Stick with ads that show content in Messenger when a user clicks on them.

• Use static, understated ads. It’s best to create ads specifically for showing in messenger, rather than just importing your timeline ads.

Keep your ads simple and subtle. Avoid flashy ads that feel like they try too hard to get attention. Messenger is a very different environment than the timeline. It’s very easy for users to tell Facebook that your ads are not useful to them, which could reduce your ad showing.

That’s it for Home Screen Ads. Simple, right?

Let’s talk about Promoted Messages.

Promoted Messages have the same look as messages from friends. But they’re from your brand.

Here’s what you need to know about Promoted Messages:

• Promoted Messages are only available for campaigns with the messages objective. If you select a different objective for a campaign, Promoted Messages won’t appear in the “Ad Type” menu.
• You can send Promoted Messages any time. Ordinarily, you can only send messages within 24 hours of the last message they sent you.

• You can only send messages to people who have messaged you in the past. This is pretty self-explanatory. People who have unsubscribed or deleted your conversation cannot be contacted with Promoted Messages.

• Promoted Messages aren’t delivered immediately. Facebook says that your messages will be delivered 3-5 days after your campaign starts. Facebook automatically sends messages when people are most likely to see them based on how they use their messenger app.

Facebook recommends that you run a Promoted Messages campaign for at least seven days to ensure that all your messages get delivered.

• You can only send one message to each person. If you’d like to send more than one message per customer, you’ll have to create multiple ad sets.

Keep in mind that it’s easy to irritate customers with too many messages. Keep the message volume reasonable.

• Facebook charges for impressions. You’re going to get charged whether the user opens the message or not. Keep this in mind as you plan your budget.

Right now, the average cost of Promoted Messages is $30 per 1000 impressions.

There’s quite a bit there. Fortunately, the Facebook Ads Manager takes care of most of the important stuff.

The list of best practices for Promoted Ads is much shorter.

Since you can only send Promoted Messages to people who’ve already contacted you, these ads are exclusively remarketing ads.

• Use Promoted Messages for promoting events, sales or offering discounts. Since these customers have already messaged you, it’s pretty likely that they already have all the information they need to make a buying decision. They likely just need a little nudge.

Price reductions go a long way here.

• Target specific segments of your subscriber list. Just like email marketing, Promoted Messages work better when they’re more relevant. Facebook lets you get very granular with your segmentation and targeting, so take advantage of it.

That’s all there is to it. Easier than it looked at first, right?

We’ve got one last thing to cover.

Creating Facebook Messenger Ads

Facebook Messenger Ads can be created in the Facebook Ads Manager, using any campaign with traffic, messages or conversion objectives.

Creating Facebook Messenger Ads is similar to creating other ad types, so we’ll cover this quickly.

1. Go to Ad Creation and select “Traffic,” “Messages,” or “Conversions” as your objective.

If you want to create Promoted Messages, select the “Messages” objective.

1. Select the ad type you want to create.
2. Select where you want people to go when they click your ads. For Click-To-Messenger ads, select “Messenger.” For Promoted Messages and Home Screen Ads you can select either “Messenger” or “URL.”
3. Specify your audience. By default, ads will be shown to everyone. You can choose audiences you’ve already built or select a new audience based on Facebook’s segmentation factors.
4. Select the placement.
   For Click-To-Messenger Ads, select the “Home” placement.
   For Home Screen Ads, select the “Messenger” placement.
   For promoted messages, you can only choose “Sponsored Messages.”

Specify your budget and schedule.

1. Build your ads. You can specify your text and images for all messenger ads. You can also customize customer actions like providing suggested quick replies.
2. Run your ads!

And one last thing: consider using a Facebook chatbot to help you out. Message volume can get unmanageable fast. A chatbot can do a lot of work in dealing with common questions and issues.

That’s it for our 10-minute rundown of Facebook Messenger Ads.

So have a go at using Facebook Messenger Ads in your business. As always, measure, test and iterate. Then send us a message and let us know how these ads work for you!

In an update from Facebook last month, the social media giant announced it would be bringing down the hammer on low-quality ads in an effort to improve user experience and transparency.

In the announcement, Facebook said:

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“Low-quality ads on Facebook, such as ones that include clickbait or direct people to unexpected content, create bad experiences for people and don’t align with our goal of creating meaningful connections between people and businesses. We are now going further in our efforts to limit low-quality ads on our platforms by disapproving more of them and reducing distribution for more ads in our auction.”

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Facebook’s new low-quality ad restrictions come at a time when more and more social channels are pushing for transparency to ensure users have quality experiences on their platforms.

So what does all this mean? And how strict are the restrictions? In this article, we’ll outline everything you need to know about Facebook’s new restrictions on low-quality ads and what this means for advertisers.

What is considered a low-quality ad on Facebook?

Facebook outlines a few examples of typical low-quality ads to avoid:

Engagement bait

Ads asking users for likes, comments or shares are considered spammy content. Facebook also has specific rules about likes and comments in contest promotions.

Remember that these types of ads that hack Facebook’s engagement algorithm are not only poor in nature, but they can also skew your data.

Withholding information

Ads that clearly withhold information in the copy to entice people to click or understand the full context are restricted.

This type of ad is a key problem when it comes to transparency and user experience — they often lead to spam or landing pages that a user has no interest in.

Sensationalized language

Facebook restricts ads that exaggerate headlines or command a reaction from people but don’t deliver what’s expected on the landing page.

While this type of ad can be effective, Facebook is moving to restrict them to avoid poor user experience. The problem is, some brands draw attention using dramatized or outrageous headlines that overstate the ad’s true purpose, which leads to unnecessary and false information. An ad like this could be using words like “amazing” or “mind-blowing” in the ad copy as you see in this example below.

In addition to these main restrictions, Facebook deems an ad low-quality or disruptive if the ad contains or does any of the following:

• Uses images that are excessively cropped or require people to click the ad to view the full image.
• Includes deceptive ad copy that incentivizes people to click on the ad.
• Features suggestive or shocking content on the landing page.
• Displays malicious or deceptive ads on the landing page.
• Has a high ratio of ads relative to content on the landing page.
• Uses popup ads, interstitial ads or other other ad formats on the landing page that disrupt the user experience.
• Provides an experience in which the content doesn’t match what the user expected to see.

What do these new restrictions mean for advertisers?

It seems simple, right? Avoid low-quality ads in your ad groups and it’s smooth sailing.

But Facebook isn’t only pushing for improved ad quality — it’s incentivizing advertisers to avoid it at all costs. Even one or a few ads that slip through the cracks could impact the performance of all your Facebook ads.

To enforce these low-quality characteristics, Facebook has put a couple of penalties in place to motivate advertisers to only create truthful and transparent ad experiences.

These penalties for low-ad quality ads on Facebook include:

• Any ad with low-quality attributes will see reduced distribution in Facebook’s ad auction or will be disapproved. This applies to all advertisers, but media, entertainment, politics or issues of national importance may be impacted more as low-quality characteristics often pertain to them the most.
• Multiple ads flagged with low-quality attributes can impact the performance of all your ads on Facebook.

As an advertiser, this means you should follow these restrictions carefully.

Even a couple ads considered low-quality could restrict all of your ads on Facebook, which leads to less audience reach and higher costs.

We recommend that if you’re running a Facebook campaign, be transparent and honest about your product and service offerings. Don’t sensationalize or tempt users to click on ads with inflated headlines or copy.

Facebook’s low-quality ad restrictions are just another step in the direction toward transparency on the platform and it’s best that brands fall in line to ensure the best possible user experience.

Facebook advertising is a staple in almost every social media strategy. Creating the right strategy, however, can be a bit of a challenge as there are a lot of working pieces.

For one fashion e-tailer, sharpening the human connection in their ads was the path to their success.

This international subscription e-tailer has dominated in digital sales through social media advertising most notably through personalized Facebook ads.

What follows is an investigation of the brand’s strategic application of tailored Facebook ads to boost online subscriptions.

Sizing up with personalized targeting

The e-tailer has utilized Facebook’s Tailored Targeting features since their inception, focusing most on relevancy to generate clicks.

What most advertisers fail to realize is that targeting is more than putting ads in front of an audience. It’s a way to personalize an experience or touchpoint, and that’s exactly what this brand has accomplished.

The fashion e-tailer delivers its ads to the right audience at the right time using the right personalization tactics. Ultimately, this leads to more clicks and purchases.

Not only does the company focus on seasonal factors as a way to reach their audience, but they personalize targeting based on life events.

Beyond delivering ads to females between the ages of 18 and 34, they dig deep into understanding their customers’ needs by leveraging customer data and Facebook’s custom audiences. Then, they create targeted segments with a wealth of customer details — location, profession, fashion tastes, where they are in life, etc.

Is the user going backpacking across Europe and need the perfect walking shoe? Are they starting school in the snow-capped region of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula and need a warm boot? Perhaps a user has been searching for wedding rings, so they deliver an ad tailored to wedding accessories.

While this kind of targeting often gets a bad rep for seeming too forward, brands who deliver relevant content are the ones who reap the benefits. They have a better understanding of their audience and serve ads that users can relate to.

Ads that address customer intent

Ad creatives are just as important as the science behind reaching the best audience.

This brand delivers ads that serve a purpose, going beyond traditional Facebook ads. By utilizing GIFs or interactive content that addresses a problem, the brand sees increased engagement across their Facebook content.

As a fashion brand, helping customers express individuality and character is a piece of the overarching goal.

The brand gives their products a sense of purpose, tying them into real-life applications. Nowhere do they say “buy this,” but rather the ads align with customer needs and desires.

Consider this ad: the brand asks the user to screenshot a GIF of several shoes interchanging quickly. The end result is a user with a screenshot of her “perfect shoe.”

An ad like this does a few things:

• The user is immediately stopped in the feed using a quick-moving image
• The ad addresses the user’s need to find a new style in a fun, quirky way
• It gets users engaging and clicking on the ad, boosting the relevancy score

Ads that feature more products, like Facebook carousel ads, also see increased engagement across the board for this brand.

If the ad fits

What you can take away from this is the brand’s ability to meet its customers’ needs through the use of data-driven advertising and personalized content.

Merging creatives and ad targeting on Facebook will get you the most efficient results as this directly influences the platform’s relevance score for your ads.

So take a page out of this fashion e-tailer’s book and start leveraging your customer data to deliver Facebook ads that address your customer’s needs.

Common misconceptions and myths about Facebook advertising often seem to discourage business owners, CMOs and marketing specialists from promoting their companies on the social media giant. But we have news for you: they’re called myths for a reason because they’re simply not true!

Sure, user growth on Facebook has slowed in recent months, but it’s still one of the most beneficial advertising platforms for all types of businesses. It continues to capture the most time and attention than any other platform.

For that reason, we broke down several common myths about Facebook advertising to help you understand the power behind Facebook ads.

Myth #1: It’s not beneficial for my B2B company

You might think this because Facebook has become a hot spot for e-commerce companies lately to promote their latest product lines. The truth to the matter is: Facebook is extremely lucrative for B2B businesses, too. And here’s why:

• There are well over two billion users on Facebook. There are plenty of industry experts and business owners looking for what you offer.
• Targeting options on Facebook are plentiful, and you can focus on Lead generation campaigns.
• B2B content offering free downloads or trials do well on Facebook.

If these points aren’t convincing enough, then consider this statistic: 89 percent of B2B businesses use Facebook over LinkedIn (81 percent) now. It’s clearly working.

You might be thinking to yourself: I’ve tried B2B advertising on Facebook, but no luck.

B2B ads on Facebook will often fail because they’re not relevant, calls to action are missing the mark or they’re simply not the right ad type for B2B. While there are many options for B2C companies on Facebook, there are just as many for B2B.

Myth #2: Boosting a post is the same as running a Facebook campaign

There is a common misconception that boosting a post can get you the same results as running a Facebook ad, but that’s actually not the case—at all.

They are two very different things.

Boosted posts have one purpose: to increase post engagement and impressions. Boosting a post won’t give you the same detailed targeting criteria as Facebook ads. Facebook campaigns run with the specific intent behind them, for example, a conversion campaign targets those most likely to convert.

With that said, if you’ve been boosting posts with the goal of driving traffic the same as a Facebook campaign would, you won’t see the same results.

Myth #3: I need a large Facebook following for ads to work

Don’t let a small following discourage you. You don’t need thousands of Page likes for your Facebook campaigns to thrive.

Facebook is home to more than two billion monthly active users. Your message is bound to get in front of a fraction of that number. You can create custom audiences and let Facebook put your product or service in front of those people—whether or not they like your page.

You can even create specific audiences based on email lists you might already have or target based on demographics.

Myth #4: It’s too competitive, so CPC is too high

Facebook has become entrenched with advertisers squabbling for ad space, so businesses feel that competition is too high. Therefore, companies shy away from even the idea of promoting their business on the platform.

Despite the competitiveness on Facebook, CPC rates have remained steady for a few years (except Mobile App Installs and Post Engagement ads). With that in mind, CPC could always see an increase in the future, so it’s worth investing in Facebook advertising now.

Myth #5: Facebook advertising is only for lower-funnel marketing strategies

Marketers often focus much of their Facebook ads on retargeting efforts, but as you consider all parts of the marketing funnel, campaigns on Facebook work well for upper-funnel strategies, too.

In this case, retargeting isn’t your only option for Facebook. Campaigns on Facebook can also serve the purpose of brand awareness, as long as you focus your content on promoting the brand and treat the ad more as an organic post.

Myth #6: People don’t like Facebook ads, so it’s not worth it

If you’ve ever been discouraged from Facebook advertising simply because people may not like it, you’re missing out on valuable leads!

Of course, people don’t want to see ads that don’t pertain to them (or ads that seem unnatural or pushy). Facebook has a smart algorithm for this reason – it targets users based on relevant content. The more clicks the ad receives, the more relevant Facebook views it. The more relevant the ad, the more people see it and appreciate it because it’s an ad specific to them.

So there you have it – six myths about Facebook advertising debunked. These myths only skim the surface of the common misbeliefs out there. That’s why proper research is necessary to come to the conclusion yourself that Facebook advertising is so powerful for businesses.

If you think you know Facebook inside and out, we’re about to put your knowledge of the social media giant to the test. Using Facebook is arguably one of the most effective ways to grow your business, both from a brand awareness and engagement perspective.

With over 2.2 billion active monthly users, it’s simply a platform that you cannot afford to be leaving to one side. However, there may well be some Facebook features for business that you’re unaware of – some of which could give you an advantage against competitors who are also using Facebook.

Here are a few tips and features that you might not have heard of, or maybe you know about but you just aren’t using to their full capacity.

Facebook features for business that your business should start using

1. Watch other pages and compare their activity to yours

Call this a little R&D, if you like – with the “watch” feature, you’re able to follow up to 100 different brand pages. You’ll be able to quickly compare and contrast page activity with your own, including some basic performance figures, e.g., estimated views, engagement and audience growth.

This is a priceless way to gain valuable insight into your competitors and the way they’re using Facebook. Of course, they can also follow you as well.

2. Messenger chatbots make your life easier

Hey, we’re all human and we all have lives outside of our businesses. That’s when chatbots can be so helpful. If you’re on vacation, sleeping or just busy with other things, your chatbot can answer the basic questions that anyone who visits your business page might have.

There’s also an added benefit that is overlooked – it promotes a policy of proactive customer support, rather than reactive or passive. What does that mean? Well, with your Messenger chatbot you’ll be able to start a conversation with each customer at any time of the day.

In turn, you can expect higher engagement rates as you’re virtually saying “hello” to every user who lands on your page.

Oh, and we nearly forgot about the obvious financial benefit of using chatbots. By implementing a fully functioning chatbot, it’s cheaper and faster than creating a cross-platform app or hiring another employee.

3. Make use of the powerful audience insights

This slightly ties into the paid advertising side of things, but we couldn’t write this article without mentioning Facebook’s audience insights. They’re a fantastic way to gain valuable insight on your users (like the Google Analytics of Facebook).

The access to such detailed and relevant information about your users will ensure you’re in the best position possible to create content that resonates with those people the most.

4. Hashtags aren’t just for Twitter

The hashtag has risen from the dead to become one of the most used symbols on your keyboard. But it’s not just Twitter where they can be an effective tool – particularly for businesses. Yes, hashtags are most definitely a thing on Facebook… using them to start a conversation with a specific group or comment on a trending topic are the most common approaches.

While we’re talking about Twitter – pinning posts to the top of your feed is also a feature on Facebook. This is a great way to keep important or popular content at the top of your Facebook business page. For example, that might be a company announcement or a product launch.

5. Take your photos and imagery to the next dimension… literally

This is a bit of a bonus point, but it could help you set your business page apart from your competitors. 3D photos are now available – they’ll live in your news feed just like any other photos.

The exception occurs when you scroll across them, touch or click them, or tilt your phone. According to TechCrunch, “They’ll respond as if the photo is actually a window into a tiny diorama, with corresponding changes in perspective.”

In summary, help your company stand out from the crowd with these Facebook features for business:

1. Watch other pages and learn from your competitors
2. Make the most of chatbots in Messenger
3. Dig through the audience insights to learn more about your users
4. Start introducing hashtags where you can
5. Add a little flare with 3D photos

Over the past year, Facebook has seen a lot of changes to its platform. In Q1 and Q2, we’ve already seen significant updates trickle into the network, including a News Feed update and several policy alterations. The social media giant has been aiming to improve transparency across all aspects of the platform.

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”Our focus in 2018 is to keep people safe, and to keep building the experiences people expect from us.” – Mark Zuckerberg

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Keeping up with all these changes and understanding how it affects you can be challenging. We’ve compiled an easy-to-digest list of Facebook updates in the last year that marketers need to know.

RELATED: Facebook advertising tips for success

More friends and family in your News Feed

Facebook updated its News Feed algorithm in January 2018 in order to promote more meaningful interactions between people. These changes include:

• Less organic content from businesses, brands and media
• More content from family, friends and groups that promote conversation
• More content from trustworthy local news publishers

What does the change mean for brands? With Facebook scaling back public content, users are seeing more organic content from people they know and less from brands. Organic reach will be more difficult to achieve, which means that brands have been shifting their Facebook strategies to focus more on paid efforts.

Facebook will prioritize organic posts that receive more engagement, so Pages that see little reaction or engagement may see the biggest impact from the algorithm update. Users may still prioritize who they see in their News Feed in their settings.

How brands and media can make the algorithm work them:

• Focus on engaging content, like video
• Post content that is valuable to your specific audience
• Post trustworthy content
• Make organic and paid media work together
• Localize your content

Transparency for political ads

Facebook recently announced a change to their political ad policies making it so advertisers will need to be authorized in order to publish electoral or issue ads. Additionally, Facebook will mark all political ads in the top left corner with the label “Political Ad.”

 

^{Image credit: Whyy.org}

The update aims to increase accountability and transparency for these types of advertisements, meaning Facebook wants you to know where these ads come from.

For an advertiser to be authorized, they will need to verify their identity and location.

RELATED: How to avoid having your ads associated with fake news

An increase in authenticity for Pages

Facebook has also cracked down on fake Pages, which has always been against their policy. Pages with large follower counts are now required to be verified on Facebook. Those that do not pass the verification step will be prohibited from posting.

Want to verify your Facebook Page? Learn how to here.

The decline of engagement bait

Facebook is beginning to frown upon engagement bait tactics. For example, if a post asks users to “like” or “comment” with the incentive to win something, Facebook will begin to limit the reach of that post.

Exceptions include posts promoting local issues like a missing person or important causes.

 

^{Image credit: PCMag.com}

A change to advertising tools

We can also expect a change to many of Facebook’s advertising tools throughout 2018. Brands should adapt as these changes roll out.

These updates include:

• Removal of some audience size data
• No more custom audience sizes
• Removal of partner data
• Apps using API now require approval
• Removal of call and SMS data targeting

How marketers can adapt: Some of these changes have not taken full effect yet, but will roll into the platform soon enough. Remain flexible as Facebook shifts some of its policies and tools and adjust strategies as needed. Advertising on Facebook is still just as lucrative, with many ad features remaining the same.

New features you need to know about

In addition to Facebook’s policy and ad updates, there are also many new features they have introduced for advertisers. In short, while it takes time to adjust, Facebook’s new features are a good thing for advertisers.

Here are the top features that have the most impact on results and cost:

Dynamic Creative: Facebook introduced a new way to A/B test your ads this year. Dynamic Creative lets you create a Facebook ad with multiple assets and Facebook’s algorithm will find the best performing creative combination.

Dynamic language optimization: No more ads with single languages. You can now deliver multilingual ads to your audiences by including up to six different language options for one ad.

Domain verification: Prior to this feature, Facebook didn’t allow you to edit your link previews. Thankfully, with the new domain verification, you can now edit your link previews as long as you’ve verified your domain ownership.

Multicity and multicountry features: You no longer are limited to selecting one city or country to target per ad. For example, if a single ad pertains to multiple cities, you can target all cities based on size.

Messenger Broadcast: Facebook has been testing a new self-serve tool for businesses to mass-message marketing messages to users.

Staying flexible in the Facebook universe

It’s expected that Facebook will always be changing. Whether it’s developing improvements for the platform or making big shifts in the algorithm, as a marketer, the best advice is to adapt to these changes and learn how new features will work for you. Slowly adjust your marketing tactics to stay on top of changes so that you’re set up for success on Facebook.

Whether you have some experience or are completely new to Facebook advertising, you may not realize the full benefits of incorporating Facebook Messenger ads into your marketing strategy.

The idea behind Facebook Messenger ads is to promote conversation with a brand, typically with goals to increase engagement, customer satisfaction and most importantly, increase conversions. More than 1.3 billion people use Facebook Messenger to connect with friends, family and their favorite companies every month. Facebook began rolling out Messenger ads in 2016, with the usage of mobile messaging apps having already surpassed standard network apps in 2015.

Facebook Messenger ads operate very similar to ads on Facebook, but the goal here is for brands to start conversations and keep them going. There are three advertising options available:

• Destination ads on the Newsfeed
• Messenger homepage ads
• Sponsored messages

The key differences

All brands have different business goals. Some ad types will serve goals better than others. Facebook designed each ad type to do the following:

Start a conversation

Messenger homepage ads and messenger destination ads fall in the same category. They’re both designed to prompt new conversation. Messenger destination ads, or rather click-to-messenger ads, are exactly as they sound. This ad type is similar to Newsfeed ads but with a “Message Now” call to action rather than “Shop Now” that would take you to a predetermined URL. In this case, when a user clicks the ad, they receive a message from the brand prompting conversation.

There are many avenues to take with destination ads. For example, you might explore the option of offering a coupon, but when someone clicks on the ad, they’re taken to Messenger with a chat bot or a pre-written message with more information about the discount.

Facebook Messenger ads also offer the capability to place display ads on the homepage of the mobile app, a similar display to the Newsfeed.

^{Image credit: AdEspresso by Hootsuite}

Re-engage customers

Facebook Messenger ads also allow sponsored messages. Unexpectedly, brands can send messages to users to encourage engagement. The catch? There are a couple. You can only send messages to customers who have sent you messages in the past, which is why this feature brings so much value to re-engagement. Lastly, the cost associated with these messages are based on impressions, not clicks.

Facebook Messenger ads offer a special kind of experience for your customers. Here’s why you should be using them in your social ad strategy:

Brand awareness: Like Newsfeed ads, you can expose your brand to a wider audience. More people are using the mobile Facebook Messenger app than Facebook on mobile.

Personalization: A major component of Messenger is to add a personal touch to the company. It’s a place where your potential and returning customers can ask questions, share feedback or even place orders. With ads directing users to Messenger, it encourages a sense of personalization to their experience, especially if the user is looking for something particular from your services.

Retargeting efforts: Whether you want to run a social retargeting campaign using messenger destination ads or send sponsored messages to users who may have communicated with you before, Facebook Messenger ads cater to getting in front of those who may just need that final push.

Related: Facebook advertising tips for success

Expand your Facebook expertise. Browse Strike Social’s blogs here:

Gathering info that can help determine things like the best time of day or day of the week to post content is one of the most compelling reasons to use Facebook’s Insights tool. If you’re running various social media campaigns, especially ones involving Facebook, it can also be a cost-effective way to plan your strategy.

As the name suggests, the Facebook Insights tool provides useful “insights” into your active users and how your pages are performing. And, if you’ve been struggling with ad targeting, you’ll definitely want to have a better understanding of the insights tool.

Are you ready to get better insights to inspire your future campaigns? Learn more about the features available on the Facebook Insights tool and how to use them to your next campaign’s benefit.

Accessing your page’s stats with Facebook Insights

Digital ad expenditure on Facebook is expected to be nearly $16.33 billion for 2017. If you’re trying to reach the right consumers for your products and services via this platform or boost conversions with your ads, you’ll get a better return on ad spend (ROAS) with instant access to useful stats.

To access your fan page stats on Facebook, go to your fan page and, from the horizontal menu at the top of the page, click on “Insights.”

^{Image credit: Facebook Insights}

Here is an example of the insights you can access on this page, with explanations below:

^{Image credit: Facebook Insights}

Page summary — Displays stats that can be analyzed and compiled according to “today,” “yesterday,” the “last 7 days” or “last 28 days.”

Actions on page — Did someone click on your website or on your phone number? Actions also include clicking on any CTA’s present on your page or accessing the directions link.

Page views — How many people viewed your fan page.

Page likes — Shows whether or not your followers have increased or decreased, plus details where and when your likes occurred. You can use this insight to help determine the best time to post content.

Page reach — The “reach” tab on the Insights tool will let you know if your intended audience is actually seeing your content. This section will show your page views, including the number of unique views you’re getting. Unique views are visitors who actually searched for you rather than clicking on a Facebook ad.

Page engagement —Shows you when your fans are online and the success of different types of posts based on reach and engagement. You can even compare your page’s results with a page similar to yours to glean what is working on a global basis.

Videos —If you’ve uploaded a video, you can analyze video metrics according to the number of views, number of 10-second views and your top videos for the week.

Your 5 most recent posts stats

Below the page summary, you’ll see information about the virality of your posts. This is a breakdown of your posts based on type. You can look at data for all posts or get specific to see how much engagement you’re getting from posts with videos, photos, posts and even the questions you’re presenting to your audience. Such info can be used to determine what type of social content is likely to encourage further engagement with your brand beyond the traffic your ads generate.

^{Image credit: Facebook Insights}

Pages to watch

Whether it’s a competitor or a source of inspiration, you can add five or more pages for comparative purposes. With this feature, you will see several metrics relating to your competition’s Facebook activity, including the number of posts by page admins, number of fan interactions and top performing posts across all watched pages.

^{Image credit: Facebook Insights}

Exporting your data into Excel format

If it’s easier for you to view your data in Excel format, click the top right button on the Insights page to view your stats this way. Get results by date by selecting “Page Level Data” and selecting your preferred date range. This is useful if you want to track content performance over select periods of time.

^{Image credit: Facebook Insights}

Conclusion

More than 70% of male internet users and 80% of women internet users regularly visit Facebook. Marketing to such a large audience via Facebook is only effective if you narrow your focus. Facebook’s page Insights tool allows you to learn more about your content’s performance and your Facebook audience’s habits, yielding a macro understanding of page results.

Interested in learning more about Facebook? Read: Know your options: all the types of Facebook ads

You’ve checked and rechecked your punctuation and your grammar. You’ve read it backward and forward. It’s perfect. Time to make your masterpiece public.

But wait! Before you hit publish, have you considered how to boost your blog’s performance on Facebook? The quickest way to reach out to your internet audience is through social media. You can do this either organically or through paid advertising. Both have their merits, but if you are trying to accrue a following, it’s to your benefit to at least look into some of Facebook’s paid advertising offers.

Paid advertising allows you to directly target your intended audience, get your updates seen and drive traffic to your blog site.

Increase Blog Traffic with Facebook Ads and Boosted Posts

There are two paths from which to choose: Boosted Posts and Facebook Ads.

Boosted posts

Boosted Posts are an effective way to reach people who have already liked your page and to acquire new followers. A boosted post appears in the user’s newsfeed and can take several forms — status updates, blog posts, videos and events.

You can boost a post when you create it or anytime after it’s been published. Many people choose to boost a post after it has gained traction organically and outperforms other posts made by you. With a Boosted Post, you pay for the engagement on the post (likes, comments, shares, etc.)

Boosted posts are given priority over other posts, appearing higher on the feed for increased user discovery. Posts are boosted directly from your Facebook page. First, find the post you want to promote and then select the “boost post” button (directly below and to the right of the post.)

Next, determine who should see your post. You have several targeting options when boosting a post: people who like your page, people who like your page and their friends or people you select through targeting.

Let’s break down each option:

• People who like your page: many businesses did a poor job of initially attracting high-quality page likes. We tag our friends, many of whom have no idea what the page is about, and ask them to “like” our page. Our friends like the page because they ‘like’ us, not our product. Save your money for people who are really interested in your content.
• People who like your page and their friends: As with option No. 1, this choice is also best skipped as friends of your friends probably find your content irrelevant too.
• People you select through targeting: The targeting option lets you select the type of people you want to reach based on their location, age, gender and up to 10 interests. Your custom audience can be saved for future use or you can redefine your parameters next time you boost. This option is the best value for your money.

Facebook offers several options for both payment and boost run. As shown by the below screenshot, Facebook recommends spending an average of $30 but the amount paid can be as little as $10. However, a lower budget means fewer people are likely to see it. You also have the option to define your own budget. To learn more about your budget options, visit Facebook’s business page to know more about setting a budget and your payment options.

Once you have chosen your budget, you will need to choose a run time for your campaign. Boosted posts can run anywhere from one to fourteen days, or you can set a custom end date for your campaign. Facebook sums up your budget and duration decisions for you, plus an estimate of the post’s estimated reach. Take the time to experiment with different payment levels and run time to learn how each choice affects post reach. Then, select the terms which make the most sense for your budget and campaign goals.

Facebook ads

Facebook Ads are considerably different from a boosted post. First, where Boosted Posts take the form of Facebook content and live in the user’s newsfeed, Facebook Ads offer several placement options, such as Desktop and Mobile Feed, Right Column, Instant Articles, In-Stream Video, Instagram and Audience Networks. With Facebook Ads, you choose whether to run your ads across all of the eligible placements or to manually select ad placement during your ad set-up.

Additionally, Facebook Ads allow for specific targeting on a granular level and offers several marketing tools to help you meet your business objectives.

For blog promotion, we recommend Facebook’s Link ads format to direct interested users to your chosen content. The entire ad is clickable, so it doesn’t matter whether the user clicks on the text or the image; they will be taken to your web page.

Once you have selected “link ads,” you are directed to the first of three set-up pages, the Campaign. On this page, you can choose from several marketing objectives, such as awareness, consideration or conversion. For blog clicks, select “send people to a destination on or off Facebook.”

When someone clicks on your ad, they will be taken to the destination of your choice, which for this objective should be the content of your blog post.

Once you have selected your marketing objective, you will be taken to “ad set” to define your audience, set your budget and determine ad delivery schedule.

Want to know more? View the types of Facebook ads.

Define audience

For this step, you need to either create a new audience or use a previously saved one. To create a new audience, first complete the basic demographics, age, gender, language and location.

The next step is to define your ad placement.

Facebook recommends automatic placement, as they believe this allows them to get you the best results at the lowest price. You can choose to remove placements, but it depends on your blog content–choose the placement that best fits your topic.

Finally, you need to set your budget and schedule. Facebook sets a minimum budget according to whether you’re using automatic or manual bidding. According to Facebook’s Ads Manager, the minimum for ads set in U.S. dollars is:

• For impression ad sets, the daily budget must be at least $1 a day
• For click ad sets, the daily budget must be at least $5 a day
• For event ad sets like offer claims or app installs, the daily budget must be at least $40 a day

Advanced options reveal the following choices: optimization for ad delivery (link clicks or impressions), automatic or manual bidding, when you get charged (CPC or per impression), to run ads all the time or on a schedule, and either a standard or accelerated delivery schedule.

Finally, you can choose your ad format and select your links and related Facebook page. To learn more about Facebook ad options, read the article Know your options: all the types of Facebook ads and Facebook Ads Manager.

Putting it all together

As you can see, Facebook Ads Manager offers more opportunities to customize and optimize your ad set over Boosted Posts. Choose your advertising format based on your budget, objectives and level of expertise. If this is your first time advertising on Facebook, you can always decide to ease into the platform to see how it all flows together. Whatever you decide, don’t be afraid to put yourself and your blog post out there; it’s the only way to grow both yourself and your following.

Ready to get started? View the options for Facebook ad sizes.

Representing 66 percent of all social media advertising spend, Facebook is undeniably important. And for brands that get it right, the return on investment can be substantial.

Like most advertisers, you’re probably sold on Facebook advertising as well. You know your goals. You’ve set your strategy. In short, you’ve completed all the groundwork for a successful ad campaign. Now it’s time to go shopping.

So which media format is best to convey your brand’s message, and where should your creative be placed? This primer on all the different types of Facebook ads will walk you through everything you need to know to strike the perfect match.

Dive deeper into the types of Facebook ads: The complete list of Facebook ad sizes

Placement options for Facebook ads

When it comes to placing your advertising on Facebook, you have three main options: the desktop right column, the desktop news feed and the mobile news feed. These types of Facebook ads are pretty easy to understand based on name, but it’s important to realize that some adjustments will need to be made to optimize your creative from format to format.

Desktop right column

The desktop right column is really just that: the column on the right-hand side of Facebook’s news feed (no tricks, we promise). Just be mindful that the smaller format requires some tweaks to what you might also be running in the main feed on desktop. Also, know that the right-hand column does not appear on mobile.

Desktop news feed

Facebook’s desktop news feed is what people see when they log into the site on — you guessed it — a desktop or laptop computer. This larger format allows for greater flexibility with your advertising.

Mobile news feed

The mobile news feed is what people see when they fire up Facebook on a smartphone. As is the case with most websites, Facebook optimizes its news feed for this tighter space. So take note when you assemble your ad: Make sure your creative is still readable and impactful. Also, consider how people might interact differently with video when they’re on the go.

 ^{Image credit: Facebook}

Types of Facebook ads

Now that you know where your ad campaign might appear on Facebook, consider your options for media format. Do you want to advertise with images, video or one of the other unique types of Facebook ads? Here are the many formats available for your creative.

Advertising with images on Facebook

The most familiar of all the types of Facebook ads, display has been an internet staple long before social was even a twinkle in Mark Zuckerberg’s eye.

 ^{Image credit: Facebook}

Why images?

A picture is worth a thousand words. Give people a snapshot of your brand, product or service — something that will make a lasting impact. Images serve as an emotional pathway, connecting conscious thoughts with unconscious desire.

Available for

• Desktop right column
• Desktop news feed
• Mobile news feed

How to create a Facebook image ad

1. Go to Facebook’s Ads Manager.
2. Choose your campaign objective.
3. Define your audience, budget and schedule.
4. Advance to step 3; select media, text and links to create one or multiple ads.
5. Select “single image.”
6. Select a stock photo, or upload your own.
7. Use the cropping tool to shape your ad to your specifications.
8. Review ad.
9. Place order.

Advertising with video on Facebook

If a picture is worth a thousand words, consider the exponential effect you can have frame by frame. That’s why video is quickly eclipsing display as the ad format de jour.

^{Image credit: Facebook}

Why video?

Video has exploded, with 90 percent of people saying that watching a product video aided in their decision-making process. Videos afford advertisers the opportunity to explain, entertain or gain loyal brand followers. When expertly executed, video also breaks down difficult concepts. Of course, you can’t go wrong with making your ad entertaining — in fact, comedy comprises 39 percent of online video consumption.

Available for

• Desktop right column
• Desktop news feed
• Mobile news feed

How to create a Facebook video ad

1. Go to Facebook’s Ads Manager.
2. Choose your campaign objective.
3. Define your audience, budget and schedule.
4. Advance to step 3; select media, text and links to create one or multiple ads.
5. Select “single video.”
6. Upload your video.
7. Review order.
8. Place order.

Tip: Facebook only supports certain types of video files. Make sure your video complies with Facebook’s ad guidelines.

Advertising with Canvas on Facebook

Introduced by Facebook in 2016 (and coming soon to Instagram), Canvas is a mobile-optimized media option that offers a full-screen experience with images, videos, links and text. Because these totally immersive ads live exclusively on Facebook, you can worry less about bounce rate. The only caveat is that the content must also be original to Facebook.

^{Image credit: Facebook}

Why Canvas?

Canvas ads are popular with retail advertisers, because the format allows for rich, glossy layouts akin to a magazine. The full-screen aspect can bring brands to life through compelling storytelling.

Available for

• Mobile news feed

How to create a Facebook Canvas ad

1. Go to Facebook’s Ads Manager.
2. Click “create ad.”
3. Choose the “clicks to website” objective.
4. Define your audience, budget and schedule.
5. Advance to step 3; select media, text and links to create one or multiple ads.
6. At the ad set level, select “edit placements” and then “mobile only.”
7. Choose “Canvas” for your ad level destination.
8. Add a previous Canvas doc or select the + button, next to the text field, to open Canvas Builder.
9. When in Canvas Builder, select a theme, header, photo and button.
10. Choose how you want your Canvas photo to fit on a mobile screen.
11. Choose a font, color and a destination URL for your button.
12. Click “add component” to add text blocks, buttons and photos.
13. Use the right side of Canvas Builder to preview your creation and ensure Canvas quality.
14. Arrange the order of your Canvas components.
15. Click “save” at the top.
16. Close Canvas Builder.
17. Choose your headline and text. This will appear with your ad on mobile.
18. Review ad.
19. To complete ad, click the green “place order” button.

For more on the Canvas ad creation process, visit Facebook’s help center.

Advertising with Carousel on Facebook

With Facebook’s Carousel format, you can add up to 10 pictures/videos, headlines/links or calls to action in a single ad placement. People can view all these assets by swiping left to right on mobile or clicking through on desktop.

^{Image credit: Facebook}

Why Carousel?

Carousel ads are great for showcasing different items in a product line or specific product details. Carousel ads can also tell a more complete brand story as people swipe through each card. Other creative uses include mobile app tours and telling a customer’s story.

Available for

• Desktop right column
• Desktop news feed
• Mobile news feed

How to create a Facebook Carousel ad

1. Go to Facebook’s Ads Manager.
2. Click “create ad.”
3. Choose from one of the following campaign objectives: “send people to your website,” “increase conversions on your website,” “get video views” or “get installs of your app.”
4. From the ad format section, select “multiple images from one ad,” located at the top of the page.
5. Go to images and links. Uncheck the box labeled “automatically show the best performing images and links first” if you like the order of your images. Leave the box checked if you want Facebook to automatically sort your images (note: you may have to select “show advanced options” to see this box).
6. Go to “images and links.”
7. Select the “1” box, upload your first image and complete the details of the first card. Specific URLs and descriptions can be added in this step.
8. Repeat the above step with additional images, descriptions and specific URLs.
9. Click “remove” to delete an uploaded image.
10. Satisfied with your Carousel ad? Click “place order.”

Advertising with Collection on Facebook

Launched in March 2017, Facebook designed Collection to get people shopping! A mobile news feed format, Collection helps people find and buy products shown in a marketer’s video, slideshow or image. The ad format displays a row of 4 product images that expand into a full-screen catalog of up to 50 product images.

Tapping on a product image takes a user to the mobile site or apps product page.

To get started you will need an image or video and you will need to create a product catalog.

^{Image credit: TechCrunch}

Available for

• Mobile news feed

How to create a Facebook Collection ad

1. Go to Facebook’s Ads Manager.
2. Click “create ad.”
3. Select “traffic” or “conversions” from the ad objective menu and click “continue.”
4. Select “website,” “messenger” or “app.” If you’re using an app, Facebook recommends that you link people directly to your products within your app.
5. Choose your audience, budget and schedule.
6. Click “continue.”
7. Select the Collection format.
8. Select an image, video, or slideshow. For video, 1:1 or 16:9 aspect ratios are recommended. For images, an image size of 1,200 x 628 pixels is recommended.
9. Choose your Facebook Page, a headline (25 characters recommended) and text (90 characters recommended).
10. Select your product catalog from the drop-down menu.
11. Select your product set, or click + to create a new product set. Facebook recommends that your product set contains all products relevant to your main image, slideshow or video. The more products there are in your product set, the better the ad is likely to perform. The minimum number of products is 8.
12. Select “mobile news feed” under ad preview to see your collection format ad.
13. Note: Because this feature is mobile only, you may see a pop-up window asking you to remove all non-mobile placements. Click “remove placements.”
14. The products featured in the news feed section let you control the 4 product images below your video, slideshow or image. By default, the 4 images will be ranked by the likelihood of purchase.
15. Click “change” to select 1 – 4 specific images from your product set. The product images you select won’t be ranked by likelihood of purchase.
16. Select “preview” below “post click experience” to see what the ad would look like after people tap on it.
17. Select “send notification to Facebook” to send your collection format ad to your mobile using the Facebook app.
18. Click “place order” to finish.

You know the types of Facebook ads. Now find the perfect fit.

Now that you know all the types of Facebook ads, you have a lot of flexibility. Consider which placement and media option makes the most sense for your brand while testing the waters to take your creative in new directions. From simple images to custom Canvases, you will be cornering the Facebook market in no time.

Drive More Conversions This Father’s Day with Meta Advantage+ Audience Targeting

Father’s Day follows closely on the heels of Mother’s Day, giving brands another high-impact opportunity to connect with shoppers honoring the dads and father figures in their lives. For marketers, Father’s Day advertising on platforms like Facebook and Instagram comes with both potential and pressure, as holiday periods often bring increased competition and fluctuating ad costs.

In this guide, we’ll show you how to unlock better performance and cost efficiency using Meta’s Advantage+ audience targeting. Learn how your Father’s Day campaign can reach high-intent target audiences across Facebook and Instagram ads when it matters most.

Why Father’s Day Is a Key Moment for Meta Advertisers

Advertising for Father’s Day presents a valuable opportunity for brands, with 63% of U.S. consumers planning to celebrate. While that’s relatively steady compared to other holidays, 36% of those shoppers will be searching for Father’s Day gifts online, making it a critical moment for Meta advertisers to capture demand.

And while 40–42% of shoppers still plan to visit physical stores, Meta’s extensive platform reach allows your Father’s Day ad to shape purchase decisions long before shoppers step into a store or complete their online checkout.

Meta Ad Cost and Performance Trends Around Father’s Day Advertising Periods

As seen above, the bulk of the purchases occur just before or within June. Do you need to launch early or just in time for shoppers’ searches for Father’s Day gifts? Our Meta ads data tells us the trends for different funnel stages when planning your Father’s Day campaigns.

Planning Your Awareness Campaigns

Running awareness-focused Meta campaigns in April through early May helps build momentum while CPMs remain relatively stable. Facebook typically sees rising awareness costs about a month out from the holiday, while Instagram maintains stronger traction even closer to the date.

Expect the highest CPM spikes in the week leading up to Father’s Day, especially as more brands compete for the same target audiences. After the holiday, CPMs drop, opening up cost-efficient opportunities for re-engagement and early back-to-school promotions.

Immersive Engagement Campaigns

Consideration campaigns also see an early ramp-up, with CPE (cost per engagement) peaking in April and gradually normalizing by Father’s Day week. On Facebook, engagement becomes much more cost-effective during the holiday itself, showing a 65.2% decrease in CPE, suggesting it’s the best time to run interaction-based Father’s Day ad campaigns.

While slightly more volatile in April and May, Instagram maintains consistent engagement costs throughout the shopping window, making it a strong choice for Father’s Day engagement campaigns.

Lead to Conversion with Clicks Campaigns

For click-based objectives, Facebook and Instagram ads tend to become more competitive immediately after Father’s Day. This surge often reflects a mix of advertisers aiming to re-engage audiences, offload leftover inventory, or kickstart early summer promotions. Those who activated summer and 4th of July campaigns earlier tend to benefit from more efficient clicks before the spike hits.

CPCs (cost per click) remain predictable but are higher during this window. If you’re planning your Father’s Day promotion ideas, it’s best to launch conversion-focused ads earlier to beat the spike. Facebook ad costs are more stable here, while Instagram may need tighter pacing and creative testing to maintain efficiency.

Recommended Strategy for Father’s Day Meta Ads

What’s the suggested strategy, considering these Meta ad performance trends during the months before and well within the Father’s Day weekend?

How Advantage+ Audience Supports Your Father’s Day Advertising Strategy

Now that your Father’s Day advertising funnel is in place, how does Meta Advantage+ Audience fit in the equation?

Built with advanced machine learning, Advantage+ Audience analyzes patterns in user behavior across Facebook and Instagram, identifying people most likely to engage, click, or convert, even if they fall outside your original target audiences. This allows your Father’s Day ad campaign to go beyond your set parameters and reach high-value prospects you may have overlooked.

Setting your audience targeting helps ensure that your Father’s Day ads are delivered to people who match your intended demographics and interests. While this can create precision, it can also unintentionally limit your reach by excluding audience segments that may still be strong prospects or potential buyers. What you initially believe isn’t your ideal audience could end up driving valuable results.

That’s where Meta Advantage+ Audience becomes a powerful tool in your Father’s Day advertising toolkit. It analyzes behavioral signals across Meta platforms, such as who’s clicking, engaging, or converting, and uses those patterns to expand your reach beyond the audience you originally set. Your defined targeting will still be prioritized, but Advantage+ dynamically extends delivery to users who mirror high-performing behaviors.

Here’s how this enhances your Father’s Day 2025 campaigns:

• The system automatically shifts budget and impressions toward audiences that perform better, ensuring your ads are always optimized for the highest likelihood of clicks and conversions.
• Advantage+ can adapt rapidly: if a particular creative or audience segment underperforms, the AI reallocates resources to what’s working best, often in real time.
• Meta’s data proves the Advantage+ Audience system can drive measurable efficiencies at every stage of the funnel, especially for time-sensitive, event-based strategies such as holiday campaigns:
  • Awareness campaigns: Achieve up to 14.8% lower cost per result
  • Traffic, engagement, and lead campaigns: Up to 9.7% lower cost per result
  • Sales and app promotion campaigns: Up to 7.2% lower cost per result

Meta Advantage+ Audience targeting proves to be a powerful ally for Father’s Day advertising campaigns looking to drive more awareness, clicks, and conversions under a tight timeline. Its AI-driven approach is perfectly suited for high-velocity, event-based campaigns that demand both speed and precision in reaching the best possible audience.

How to Set Up Meta Advantage+ Audience Targeting for Father’s Day Campaigns

You’ve defined your strategy—now it’s time to put it into action. Setting up your Father’s Day campaign using Meta Advantage+ Audience requires a balance: giving Meta’s AI the freedom to optimize while still keeping the right level of control over your brand’s audience and objectives.

Follow this step-by-step guide to set up a Meta campaign that blends automation with smart targeting:

1. Go to adsmanager.facebook.com and click +Create to begin your campaign setup.
2. Select the most relevant campaign objective for your Father’s Day campaign.
   * For Sales, Leads, or App Promotion, Meta will automatically enable all Advantage+ features.
3. Continue with your campaign level set up. At this stage, you can turn on Advantage+ campaign budget or turn it off for manual budget control.
4. Configure the ad set level.
   • Proceed with the usual setup (Ad set name, Budget & schedule, etc.).
   • For the audience targeting, take a closer look at the following steps:
     • Audience controls: Define your target Location, Age range, and add any Custom Audiences you want to exclude.
     • Advantage+ audience: This feature is automatically enabled. To maintain some level of targeting control:
       • Click on Audience Suggestion.
       • Add additional parameters (age, interests, behaviors, demographics) to help guide Meta’s expansion.
       • This allows Meta to prioritize your preferred segments while still finding high-converting lookalike audiences.
     • Tip: Watch the “Estimated Daily Results” on the right side of your screen as you build your audience. This helps ensure you’re not over-narrowing or over-broadening the reach.
   • If you want specific Meta ad placements, click Edit under Advantage+ Placements and choose Manual Placements. Otherwise, leave the default setting to allow Meta to optimize across all available placements automatically.
5. At the ad level, complete your setup. Name your ad, link your Facebook Page, and upload your ad creative and format.
6. Double-check the full setup of your Father’s Day advertising campaign, then hit Publish.

Simplify Your Father’s Day Campaign Strategy With Advantage+

Every peak season demands a fresh approach, and Father’s Day is no exception. With Meta’s evolving AI capabilities, setting up a campaign has become more streamlined, but success still depends on maintaining the right level of control over performance and costs.

While Advantage+ automation can drive efficient results, it’s crucial to stay proactive. Monitoring changes, making timely adjustments, and applying human insight remain key to maximizing ad costs and performance. To see how Strike Social can help you find the right balance between automation and control, contact us for a personalized walkthrough. 

How Can Brands Effectively Market to Gen Z on Social Media?

Generation Z has set the tone for online culture, brand engagement, and the future of marketing itself. As true ‘digital natives’, Gen Z is the first age group to grow up entirely in the era of smartphones, social platforms, and constant connectivity.

With Gen Z now making up 27% of the global workforce, and even more already influencing household purchase decisions, marketing to Gen Z is no longer optional for brands that want to stay relevant. Performance-driven brands must understand the behaviors, values, and media habits that define the Gen Z demographic to drive long-term growth across social platforms.

Understanding the Generation Z Market

To build effective Gen Z marketing strategies, brands must first recognize how different this generation is from others. What resonates with Millennials may fall flat with Gen Z. Marketing to Gen Z requires more than recycled tactics; it demands a deep understanding of their digital behaviors.

What Is the Gen Z Age Range?

Generation Z typically includes individuals born between 1997 and 2012, placing the Gen Z age range between 13 and 28 as of 2025.

This wide age range introduces a unique challenge for advertisers: targeting an audience that includes minors as well as working professionals.

While some Gen Zers have full-time jobs and growing families, others are still in school and have limited purchasing power. Yet even students and younger teens wield influence, especially in digital spaces, making them a key part of the Gen Z demographic that brands should not ignore.

Advertising to Gen Z can be both nuanced and rewarding for brands willing to tailor their approach based on the generation’s diverse stages of life and digital expectations.

Marketing to Gen Z vs Millennials

When marketing to Gen Z vs Millennials, it’s important to recognize where these two generations overlap and differ. While they’re often grouped together in digital strategies, each age group has distinct preferences, behaviors, and expectations that affect how they engage with brands.

Purchase Behavior

Gen Zers are becoming increasingly aware of personal finance, with interest in this topic rising four points from 2018 to 2024. However, despite this growing financial literacy, 41% of Generation Z still identify as impulse buyers, suggesting they respond well to bottom-funnel strategies like limited-time offers and high-impact direct response ads.

On the other hand, millennials follow closely behind in impulse purchases at 34% but require more nurturing through the funnel. Research shows that 60% of millennials only purchase when convinced of the product’s value, making top and mid-funnel messaging essential for conversion.

Social Media Usage

While data for users under 18 is often restricted due to privacy policies, we can compare Gen Z and Millennials’ platform usage among those 18 and older:

Snapchat stands out for its strong hold on younger audiences, reaching 90% of the Gen Z demographic, including users aged 13–17. Despite the high percentage of minors on the platform, Snapchat estimates the buying power of Gen Zers on its platform to be $44 billion. Its interactive and creator-first design makes it highly effective for Gen Z advertising.

In contrast, platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube see heavier millennial usage. TikTok remains competitive across both groups but edges out slightly among millennials in volume, likely due to wider age inclusivity in reported data. Still, TikTok’s short-form, creator-driven model aligns closely with Gen Z marketing strategies.

Content Consumption

Both generations rely on social media to stay informed: 77% of Gen Z and 67% of millennials use social platforms to keep up with current events. 

What sets Gen Z apart is how they consume brand content through creators and influencers. Influencer marketing holds strong across both demographics: 70% of millennials in the U.S. follow at least one influencer. As for Gen Z, influencer-led discovery often drives purchase intent and brand recall more directly.

By getting to know the Generation Z demographic better, brands can fine-tune campaigns that speak more directly to each generation’s mindset and behavior.

Marketing to Gen Z on Social Media

Generation Z is the most digitally connected generation, and social media is where they discover, engage, and reach brands. If you want to succeed in marketing to Gen Z, you need to meet them on their platforms, and on their terms. That means understanding not only where they spend their time, but also how they use each platform differently.

How Do Gen Z Use Social Media?

To effectively market to Gen Z, brands must start with platform selection. Knowing where your Gen Z audience is most active helps you prioritize your media buying and content strategy. And for this generation, short-form, visual-first content is king.

According to Sprout Social, here’s how many Gen Z users say they use at least one account on each major platform:

Why Is Social Media Marketing the Most Effective Channel for Gen Z?

It’s no secret that social media is at the frontline when it comes to marketing to Gen Z. This generation isn’t passively scrolling; they’re engaging and buying directly on their favorite platforms. Here’s why social media remains the most powerful channel for Generation Z marketing strategies:

To market to Gen Z effectively, brands must go beyond ads and adopt a social-first strategy that blends creator partnerships, trend-driven content, and community-driven discovery. Social media is not just a channel for Gen Z: it’s where they discover, evaluate, and buy, making it the most powerful touchpoint for this generation.

Advertising to Gen Z in Paid Social

Now that you know where and how Gen Z engages on social media, the next step is crafting a paid advertising strategy tailored to their age group and platform behavior. However, marketing to Gen Z, especially younger teens, comes with unique limitations that you must account for in your campaign planning.

Limitations with Advertising to Gen Z Audiences

All major platforms heavily regulate advertising to users under 18 due to global privacy laws and platform-specific policies. These restrictions impact how you can target and what content you can show to Gen Z, especially those between the ages of 13 and 17.

For example, in regions like the EU, EEA, and Switzerland, ads typically cannot be shown to users under 18 at all. In other markets, ad targeting for this group is often limited to broad demographic categories, with no access to personalized targeting.

Gen Z users aged 18–24, however, are fully eligible for personalized ad targeting, making them a key segment for performance-driven campaigns.

Because of stricter restrictions on Facebook and Google, TikTok and Snapchat have become go-to platforms for reaching Gen Z teens aged 13–17. They still have limitations, but offer more advertising flexibility for younger age groups.

Snapchat actively promotes its platform as suitable for ages 13 and up. The app offers more flexibility in targeting younger Gen Z audiences, though it is still highly dependent on country-specific regulations and content categories.

Here’s how Snapchat manages age-based restrictions across different regions:

Workarounds & Strategy

Despite strict limitations on targeting Gen Zs, effective strategies still exist to reach this influential audience. Gen Z represents a major share of social media activity, and while direct targeting is restricted, there are smart workarounds to get your brand noticed and drive meaningful engagement.

Broad Targeting

TikTok’s user base includes a large share of teens, with approximately 25% of all users 20. Thus, even with restrictions, brands can still reach younger Gen Z users using broad targeting. This includes options like location, language, device type, and search keywords (U.S. only).

Snapchat offers even more flexibility. Although general ad targeting is often set to 18+, platforms like Snapchat allow you to refine by:

• Placement
• Age
• Language
• Location
• Device details (OS, carrier, phone model)

Creator and Influencer Collaborations

Influencer marketing continues to be one of the most effective ways to reach Gen Z. Partnering with creators for branded content, sponsored posts, or hashtag challenges allows you to circumvent ad targeting limitations while still resonating with Gen Z’s values. These collaborations feel more authentic and peer-led and are more likely to earn Gen Z’s trust and attention.

Using Effective Ad Formats on Meta and YouTube

Even though Facebook and YouTube advertising restrict targeting for users under 18, Gen Z adults (18–24) remain fully targetable. These platforms still offer effective ways to reach Gen Z through high-performing ad placements.

Here’s a quick look at top-performing Meta placements for click-focused campaigns:

On YouTube, Shorts are especially effective with Gen Z, offering up to 15.9% engagement rates when paired with influencer content. These short-form videos align with Gen Z’s media habits and offer a prime format for brand engagement.

Successfully advertising to Gen Z requires more than just checking the right targeting boxes: it demands an adaptive strategy, constant optimization, and content that speaks their language. For in-house teams, this can be a resource-heavy lift.

Partnering with an expert ad agency can help you gain an advantage over competitors in effectively marketing to Generation Z. Request a personalized walkthrough from our team and learn how marketing to Gen Z audiences can be made easier.

Turning Gen Z Attention into Brand Loyalty 

You may think marketing to Gen Z simply means following the latest trends, but it’s also about understanding a generation that values authenticity, creativity, and community. While they may be digital natives, Gen Z is also highly selective about the brands they engage with, making trust and genuine connection more important than ever.

Their behavior online is shaped by a deep awareness of digital culture and a clear expectation for transparency. Brands that embrace this mindset by delivering real value, relatable content, and inclusive messaging are more likely to earn recognition and recall from Gen Z audiences.

As social platforms evolve, so will Gen Z’s expectations. Capturing their attention is just the beginning: building trust and growing with them is how you turn that attention into lasting brand loyalty.

This post was updated in May 2025 to provide you with the latest information.

Optimizing your YouTube ads means tailoring content to align with viewer preferences—whether they’re watching on desktop or mobile. Understanding the right YouTube ad specs, sizes, and dimensions ensures your creatives are displayed correctly and viewed exactly as intended.

Successful YouTube advertising isn’t just about performance metrics; it’s about how your audience perceives and interacts with your video ads on the platform.

We’ve outlined the YouTube ad specifications below to help you with your 2025 YouTube advertising.

Types of YouTube Ads, Sizes, and Specifications

Overlay ads

As of April 6, 2023, Overlay ads have been discontinued in YouTube. Active overlay ads will only appear on desktop view as YouTube Creators shift to newer ad formats for YouTube advertising.

Think of discovery ads as an online billboards of sorts. These are generally static images or have very minimal movement and animation to them. According to the YouTube ad specifications, they appear either to the side of the video or as an overlay on the bottom of the video. They’re good to include in your YouTube advertising mix because they’re less expensive than other ad forms like those that appear before or during videos.

Since they don’t directly interfere with user activity on the site, users might also respond better to their presence. A potential drawback could be that some users have a tendency to tune out these kinds of ads, but a truly great ad can break through the clutter. Whatever size or format you choose is up to you, just make sure that the content is optimized for the ad format and that there is a clear call-to-action for your YouTube audiences to respond to.

Sponsored cards

YouTube Sponsored cards have also been discontinued, as part of an ongoing effort to streamline the viewing experience and shift towards different video advertising formats.

In that sense, a sponsored card ad is similar to display ads except where it’s located and how it functions differs slightly. The commonality among them is the ever critical call-to-action.

Bumper ads

Ad placements

• YouTube videos, video partner sites, and apps within the Google Display Network

A bumper ad is a non-skippable video ad format created to extend the reach of a campaign. It appears before the video the user has chosen to view. Sold on a CPM basis, Bumper ads perform well on both Connected TV and mobile devices. In alignment with the 2025 YouTube ad specs, the maximum video length for bumper ads is 6 seconds.

Standard display ads

Ad placements

• Google Display Networks, Gmail, YouTube Home Feed and YouTube In-Feed

Demand Gen (formerly Video Action Campaigns)

YouTube advertising goes beyond awareness, helping brands move audiences down the funnel to drive engagement and conversions through video ads and product shopping ads. Video Action Campaigns (VAC) have been pivotal in achieving these goals.

VAC has now transitioned to Demand Gen, enhancing its capabilities to expand its reach while maintaining the performance and results that brands rely on. This evolution offers advertisers an opportunity to tap into broader audience segments without compromising on the effectiveness of their campaigns.

Image ad settings

• Images: Up to 15 images
• File format: JPG, PNG, or static GIF
• Business name: ≤25 characters
• Headlines: ≤40 characters; can add up to 5
• Description: ≤90 characters; can add up to 5
• Resolution: 1920 x 1080px (horizontal); 1080 x 1920px (vertical); 1080 x 1080px (square)
  • Minimum px for Standard HD: 1280 x 720px (horizontal); 720 x 1280px (vertical); 480 x 480px (square)
• Maximum file size: ≤ 5MB

Video ad settings

• Videos: Up to 5 videos
• Business name: ≤25 characters
• Headlines: ≤40 characters; can add up to 5
• Long headline: ≤90 characters; can add up to 5
• Description: ≤90 characters; can add up to 5
• File format: .MPG (MPEG-2 or MPEG-4)
  • .WMV, .AVI, .MOV and .FLV .MPEG-1, .MP4, .MPEGPS, 3GPP, WebM, DNxHR, ProRes, CineForm & HEVC (h265)
• Resolution: 1920 x 1080px (horizontal); 1080 x 1920px (vertical); 1080 x 1080px (square)
  • Minimum px for Standard HD: 1280 x 720px (horizontal); 720 x 1280px (vertical); 480 x 480px (square)
• Frame rate: 30 FPS
• Aspect ratio: 16:9 for horizontal; 9:16 for vertical; 1:1 for square
• Maximum file size: ≤ 256GB

Carousel ad settings

• Images: Up to 10 image cards
• Business name: ≤25 characters
• Headlines: ≤40 characters; 1 per card; 1 headline for the full carousel
• Description: ≤90 characters

In-stream non-skippable ads

These YouTube ad formats play while viewing the video content and last up to 15 seconds or shorter. Non-skippable video ads appear before the selected video and much be watched in its entirety before the video can be viewed.

Ad placements

• Where they appear: Appear before, during, or after YouTube videos
  • Also served across video partner sites and apps within the Google Display Network (GDN) (unless excluded in campaign settings)

In-stream skippable ads

Skippable video ads allow viewers to skip ads after 5 seconds and move on to their viewing selection.

Ad placements

• Where they appear: Ads are served before, during, or after YouTube videos
  • Across video partner sites and apps within the Google Display Network (GDN) (unless excluded in campaign settings)

Video View Campaign Skippable in-stream

Video View Campaign In-feed

Assets overview

• Video URL: Must be uploaded to YouTube
• Final URL: Landing page users are directed to after clicking the ad
• Display URL: Up to 2 customizable paths (15 characters each)
• Long headline: ≤90 characters
• Description: ≤90 characters

Video View Campaign in YouTube Shorts placement

As YouTube Shorts emerges as a standalone vertical video feed, Video View Campaigns capitalize on this placement to drive more engaged views. At Strike Social, YouTube Shorts has proven highly effective, with one of our standout campaigns attributing 43% of its total ad views to Shorts placements alone.

Assets overview

• Video URL: Must be uploaded to YouTube
• Final URL: Landing page users are directed to after clicking the ad
• Display URL: Up to 2 path segments (15 characters each)
• Long headline: ≤90 characters
• Description: ≤90 characters

Video Reach Campaign

To expand your reach across both YouTube and YouTube TV platforms, Video Reach Campaign (VRC) allows your video ads to appear on both small and large screens. Below are the recommended YouTube ad specifications for VRC:

Ad placements

• Where they appear: Appear before, during, or after YouTube videos (desktop, mobile, tablet, and Connected TV)
  • Also served across video partner sites and apps within the Google Display Network (GDN) (unless excluded in campaign settings)

Assets overview

• Video URL: Must be uploaded to YouTube
• Final URL: Destination landing page users reach after clicking the ad
• Display URL: Up to 2 path segments (15 characters each)
• Long headline: ≤90 characters
• Description: ≤90 characters

YouTube VRC specifications

• Resolution:
  • 1080p (Full HD): Recommended pixels (px) for HD: 1080 x 1920px (vertical)
  • 720p (Standard HD): Minimum px: 720 x 1280px (vertical)
  • SD: 480 x 640px (vertical)
    • For optimal quality, we don’t recommend using SD.
• Aspect Ratio: HD: 16:9 for horizontal; 9:16 for vertical; 1:1 for square
• Format: .MPG (MPEG-2 or MPEG-4), .WMV, .AVI, .MOV and .FLV .MPEG-1, .MP4, .MPEGPS, 3GPP, WebM, DNxHR, ProRes, CineForm & HEVC (h265)
• File Size: ≤256 GB
• Format composition: Any length; Recommended:
  • (1) horizontal :15 and (1) horizontal :06
  • (1) vertical :06-:60

Set Your YouTube Ad Creatives for Success

Your YouTube ad is the first point of contact with your audience, making it essential to ensure it’s both visually appealing and conveys your message effectively. To ensure your ad is displayed as intended and captures your audience’s attention, it’s crucial to follow the right specifications.

This YouTube ad specs guide will prepare you for success in 2025. Looking for more tailored insights? Sign up for our newsletter to receive regular updates on YouTube paid advertising and more.

This post was updated in April 2025 to provide you with the latest information.

Building an Influencer Marketing Strategy That Scales with Paid Media

Influencer marketing has become one of the most effective ways for brands to build trust, boost engagement, and connect with social-first audiences. With 72% of Gen Z and Millennials following influencers, and over half making a purchase based on an influencer’s post, it’s clear that creators hold real sway in the buyer journey.

However, not all influencer marketing strategies can drive equal results. Thus, to maximize impact, your influencer campaign must be designed with paid social in mind. In this guide, we’ll show you how to build an influencer marketing strategy that seamlessly scales with platforms like Meta, TikTok, and YouTube.

What Is Influencer Marketing?

Influencer marketing involves partnering with individuals who have built authority, credibility, and a dedicated following in specific niches. These influencers can shape opinions and drive purchasing decisions, especially when they share relatable, personal content across social media platforms.

By showcasing your product or service through someone their audience already trusts, you create a more human, attainable connection between your brand and potential customers.

Furthermore, influencer marketing thrives on long-term collaboration. When an influencer genuinely connects with a brand, their content becomes a cycle of trust: they use the product, recommend it authentically, and inspire action from their followers. This is the foundation of a successful social media influencer marketing campaign.

Organic Influencer Marketing vs. Influencer Advertising

Understanding the difference between organic influencer marketing and influencer advertising through paid social is key to crafting a strategy that performs.

• Organic Influencer Marketing: This approach is typically more casual and relationship-driven. Brands may send products or offer services in exchange for a review or mention, without a formal contract.
  
  If the influencer enjoys the experience, they may share a spontaneous Instagram Story, a TikTok mention, or a YouTube vlog. While organic posts feel authentic, they rely solely on the influencer’s reach and discretion.
• Influencer Advertising through Paid Social: This involves formal agreements where influencers are compensated for creating sponsored content. The content is then repurposed into influencer ads, extending its reach to more audiences.
  
  By using paid social ads, brands gain control over placement, targeting, and scalability, making this approach ideal for reaching broader, performance-driven objectives.

Effective influencer marketing strategies aren’t just about big budgets — it’s about building genuine relationships. That said, influencer advertising can still boost engagement by as much as 61% through paid social media.

Combining both approaches is the best way to maximize impact across social media advertising platforms. The authenticity of organic influencer relationships blended with the reach and precision of paid social advertising is a powerful engine to drive results towards your brand’s objectives.

Is Influencer Marketing Right for Your Brand?

If your brand already has an in-house creative team, you’re likely producing content that reflects your identity and voice. However, integrating an influencer marketing strategy can take that a step further, offering a native, authentic presence in social feeds that often outperforms traditional display or video ads.

It’s natural to feel hesitant about diving into influencer marketing, especially when it adds a new layer to your campaign strategy. But the benefits often outweigh the uncertainty. Here’s how to tell if it’s the right move for your brand.

Key Signs Your Brand Could Benefit from Influencer Marketing

• You want to build authenticity and trust: Influencers create content that feels personal and relatable—something polished ad creatives sometimes can’t replicate. In fact, 48% of consumers say they’re more likely to purchase a product recommended by an influencer they follow.
  
  This trust carries over to your brand, especially when the influencer’s values and voice align with yours.
• You want to reach niche or hard-to-target audiences: Many influencers and microinfluencers build communities around specific interests, demographics, or lifestyles.
  
  While platform tools like Meta’s Advantage+ Audience offer strong targeting tools, influencers offer something algorithmic targeting can’t: personal relationships with highly engaged followers. That makes influencer ads an effective way to expand your reach into niche segments.
• You’re ready to scale through paid social: Organic posts only go as far as an influencer’s follower count. But by integrating influencer content into your paid social strategy, you can unlock scalable growth across platforms like Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok. Influencer creative is often platform-native and performs well as sponsored content, giving your campaigns more flexibility and higher engagement rates.

In modern digital marketing, influencer ads enhance the entire media strategy by combining creative storytelling with high-performing ad formats. Adding an influencer marketing strategy to your campaign mix can pay off in both trust and performance.

How to Create an Influencer Marketing Strategy

Now that you’re ready to launch your influencer marketing campaign, it’s time to build your strategy. This quick-start guide outlines the core steps to help you kickstart expanding your audience across different platforms.

Step 1: Find the Right Influencers for Your Business

Start by analyzing whether the influencer’s audience aligns with your target demographics, such as their followers’ age, location, interests, and content themes. For example, a skincare brand targeting Gen Z should collaborate with influencers whose audience reflects that age group and a lifestyle that complements your brand identity.

Don’t just rely on follower counts. Examine engagement rates, content tone, and authenticity. With view counts now including replays and auto-plays, especially for YouTube Shorts views, it’s better to ask for engaged views to align better with your YouTube ad metrics.

Step 2: Build Relationships with Influencers

Initial campaigns are a chance to test content fit and audience reception before entering longer-term agreements. Look for how creatively aligned the influencer is with your brand, and how well their followers respond to branded content.

The goal should be to move from one-off posts to sustained partnerships. Long-term collaborations foster trust, turning influencers into brand advocates who drive deeper loyalty among their audiences.

Be clear on expectations early: align on objectives, content formats, timelines, and creative direction to build a productive and transparent relationship.

Step 3: Negotiate an Influencer Marketing Package

Your influencer marketing package should include:

• Defined deliverables (e.g. 1 video/week, 2 Instagram Stories, etc.)
• Usage rights (e.g. 1 product review post, 1 exclusive asset for paid ads)
• Exclusivity clauses (e.g. no partnerships with direct competitors during the campaign)

Rates will vary depending on the influencer’s tier (nano, micro, macro, or celebrity), platform, and content complexity. Negotiate based on both their reach and engagement, as well as the type of content you need them to produce.

Step 5: Measure Results and Scale

Using ad management tools, track KPIs such as reach, engagement, conversions, and video views. Make sure to distinguish between autoplays and engaged views, especially for short-form formats like YouTube Shorts, Instagram Reels, and TikTok.

Accurate measurement helps you identify top-performing creators and content styles worth reinvesting in. Use these insights to confidently and efficiently scale your influencer marketing strategy across multiple channels.

Making Influencer Strategy Work for Your Paid Media

Influencer advertising is no longer an optional add-on for brands; it has now become a core driver of digital marketing performance. As audience behavior shifts, authentic influencer content is what truly resonates and drives action.

By partnering with creators who authentically fit your brand, you can further amplify your reach by boosting it on paid social media. The combined credibility and relatability of influencers alongside the precision targeting and scalability of paid media can help you achieve your marketing goals.

Ready to develop and execute an influencer marketing strategy that drives results? Talk to our team of experts and start building your next high-impact campaign.

Social media has emerged as a highly lucrative digital marketing channel. If you’re ever wondering how big this industry is, consider these social media advertising trends. 

The global social media ad spend was more than $23 billion in 2024. Unsurprisingly, the US was the top country, with over $72 billion spent on social ads.  

When a large portion of your marketing budget is dedicated to social media, you need to build campaigns that deliver high ROI. 

Being aware of social media advertising trends and anticipating how they would disrupt the landscape can help you take your marketing efforts to a different level. 

In this article, I will discuss the seven most notable social media advertising trends that I feel will shape this industry’s future. Be prepared to embrace them to maintain a competitive advantage.

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Top Social Media Advertising Trends to Incorporate in Your Strategy

Several trends create ripples in the social media marketing industry every year. I have handpicked seven of the most notable social media advertising trends you should be aware of.

Let’s take a look.

1. AI-Powered Advertising Will Continue to Rise

Artificial intelligence is creating big waves in the marketing and advertising industry. The value of AI in marketing is estimated to cross $108 billion by the end of 2028. 

One of the most promising social media advertising trends is AI-powered advertising. AI tools can analyze a wealth of customer data to help you understand customer preferences and pain points. As a result, this helps you create more targeted ads. 

As shown below, AI contributes significantly to research, efficacy, and creativity in advertising.

Going forward, marketers will utilize generative AI tools to ideate campaigns, create banners and videos, and even help with campaign pacing. AI will also be predominantly involved in monitoring and deriving real-time insights to optimize campaigns.

2. Micro-Influencers Will Keep Dominating

One of the noticeable social media advertising trends is that brands are choosing micro and nano-influencers to create Instagram, Facebook, or YouTube influencer ads over big names. In a survey conducted by Hubspot, over 40% of marketers agreed that working with small and niche-specific influencers resulted in better ROI, as shown below.

Now that the focus is more on creating customer-centric campaigns and ads, influencers with a smaller but tight-knit community are preferred for higher engagement. The key lies in choosing content creators who are highly influential in your niche and are already engaging with your target audience.

According to Social Cat, micro-influencers can boost 3 times in comparison to macro influencers, so connecting with micro-influencers can provide good results at the lowest cost.

In addition to micro-influencers, industry experts are also tagging the rise of AI influencers as one of the important social media advertising trends. In the years to come, we can expect to see more brands collaborating with AI avatars to run influencer campaigns.

3. Social SEO to Reshape Discoverability

Consumers are increasingly relying on social channels like Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook, and YouTube to research new products and gather information about brands. That’s why optimizing your social media content, LinkedIn outreach campaign, and ads for SEO is one of the major social media advertising trends this year. 

You can optimize ad captions by including the right keywords and hashtags. Similarly, increase the discoverability of your video ads by writing SEO-friendly scripts. Testing different versions will help you figure out the best kind of social media ads that will generate maximum engagement.

4. Brands Will Keep Making Short-Form Videos

Video content outperforms static ads, especially short-form ones. This is emerging as one of the major social media advertising trends in 2025. 

Given the popularity of short-form content on social media like TikTok and Instagram Reels or YouTube Stories, marketers are continuing to lean toward creating short-form video ads. 

Consider this YouTube ad by GoDaddy. Within 30 seconds, the brand created a compelling ad with engaging storytelling.

There are many advantages of short-form social media ads. It’s quick to consume, quick-hitting, engaging immediately, and more importantly, users like it. Moreover, social platforms prioritize this content type in algorithms. 

That said, creating captivating ads that instantly grab the attention of the viewers can be challenging.

To create compelling headlines for your social media ads to boost engagement, you need to master storytelling, appeal to your audience’s emotions, and have a solid hook.

5. Authentic Content Will Generate More Engagement

Social media ads are moving away from branded promotional content towards authentic content. This is one of the important social media advertising trends to be incorporated into your ecommerce growth strategy. 

What qualifies as authentic content? Anything credible and trustworthy. Social proof and user-generated content are the most effective types of content to be used in social media advertising. 

Include reviews and user and employee testimonies to humanize your brand and drive immediate action. If you want your ads to be more effective, work on making them culturally and contextually relevant. That’s when your target audience will better resonate with your brand and your products.

6. Social Commerce Will Become a Revenue Machine

Another notable social media advertising trend is the growth of social commerce. Shopping directly from a brand’s social media account offers a unique and seamless experience for customers. This will mean more revenue for brands in the coming years. 

Over the past couple of years, marketers have explored the possibility of creating shoppable ads that would lead potential buyers directly to product catalogs on a brand’s social profile. 

You can create stand-alone ads, Stories or Reels ads, collection ads, or video ads to engage your target audience on TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, or YouTube. 

By adding product tags, catalog links, or stickers with product pricing and descriptions, you can drive traffic with a single click. 

You can also conduct A/B testing to compare different ad formats, placements, and messaging, helping you identify which combinations drive the highest engagement and conversions.

7. Privacy and Data Protection Will Become More Relevant

Privacy and data protection in the social media advertising space will become more crucial than ever before. With customers becoming more concerned about how and where their data is being used, brands will have to make conscious decisions to win their trust. 

You can begin by being transparent about the usage in your social media policy. Adopting strict ethical practices in data collection, AI access, and ad targeting will become industry standards. 

The sooner you make this decision, the better you’ll be positioned in a privacy-conscious marketplace. 

Conclusion

The social media advertising trends we have discussed hint at huge technological leaps in the social media landscape. Trends like AI adoption, a shift in micro and AI influencer marketing, social SEO, contextual authentic ad content, shoppable ads, and a privacy-first approach are reshaping social media marketing as we speak. 

Analyze these social media advertising trends at length and how they would impact your business. By adapting these insights into your strategy, you can be future-ready and gain a competitive edge. 

Have some great content up your sleeve? We invite you to reach out to us. We are excited to collaborate with talented writers and feature high-quality content on our blogs.

How to Use Meta Advantage Suite: A Complete Guide for Advertisers

Meta is doubling down on AI-driven automation with the full rollout of the Meta Advantage Suite, a powerful set of tools designed to streamline ad creation and optimize performance. Businesses using Advantage+ campaigns have already seen up to a 12% reduction in CPA and a 15% increase in ROAS, proving that automation is driving better results.

As Meta continues evolving its ad system, advertisers who use these tools can save time, simplify campaign management, and scale effectively. But how do you balance automation with maintaining control over your campaign performance?

In this guide, we’ll break down the Meta Advantage Suite, explore its key features, and show you how to use these AI-powered tools to maximize your campaign results.

What is the Meta Advantage Suite?

The Meta Advantage Suite is a comprehensive set of tools designed to simplify and automate advertising across Facebook and Instagram. First introduced in 2022, it addresses key advertiser pain points—eliminating the need to manually upload and test hundreds of ad creatives or constantly monitor performance to determine what works best.

Meta Advantage+ helps advertisers reduce manual effort while improving campaign efficiency by automating time-consuming tasks like audience selection and budget allocation. While Advantage+ tools focus on streamlining entire workflows, other Advantage features enhance automation throughout the ad creation and management process.

Let’s take a closer look at how each Meta Advantage+ tool contributes to smarter, more efficient advertising:

Advantage+ Audience

Advantage+ Audience works with Meta’s AI to automatically identify and target users who are most likely to view, click, or purchase based on your business or product. When this feature is enabled, Meta dynamically adjusts your audience, ensuring your ads reach users who can improve cost efficiency and performance.

To maximize the benefits of Advantage+ Audience, you can utilize the following tools:

• Advantage Detailed Targeting: Expands interest-based targeting for broader reach. For example, if you’re running a traffic campaign for a real estate listing and have defined “Business & Finance” as an interest, Meta may also target users interested in “Banking”, even if it wasn’t in your original settings, to increase potential clicks.

• Advantage Custom Audience: Enhances custom audiences by refining targeting based on past interactions, such as engagement with your Facebook Page or Instagram account. This helps guide users toward lower-funnel actions like clicks or purchases.

• Advantage Lookalike: Uses an existing audience source—such as a customer list or newsletter database—to find users with similar profiles who are likely to engage or convert. You can define the similarity level, up to 10%, to optimize reach and improve match quality.

Advantage+ Catalog Ads

Designed for eCommerce advertisers, Advantage+ Catalog Ads streamlines the process of running sales campaigns by eliminating the need to add products for each new campaign manually. Beyond sales, Advantage+ Catalog Ads can also be used for app promotion, engagement, lead generation, and traffic objectives.

This tool personalizes product ads for each user by using tracking data from Meta Pixel or app software, ensuring that ads are dynamically tailored based on user behavior and preferences.

• Advantage+ Creative for Catalog: Automates creative variations to optimize engagement by testing multiple formats and identifying high-performing assets. For instance, if Meta’s AI determines that a user engages more with swipeable carousel cards, the ad will be displayed in carousel format.
  
  Alternatively, if the AI predicts a higher likelihood of direct purchase, the ad will appear in Collection format, showcasing the most relevant product based on the user’s behavior.

• Advantage+ Creative: A broader feature within the Meta Advantage Suite, this tool enhances ad creatives without requiring new uploads or separate ad variations. Enhancements include:
  • Text and headline improvements (during campaign creation and post-launch adjustments)
  • Dynamic overlays (text, branding, and logos)
  • Music additions for engaging ad experiences
  • Optimized CTAs for Stories placements
  • Site links dynamically added based on the provided URL
  • Adaptive image and video enhancements (cropping or expansion based on the user’s perspective)

Advantage+ Placements

This Meta Advantage Suite feature automates ad delivery across Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, and the Audience Network, selecting the most effective placements from over 20 options. Advantage+ Placements ensures your ads appear where they are most likely to drive engagement and maximize efficiency, reducing the need for manual placement selection.

Recent data from our latest Facebook benchmark report shows that awareness campaigns in 2024 experienced a 51% efficiency improvement, with lower CPMs throughout the year. This performance boost is largely attributed to Advantage+ Placements, which expands ad reach across Meta’s full advertising network–serving ads where they can generate the best results.

Meta Advantage Campaign Solutions

With Advantage+ App Campaigns and Advantage+ Shopping Campaigns, advertisers can streamline the entire ad workflow with Meta’s end-to-end campaign solutions:

Advantage+ App Campaigns

Previously known as Automated App Ads, Advantage+ App Campaigns are designed to drive maximum app installs by automating key campaign elements—including budget allocation, audience targeting, and placement selection.

With Meta’s latest update, all Advantage+ features will now be automatically enabled when selecting the app promotion objective:

Advantage+ Shopping Campaigns

To help your shopping and sales-focused ads reach more relevant audiences, you can use Advantage+ shopping campaigns to make your products more discoverable.

By combining Advantage+ Shopping Campaigns with tools like Advantage+ Creative and Advantage+ Creative for Catalog, advertisers can create highly personalized shopping experiences, ensuring your products are shown to audiences most likely to convert.

The tools within the Meta Advantage Suite allow advertisers to scale campaigns effectively while maintaining strong personalization and optimization. Aimed at saving time, cutting costs, and driving improved results, these tools mark a major advancement in automating digital advertising processes.

How to Use Meta Advantage Suite

To guide you in using the Meta Advantage Suite tools and features, here are the steps to help you maximize these AI-powered tools:

1. Selecting the Campaign Objective

Start by selecting the most relevant campaign objective based on your business goals. For the following objectives, Advantage+ features will be automatically activated:

• Leads
• App promotion
• Sales

2. Campaign Level Set-up*

* The following steps apply to Meta campaign objectives that do not have Advantage+ automatically activated.

For automatic campaign budget optimization, turn on the Advantage campaign budget at the campaign level. Then, proceed with the rest of the campaign set-up process, such as choosing the campaign name and/or updating your campaign objective.

3. Ad Set Level Set-up

At the ad set level, you can turn on Dynamic Creative to allow Meta’s AI to automatically generate different creative combinations and templates based on your initial assets.

You can also modify Advantage+ Audience settings here. To further refine your audience, click on Audience Suggestions and specify your preferences for age, gender, and interests under Detailed Targeting.

If you prefer to select placements manually, hover over the Placements section at the bottom of the screen and click Edit to customize placements.

4. Ad Level Set-up

Upload your image or video and proceed with Advantage+ creative suggestions for your primary text and headlines. With Dynamic Creative turned on, Meta’s AI will also suggest templates to further improve your ad creative.

Complete the rest of the ad setup, including URL, CTA, and ad description.

Finally, review your campaign setup and click Publish when you’re ready.

Once your campaign is live, Meta’s AI will take over to optimize the budget and ad performance. While Advantage+ Suite handles much of the heavy lifting, it’s still important to monitor campaign performance to ensure continuous optimization and refinement.

Potential Drawbacks of Using Meta Advantage Suite

While Meta Advantage+ offers many benefits, it’s important to acknowledge that it’s not without its limitations. Here are some potential drawbacks to consider when using Meta Advantage Suite:

Less Visibility on Ad Creative Performance and Effective Variations

One limitation of Advantage+ creatives is the reduced visibility into specific performance metrics. For example, you may not be able to identify which ad variations are performing the best or which creative enhancements are driving the most effective clicks.

Additionally, since Meta’s AI determines when and how to apply creative optimizations, you have limited control over how your ads are presented to audiences.

Reduced Manual Control Over Targeting and Placements

While automation simplifies campaign management, it limits advertisers’ ability to make granular adjustments. This can be a concern for brands with specific targeting needs or creative preferences.

For example, if you prefer your ads to only appear on Instagram placements, manual placements might be a better option, as Advantage+ will automatically distribute your ads across various platforms, including Facebook and Messenger.

AI-Based Optimizations May Not Always Align with Brand Strategies

Machine learning algorithms prioritize cost efficiency, which may not always equate to ad performance.

Based on our Facebook benchmark data, we observed that while cost efficiency was excellent, ad performance sometimes suffered due to increased ad exposure without targeting the right engaged audiences.

Using Meta Advantage Suite offers several valuable benefits and is indeed a valuable addition to making advertisers’ work easier. However, it’s still crucial to monitor campaigns regularly and make strategic adjustments when necessary to ensure the direction of ad performance aligns with your goals.

The Right Balance of Automation and Control over Meta Campaigns

When combined, the key components of the Meta Advantage Suite work together to help brands save time, save costs, and improve performance. Meta’s AI capabilities have certainly exceeded expectations, helping many businesses more effectively reach their cost and campaign goals.

However, it’s essential to maintain strategic oversight even as automation takes the lead. While Advantage+ can automate many decisions, it’s not foolproof and may require adjustments to stay aligned with your objectives. That’s where the expertise of Meta-certified professionals comes in—ensuring that your campaigns are managed effectively and optimized at every step.
Partnering with a Meta-certified company gives you the advantage of expert knowledge to manage campaigns from activation to fruition. To learn more about our Meta advertising expertise, request a demo of our AdTech services and how we optimize your campaigns for efficiency and growth.

The Go-To Social Media Platforms for Influencer Marketing Agencies

Collaborating with a top-tier social media influencer not only reduces the workload on your creative team but also enhances brand authenticity. Utilizing user-generated content (UGC) creates a more natural and relatable ad experience, making your campaigns more engaging to your audiences.

Currently, there are over 12 million U.S. influencers across all social media platforms. Yet the real question is: Which influencer marketing platform delivers the best results when integrated into paid ads, and where do they perform best? From audience reach to ROI, several factors determine whether TikTok, Instagram, or YouTube is the ideal choice for your influencer marketing campaigns.

Top Social Media Platforms for Influencer Marketing

The competition between TikTok, YouTube, and Instagram is fierce when it comes to video advertising and audience reach. YouTube leads with over 250 million users, followed by Instagram at 138.5 million.

However, TikTok is not to be overlooked. The app saw a surge of 88.3% user growth in 2019 and continues to grow by 2.2%–2.4% annually through 2029.

But does a platform’s user base directly translate to its effectiveness for influencer marketing? Let’s take a closer look at the different platforms and how influencer marketing agencies maximize them:

TikTok

While many assume the platform caters only to younger users, our campaign data tells a different story. Despite the majority of U.S. TikTok users being under 30, our data reveals up to 37% CPM efficiency even among audiences aged 55 and up—demonstrating TikTok’s versatility in reaching diverse audiences.

So, how does this well-rounded strategy position TikTok as an influencer marketing platform worth considering?

Promoting your Brand with TikTok Influencers

Influencer marketing agencies choose TikTok for its ability to drive high engagement through viral, short-form videos. Its algorithm naturally amplifies content, enabling brands to reach wider audiences without relying solely on paid media.

Spark Ads further enhances this by boosting organic influencer content, allowing brands to connect authentically with target audiences through established influencer communities.

Keep in mind that TikTok is just the first social media advertising platform in this discussion. While we see how it excels in both video advertising and influencer marketing, how do Instagram and YouTube compare?

Instagram

As Meta continues evolving Instagram into a video-first platform, it has become a top alternative to TikTok—especially during discussions of a potential TikTok ban. When advertisers explored shifting TikTok campaigns to Instagram Reels, it reinforced Instagram’s position as one of the top choices for influencer marketing agencies.

Assessing the Effectiveness of Instagram Influencer Advertising

Instagram is home to over 10 million influencers in the U.S., accounting for 9.8% of its users. With such a vast creator ecosystem, brands have plenty of opportunities to collaborate with influencers across various niches.

Understanding Influencer Tiers

Instagram offers a broad spectrum of influencers, from small, niche-focused creators to mega influencers with massive reach.

More followers don’t always mean better results—nano-influencers often have the highest engagement rates due to their highly engaged, niche communities, making them a strong choice for influencer-driven ads.

Is Instagram more effective for influencer advertising than TikTok? The answer depends on campaign goals, target demographics, and engagement strategy. But before drawing conclusions, let’s analyze yet another major influencer marketing platform—YouTube.

YouTube

While YouTube might appear last on this list, its engagement, effectiveness, and video advertising impact are anything but last place. Known for brand awareness campaigns, YouTube is also a high-performing platform for action and conversion-driven marketing.

Why YouTube Influencer Marketing Works

YouTube’s advantages for influencer marketing agencies are strongly tied to its ability to deliver detailed, engaging, and authentic content—whether in short form or long form. Discover why you should consider YouTube for your social media influencer campaigns:

Long-Form Content for In-Depth Storytelling

YouTube stands out in influencer marketing for its ability to host extended video content, making it ideal for detailed product showcases and tutorials:

• Detailed Product Reviews: YouTube influencers spend 10–15 minutes (or longer) discussing a product’s features, benefits, and real-world applications, making it the top choice among U.S. consumers for product reviews and information.
• Step-by-Step Tutorials: 64% of viewers have reported making a purchase after watching an explainer video. And because there’s (basically) no length limit to the videos a YouTube content creator can create, they can go into detail on product tutorials, allowing viewers to understand better what they are recommending.

Now that you have a clear understanding of how these social media influencer platforms work and how you can collaborate with content creators for brand campaigns, it’s time to assess your options. While these major platforms are the top choices for influencer marketing agencies, the right fit depends on various criteria that require careful evaluation.

Why Influencer Marketing Agencies Choose These Social Media Platforms

Influencer marketing agencies select TikTok, Instagram, or YouTube based on their unique strengths in audience engagement, creative content, placement strategies, and cost efficiency. Below is a condensed overview of each platform’s advantages:

Each social media platform has unique strengths that can enhance your influencer marketing campaigns. By aligning your campaign goals with the criteria outlined here, you can determine the best platform for your strategy.

Beyond platform selection, the influencer’s existing community is another critical factor. For example, if your brand performs well on TikTok but the influencer you’re targeting has stronger reach and engagement on YouTube, shifting your ad spend may be more effective. Likewise, if a YouTube influencer’s rates are too high, exploring Instagram influencers could deliver better results at a lower cost.

While each platform has its pros and cons, Strike Social’s data shows that a multi-platform influencer campaign can drive strong results while maintaining cost efficiency.

Connecting with More Engaged Audiences with Influencer Marketing

Choosing the right social media platform for your influencer marketing campaign is a crucial step in effectively promoting your brand. Each platform offers distinct advantages based on your goals, target audience, and budget—and when combined strategically, they can deliver even stronger performance and cost efficiency.

However, these platforms are just the mediums. Success in influencer marketing depends on aligning with the right audience, budget strategy, and content approach. Whether partnering with Instagram, YouTube, or TikTok influencers, integrating influencer marketing into your paid social strategy is now essential.

Ready to launch your influencer campaign? Contact our team for a personalized walkthrough on how we can activate and manage your influencer ads.

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Campaign Outcome

With real-time optimizations and influencer-driven content, Strike Social helped this CPG brand drive efficient traffic at scale.
Our strategic execution ensured the right messaging reached the right audience for the best possible performance.

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See other Facebook case studies.

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Campaign Outcome

Strike Social’s data-driven approach and influencer-powered strategy successfully optimized ad delivery while increasing audience engagement. By refining audience targeting and campaign execution, we aim for maximum efficiency and impact for Meta-influencer campaigns.

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See other Facebook case studies.

How to Set Up Demand Gen Campaigns for YouTube & Google Ads

For advertisers looking to simplify cross-platform advertising on YouTube and Google networks, Demand Gen campaigns are becoming the go-to solution. It’s a full transition from YouTube TrueView for Action to Video Action Campaigns (VAC) — and now, Demand Gen campaigns.

By combining the reach of Google’s ecosystem with the creative impact of YouTube video ads and image ads, Demand Gen campaigns provide a powerful way to drive action and conversions by targeting users in key moments of intent.

What Are Demand Gen Campaigns?

Powered by Google AI, Demand Gen campaigns allow advertisers to engage users across multiple touchpoints within YouTube, YouTube Shorts, Discover, and Gmail.

With the introduction of multi-format ads that can be created within a single Demand Gen campaign, advertisers can now reach and engage the 63% of customers who use Google feeds to discover or research new brands and products.

Benefits of using Google’s Demand Gen campaigns

Apart from reaching a vast audience network that you can previously reach using separate YouTube and Google ad campaigns, here are other key benefits that make Demand Gen an attractive choice for advertisers:

1. Customizable Ad Experiences: 

• Demand Gen supports multiple ad formats, including single image, video, and carousel image ads, allowing you to engage audiences with diverse creative options.
• Google Demand Gen campaigns use audience-first creatives so that the most riveting ad creatives that capture audiences are served the most to customers likely to click and convert.

2. Improved Performance Metrics:

• The early adoption of Google Demand Gen ads has brought impressive results, which has led Google to be confident in making this a more prominent campaign type:
  • 7.64% CTR with 43% better CPC efficiency on ads served in YouTube placements (Strike Social Campaign Lab data, U.S. Demand Gen campaign for entertainment brand)
  • 58% higher ROAS than Video Action Campaigns (Nielsen MMM meta-analysis on Demand Gen vs. 2024 Google AI-powered YouTube ads)
  • 3x higher CTR and 61% lower CPA (Demand Gen beta test by Search Engine Land)

3. Enhanced AI Capabilities:

• Demand Gen makes use of Google’s AI for its bidding strategy, helping advertisers secure more clicks and conversions with automated optimizations.
• AI-powered image editing allows advertisers to enhance creatives by automatically selecting and refining images from the Google Merchant Center for better ad performance.

Demand Gen Campaign Specs and Requirements

Ready to set up your Demand Gen campaigns? Here’s a detailed guide on the available ad formats and their specifications to help you create high-performing ads with this campaign type.

Available Ad Formats

Image Ads

Image ads are ideal for quick, visually appealing ads that contain all your information in a single image. If you’re looking to capture audiences who want your product or service information in one look, image ads are the way to go.

Ad specs for Demand Gen image ads

• Resolution and Aspect Ratio:
  • 1.91:1 (Landscape) – Recommended: 1200 × 628
  • 1:1 (Square) – Recommended: 1200 × 1200
  • 4:5 (Portrait) – Recommended: 960 × 1200
  • 9:16 (Vertical) – Recommended: 1080 × 1920 (Only available on YouTube Shorts)
• File Size: Max 5MB
• Headline: Up to 5 headlines (Max 40 characters each)
• Description: Up to 5 descriptions (Max 90 characters each)
• Business Name: Max 25 characters
• URL: Required; supports different URLs for mobile placements
• Logo: Up to 5 (1:1 ratio; Recommended: 1200 × 1200)
  • Logos are displayed as circular images; 5.36% of each corner may be cropped
• CTA: Automated or manual selection (choose from the following):
  • (Automated) Apply now Book now Contact us Download Learn more Visit site Shop now Sign up Get quote Subscribe See more

** Note: If uploading a GIF file for an image ad, the ad displayed will be a static version only.

Carousel Ads

Showcase multiple images in a single ad, giving your audience a more engaging experience with your Demand Gen placements. This format encourages viewers to explore and interact with your offers by swiping through the carousel.

Ad specs for Demand Gen carousel ads

• Carousel cards: Up to 10
• Resolution and Aspect Ratio:
  • 1.91:1 (Landscape) – Recommended: 1200 × 628
  • 1:1 (Square) – Recommended: 1200 × 1200 (Square images not supported in Discover placements)
  • 4:5 (Portrait) – Recommended: 960 × 1200 (Optional)
  • All carousel cards must be the same dimension. For example, if you’re choosing square resolutions for one carousel image card, then all must be square.
  • It’s recommended to have both landscape and square carousel images for better compatibility with different Demand Gen placements.
• File Size: Max 5MB
• Headline: Up to 5 headlines (Max 40 characters each)
• Description: Up to 5 descriptions (Max 90 characters each)
• Business Name: Max 25 characters
• URL: Required; different URLs can be set for each carousel card
• Logo: Up to 5 (1:1 ratio; Recommended: 1200 × 1200)
  • Logos are displayed as circular images; 5.36% of each corner may be cropped
• CTA: Automated or manual selection; can set different CTAs for each carousel card:
  • (Automated) Apply now Book now Contact us Download Learn more Visit site Shop now Sign up Get quote Subscribe See more

Video Ads

An effective way to engage users, especially on YouTube and YouTube Shorts. Reach over 250 million users in the U.S. with video ads placed across various Demand Gen placements, making it a format you can’t afford to overlook.

Ad specs for Video ads on Demand Gen campaigns

• Video Uploads: Up to 5 videos
• Length:
  • Minimum: 5 seconds
  • Maximum for YouTube Shorts ad placements: 60 seconds
  • No prescribed max length for landscape and square ads;
    Recommended: Up to 3 minutes or based on industry best practices.
• Resolution and Aspect Ratio:
  • 16:9 (Landscape) – Recommended: 1920 × 1080 (HD)
  • 1:1 (Square) – Recommended: 1080 × 1080 (HD)
  • 9:16 (Vertical) – Recommended: 1080 × 1920 (HD)
• File Size: Max 256GB
• Headline: Up to 5 (Max 40 characters each)
• Long Headline: Up to 5 (Max 90 characters each)
• Description: Up to 5 (Max 90 characters each)
• Business Name: Max 25 characters
• Logo: Up to 5 (1:1 ratio; Recommended: 1200 × 1200)
  • Logos are displayed as circular images; 5.36% of each corner may be cropped
• Sitelinks: Up to 4 (shown in skippable in-stream ads on mobile placements only)
• CTA Options:
  • (Automated) Apply now Book now Buy now Contact us Donate now Download Get quote Learn more Order now Play now See more Shop now Sign up Start now Subscribe Visit site Watch now

** Note: Your video must be uploaded to YouTube as either public or unlisted. You can also create a generative video ad directly in Campaign Manager.

** Demand Gen video ads on Gmail will only be served on mobile.

Targeting Capabilities and Limitations

Google Demand Gen campaigns offer advanced audience targeting options designed to maximize reach and relevance. Consider the following capabilities you can maximize when planning your campaigns.

1. Lookalike segment

Demand Gen campaigns allow you to create lookalike audiences based on first-party data, such as customer lists or newsletter sign-ups. This helps expand reach by targeting users who share similar traits with your existing customers.

For example, using lookalike audiences can help you target similar profiles of those who made past purchases from your website, increasing the likelihood of conversions.

Lookalike audiences are particularly effective for mid-funnel strategies, which Demand Gen focuses on. They help you find new, high-intent users by relying on your existing customer data. You can choose between Narrow (2%), Balanced (5%), or Broad (10%) to target people with similar profiles.

2. Custom segments

Custom segments help you target potential customers based on their search behavior, interests, and online activity. To improve targeting accuracy, you can create segments using specific search terms, competitor websites, or app activity.

For instance, if you want a headstart on your Mother’s Day promotions for your flower arrangement business, you can use a custom segment for search terms such as “ideas for Mother’s Day gifts,” “top 10 Mother’s Day gift ideas,” etc. to get audiences intently looking for Mother’s Day gifts and likely to make a purchase.

3. Optimized targeting

Google’s AI-driven optimized targeting expands reach beyond your specified audience signals to users likely to convert. While the priority remains on your defined audience, optimized targeting helps increase clicks and conversions by identifying new high-performing prospects.

If optimized targeting improves performance, you may notice a shift in your initial targeting selections. However, this is expected and indicates that the campaign is effectively driving the desired results.

Understanding how audience targeting works in Demand Gen campaigns allows you to align your strategy with your campaign goals better.

Step-by-Step Guide to Setting Up Demand Gen Campaigns in Google Ads

Now that you have the basics of Demand Gen campaign specs and audience targeting, it’s time to set up the campaign.

1. Choose a campaign objective that aligns with your business goals. Demand Gen supports the following objectives:

• Sales
• Leads
• Website traffic
• Awareness and consideration
• Create a campaign without guidance

2. Choose Demand Gen as the campaign type, then click Continue.

3. Set Up Campaign-Level Details:

Define the core settings for your campaign such as the campaign name, target cost-per-action (CPA), campaign budget, and campaign dates. You can also set up your location and language targeting if they will be the same for all your ad groups within this campaign.

In addition, you can select whether to distribute your ads to Google video partners (this feature is currently still in Beta testing).

4. Set Up Ad Group-Level Targeting:

Refine your targeting by setting up audience specifications at the ad group level within your Google Demand Gen campaign. Here, you can define audience segments, lookalikes, and custom audiences to ensure your ads reach the right people.

6. In the Review campaign section, review your campaign settings and targeting, and confirm that ad creatives are correctly configured. Once you’re ready, click Publish campaign.

The campaign will typically have a 2-week to 6-week learning period during which Google can collect data and optimize bids effectively. From here, monitoring your Demand Gen campaign is essential and requires a constant eye to ensure it is running on pace.

Must-Knows for Your Demand Gen Campaigns

Launching a Demand Gen campaign is only the beginning — the real work starts after going live. Complexities may arise, so understanding what to expect and how to maintain control over your campaigns is essential.

Here’s what you need to know to run effective Demand Gen ads on YouTube and Google:

Brand Safety and Suitability

Demand Gen ads serve across YouTube, Gmail, and Discover feeds, which can expose your brand to unsuitable content. Protect your brand with these strategies:

• Use Exclusions: Exclude low-quality websites, apps, and sensitive content categories (e.g., violence, mature themes). Adjust these settings under Tools > Content Suitability in Google Ad Manager.
• Add Negative Keywords: Unlike keyword targeting, adding negative keywords prevents your ads from appearing in specific searches. For example, if you want to avoid your brand showing up alongside political content, especially during election season, using negative keywords ensures your brand stays clear of any political association.

Goal Clarity

Is Demand Gen suitable for all stages of your paid social ad campaign — from awareness to traffic and conversions? While Demand Gen supports multiple campaign objectives, you must clearly define your target outcome to ensure it aligns with your campaign goals.

• Mid-to-Lower Funnel Focus: Demand Gen campaigns are designed to drive clicks and actions, such as website visits, leads, and sales.
  
  While Demand Generation can be chosen from the awareness objective, a great choice for the top of the funnel (ToFu) is Video Reach Campaigns. By utilizing different YouTube ad formats such as in-stream (bumper, skippable), in-feed, and Shorts ads, you can better increase brand awareness through video engagement within related content.

What Sets Demand Gen Apart

Demand Gen campaigns combine creative flexibility and automated targeting in ways other Google Ads formats cannot:

• Flexibility over Audience Targeting: Unlike PMax, which automates most targeting, Demand Gen gives you more granular control over audience segmentation.
• Hybrid Ad Formats: With support for images, videos, and carousel ad formats, you have more flexibility in testing creative variations and adjusting placements based on performance.

Know the Best YouTube Ads Agency to Partner With

While Demand Gen automates many processes, working with a specialized YouTube Ads agency can take your performance to the next level. Here’s what to look for when choosing the right agency to manage your Demand Gen campaigns:

• YouTube Ads Expertise: Since Demand Gen is rooted in YouTube Video Action Campaigns, your agency should have deep experience in managing YouTube campaigns. A strong portfolio of YouTube case studies will give you insight into their track record and effectiveness.
• Google-Recognized: Being a Google Partner signals an agency’s expertise in running and optimizing YouTube and Google campaigns. Further, a Google Premier Partner status reflects consistent excellence and proven performance in managing high-spend campaigns.

Strike Social has proudly held Google Premier Partner status for six years — a testament to our expertise and success in running high-performing campaigns. With the trust of many top-tier clients, we continue to deliver results and maintain this prestigious recognition.

It’s More Than Just YouTube Advertising Now

The shift from Video Action Campaigns to Demand Gen signals Google’s push toward a more integrated and expansive advertising ecosystem. Demand Gen’s expansion beyond YouTube to Google’s broader network gives you more opportunities to increase ad performance across multiple channels and placements.

However, even with increased automation, you can still maintain control through strategic campaign monitoring and pacing. As your campaigns evolve, you can position your brand ahead of innovation by learning how Demand Gen fully works and how you can improve your performance.

Is Advantage+ Audience Good for Your Meta Ad Strategy?

Meta claims that Advantage+ Audience improves ad performance, citing their own test results—up to 28% lower cost per click (CPC) and 7% lower cost per website conversion. They position it as an AI-driven solution that “typically” enhances efficiency across all campaign objectives.

More importantly, Meta is steadily pushing advertisers toward full automation—Advantage+ Audience is now automatically enabled for new campaigns in Ads Manager. But does it truly optimize performance across the board, or are there trade-offs? Let’s break down its impact and whether it’s the right fit for your Facebook and Instagram ads.

But does Advantage+ Audience truly work for all campaigns, or are there trade-offs? Let’s break down its impact and whether it’s the right fit for your Facebook and Instagram ads.

What Is Advantage+ Audience?

As part of Meta’s AI-powered ad tools, Advantage+ Audience is designed to enhance audience targeting by identifying users who are most likely to engage, click, or convert. It expands upon your selected interests and demographics, optimizing reach based on past engagement and additional behavioral signals.

How Meta Advantage+ Audience Targeting Works

According to Meta, here’s how Advantage+ Audience determines who sees your ads:

• Ads are automatically delivered to users most likely to interact, based on engagement, clicks, and conversions.
• If you provide preferences in Audience Suggestions, Meta’s AI will use them alongside its own analysis.
• Advantage+ Audience refines targeting using factors such as:
  • Meta Pixel data
  • Previous conversion history
  • User engagement with past ads and content, etc.

The goal of Advantage+ Audience is to simplify Meta ad campaign setup by replacing manual audience targeting with AI-driven automation. Instead of selecting every targeting parameter yourself, Meta’s AI determines the best audience for your ads based on your past campaigns.

Let’s have a look at the table below to see the difference between Advantage+ audience vs. manual targeting:

While Advantage+ Audience improves efficiency and lowers costs, manual targeting still holds value for niche campaigns requiring precise audience selection. For brands running multiple campaigns, Advantage+ Audience offers a balance of scalability and automation.

However, advertisers who need strict audience control and want full transparency on who sees their ads may still prefer manual targeting for highly specialized goals.

Where Advertisers Struggle with Advantage+ Audience

First introduced in mid-2023, Advantage+ Audience is no longer new to advertisers. Many brands have tested it—some achieving cost-efficient results, while others faced challenges in ad performance.

Despite Meta’s promise of simplified campaign management, advertisers still encounter key struggles when using Advantage+ Audience.

Broad Targeting ≠ Quality Engagement

The core idea behind Advantage+ Audience is its ability to expand reach beyond manual audience targeting. While this can lead to increased exposure, it often prioritizes quantity over relevance, which can result in:

• Lower CTRs: Ads may be shown to users outside core demographics, leading to minimal engagement despite high impressions.
• Misaligned leads: Automated targeting can include users likely to engage but not convert.

For example, if an advertiser wants to target primarily female audiences, Meta’s AI might still expand the ad frequency to male audiences if it predicts better performance. While this increases ad reach, it doesn’t always translate to meaningful engagement or conversions.

A real-world example comes from WordStream, which tested Advantage+ Audience under Meta’s recommended settings. While the campaign achieved a 61% lower cost per lead (CPL) than the $21.98 industry benchmark, all 130 leads generated were unqualified—proving that low CPL does not always mean high-quality results.

Downsides of Over-Automation

Since Advantage+ Audience relies on AI-driven decisions, advertisers often face blind spots that are difficult to adjust mid-campaign:

• Audience burnout: Campaigns may initially perform well with low CPMs and high engagement, but AI quickly exhausts high-quality audiences, leading to performance declines.
• Skewed budgets: When used alongside Campaign Budget Optimization (CBO), Advantage+ ad sets often absorb a disproportionate budget share compared to manual targeting.

For instance, Search Engine Land tested Advantage+ Audience vs. interest-based targeting. While Advantage+ delivered more leads at a lower CPL, the quality of leads was twice as poor compared to interest-based targeting. Additionally, 40% of the campaign budget was allocated to Advantage+ audiences, reducing control over ad spend.

Without active campaign pacing and adjustments, advertisers risk higher-than-expected costs per action (CPA) despite Advantage+’s initial cost-saving promise.

Advantage+ Audience Results: What Meta Advertising Trends Reveal

Our 2024 Facebook Ads Benchmark Report analyzed key ad cost and performance metrics to uncover the impact of Advantage+ Audience on Facebook campaigns. Let’s hear the data talk:

Impression Campaigns

Cost Efficiency: CPM improved by 51% compared to 2023, largely due to Advantage+ placements expanding reach across Meta’s ad network. This allowed ads to be shown to more audiences, effectively lowering CPM.

Challenges in Performance: While impressions increased, CTR dropped by 61%, highlighting a major drawback—ads were served to a broader but less engaged audience. The challenge? Lower costs, but weaker audience engagement.

Video Views Campaigns

Cost Trends: With 21% of Facebook users spending time on Reels (second only to the main feed at 36%), CPV improved by 20% YoY.

View Rate Decline: Despite increased exposure, view rates fell by 13%, indicating that while Advantage+ audiences were served the ads, many quickly swiped past without engaging. The AI-led targeting likely matched behavioral patterns (e.g., watching similar videos) but did not necessarily identify high-intent viewers.

Traffic Campaigns

Cost Improvements: CPC saw a 42% improvement vs. 2023, reinforcing Advantage+ Audience’s cost efficiency across all campaign types. By widening audience reach, Advantage+ was better able to identify users likely to click, aligning well with click-driven campaign objectives.

Higher Engagement: Unlike impression and video views campaigns, traffic campaigns benefited most from Advantage+ automation.

• Clicks campaigns: CTR increased by 52%
• Link click campaigns: CTR rose by 10%

Advantage+ Audience clearly drives down costs and optimizes ad spend, but only traffic campaigns—a lower-funnel objective—saw improvements in both cost and audience engagement.

While Meta’s automation expands reach and reduces costs, manual oversight remains crucial to ensure these expanded audiences actually convert.

Meta Advertising Strategies to Maximize Performance

While Advantage+ Audience targeting has both strengths and limitations, it remains a powerful tool for Facebook advertisers. The key is knowing when to use it and how to stay in control of your campaign performance.

When to Use Advantage+ vs. Manual Targeting

Advantage+ Audience works best for lower-funnel campaigns like clicks and conversion campaigns. Because it prioritizes users most likely to convert—using your Meta Pixel data and engagement history—it is well-suited for direct-response objectives.

For awareness campaigns, Advantage+ can still be effective in maximizing reach and lowering CPMs, making it a viable option when the goal is broad visibility rather than immediate conversions.

When Manual Targeting Outperforms AI

• For highly niche audiences: If your audience must meet very specific demographics, interests, or behavioral criteria, manual targeting gives you greater control over audience selection.
• For remarketing and retargeting: These campaigns rely on high-quality past data—such as Lookalike Audiences based on past conversions or B2B leads. Advantage+ may not prioritize high-intent users, as it focuses more on engagement likelihood rather than conversion potential.

Optimizing Advantage+ for Better Results

While Advantage+ simplifies campaign management, it still requires oversight to prevent audience fatigue and ensure continued performance.

To maintain control over Advantage+ campaigns, here’s what you can do:

• Add Custom Audiences: Advantage+ treats additional targeting inputs as “Audience Suggestions.” Provide as many variables as possible to help Meta’s AI refine its targeting and focus on relevant users.
• Control Ad Frequency: If applicable, set frequency caps to prevent ad fatigue. The more times Meta recycles your ads to an exhausted audience, the more engagement and performance may decline.

Enhance Your Facebook Campaigns with Strike Social’s AdTech Solutions

Keeping an eye on your ad campaigns 24/7 is no simple matter—you’d need people monitoring them constantly to ensure nothing is overlooked.

With Strike Social, you can leave the heavy lifting to us. Our mission is to help you lower ad costs while keeping your campaign performance on track. Through our Software-with-a-Service (SWAS) model, you gain access to a team of expert Facebook media buyers while maintaining full transparency with dedicated access to your campaign insights.

In combination with Meta’s Advantage+, our adtech optimizes auction bids and ensures your ads reach the right audiences. This strategic alignment helps maximize ad performance and keeps your campaigns running efficiently.

Want a full walkthrough of our adtech solutions? Request a demo from our team today.

Complete Guide to Moving TikTok Ads to YouTube Shorts Ads

If it’s a short-form domination battle between TikTok vs. YouTube Shorts, the former is the clear winner. According to Sensor Tower’s State of Mobile report, TikTok captures 55% of short-form video watch time in the U.S., while Instagram Reels holds 36% and YouTube Shorts at 26%.

If you’re considering moving from TikTok to YouTube Shorts ads, you’re in the right place. This guide will walk you through the transition, helping you navigate the platform differences, optimize your YouTube Shorts ads, and effectively tap into YouTube’s 200-million+ user base.

Why YouTube Shorts Is the Smart TikTok Alternative for Advertising

While YouTube Shorts may be YouTube’s response to the short-form vertical video trend, the platform as a whole offers far greater opportunities for advertisers. Backed by Google’s ad ecosystem, YouTube had just become the world’s second-largest search engine where audiences look for new products or research new brands.

If you’re only thinking about YouTube Shorts as a TikTok alternative, you might be overlooking the full potential of advertising on YouTube and its broad network. Here’s what you’re missing:

TikTok’s Uncertain Future

TikTok may be back in the app stores for new users to download, but for advertisers, there’s still some turmoil.

As concerns about a potential TikTok ban continue to rise, many brands have considered cross-platform strategies to safeguard their advertising investments. In fact, ad spend forecasts show a significant shift, with 10.7% moving to YouTube and 12.9% shifting to Connected TV (CTV) channels in the near future.

Realistically speaking, YouTube offers a more stable and secure option for U.S. advertisers, both technically and operationally:

• YouTube is owned by Google (Alphabet Inc.) and operates under U.S. jurisdiction, which mitigates concerns about foreign adversary risks—something TikTok can’t fully avoid.
  • Unlike TikTok, YouTube faces no immediate legislative threats, making it a much more reliable long-term platform for ad spend.
  • In response to TikTok’s uncertainties, YouTube has been proactively courting creators, encouraging them to shift to YouTube Shorts and “find your community” on the platform. This is part of YouTube’s strategy to acquire as many creators and advertisers as possible before the looming April 2025 deadline that could impact TikTok’s availability in the U.S.
• As some U.S. advertisers have explored, VPNs were briefly considered as a workaround to access TikTok during the ban. However, this approach is risky, as VPN usage can expose devices to malware, thus is not advisable.
  • YouTube, in turn, has only since expanded its reach, from the original website YouTube.com to the mobile app. Now, it has Connected TV reach as well, with Google TV and YouTube TV placements that advertisers can utilize to increase brand awareness.

YouTube Shorts’ Growth By the Numbers

YouTube Shorts has seen massive growth in the U.S., with monthly active users (MAUs) rising from 118.1 million in 2020 to 164.5 million in 2024. With YouTube’s expansion into Connected TV (CTV), this reach has extended further, adding 8 million users from YouTube TV screens.

As an official ad placement, YouTube Shorts has positioned itself as a strong competitor to TikTok in the short-form video advertising space.

Still mulling over whether YouTube Shorts ads are the way to go? Here’s what the numbers say:

• 5.91% Engagement rate – the highest among short-form platforms (TikTok 5.75%; Instagram Reels 5.53%
• 106.28% More likes than regular video content on YouTube
• 3x Increased ad RPM (revenue for creators)
• 43% U.S. advertisers already leveraging YouTube Shorts ads for promotions

Advantages of Advertising on YouTube Shorts

Transitioning your TikTok ads to YouTube Shorts unlocks a range of benefits, thanks to YouTube’s established presence in video advertising. With years of dominance in the space, YouTube provides a more stable and scalable platform—especially if TikTok is no longer a viable option for your brand.

Strong Creator Ecosystem

If influencer marketing is central to your TikTok ad campaigns, YouTube Shorts offers a powerful alternative. YouTube has its own thriving creator community, and studies show that 59% of content is shared across multiple social platforms—primarily TikTok, Instagram Reels, and YouTube Shorts. Before making the switch, check if your TikTok influencers have a YouTube presence—you may already have an existing audience to tap into.

To make partnerships easier, YouTube offers BrandConnect, a platform designed to connect brands and creators seamlessly. Announced during the Google Marketing Live Update, BrandConnect allows advertisers to:

• Find creators who have already tagged or reviewed your brand
• Propose collaborations for sponsored content
• Promote creator content directly in YouTube Shorts ads

Broader Audience Reach

TikTok’s user base skews younger, with 25% of its audience aged 18-24 and over 30% aged 25-34. While this is great for brands targeting Gen Z and Millennials, YouTube offers a more diverse audience, including older age groups with higher purchasing power.

Here’s a breakdown of YouTube’s U.S. demographic reach:

• Gen Z (25.1%) and Millennials (25.5%) make up the majority of users
• Gen X (19.9%) and Baby Boomers (15%) represent a significant portion of viewers
• YouTube Shorts’ audience mirrors this diversity, with:
  • 18-24 (15.7%)
  • 45-54 (12.9%)

Let’s break down how your TikTok ad campaign focused on reach can be expanded when shifting to YouTube Shorts or YouTube ads overall:

	TikTok	YouTube Shorts (YouTube)
Campaign objective	Reach	Reach (Awareness)
Possible ad placements	For You Feed Following Feed Profile Feed	Shorts In-stream (bumper, skippable*, non-skippable**) Connected TV networks (Google TV, YouTube TV) Can also appear in home feed, search results; Google Display Network

* For Efficient reach & Target frequency campaign sub-objective (includes bumper)
* For Non-skippable reach & Target frequency campaign sub-objective

TikTok ads are primarily limited to the app, appearing in the For You Feed, Following Feed, and Profile Feed. However, if you’re looking to expand your reach, you can also advertise through Pangle, TikTok’s ad network, which allows you to connect with audiences across 100,000+ global apps.

With YouTube Shorts, you can expand your audience reach and strengthen lower-funnel campaigns, allowing for precise targeting at different stages of the customer journey. Additionally, brand safety remains a top priority on YouTube, to make sure your ads appear alongside safe and suitable content. 

To avoid last-minute scrambling as TikTok’s future remains in flux, future-proofing your ads by transitioning to YouTube Shorts makes sense. While the shift from TikTok ads to YouTube Shorts ads may involve several steps, it will undoubtedly offer greater stability and benefits in the long term.

YouTube Shorts vs. TikTok Ads: What You Need to Know

Before making the shift from TikTok ads to YouTube Shorts video ads, you must consider key elements such as ad creatives, cost structures, and campaign setup. While both platforms focus on short-form video content, YouTube offers a wider range of placements compared to TikTok. 

This means that your video advertising strategy will need to be adjusted to ensure optimal performance on YouTube Shorts.

Format Considerations

Short-form video content is best viewed in the 9:16 vertical format, but both TikTok and YouTube Shorts offer flexibility in aspect ratios, allowing for a variety of creative approaches. For instance, if you want your audience to focus on a smaller creative, you can easily adjust. However, maximizing screen space with vertical videos remains the optimal choice for capturing attention.

Here’s a quick guide on ad creative specs, safe zones, and how TikTok vs. YouTube Shorts compare:

As shown above, YouTube Shorts supports a broader range of file types. This allows brands and influencer partners to repurpose existing video content more easily and tailor ads to different viewing experiences. Moreover, YouTube Shorts’ structure for headlines and text enables clearer messaging and calls to action (CTA), regardless of where your ad appears.

Ultimately, scaling your advertising from TikTok to YouTube Shorts can enhance your creative flexibility, allowing you to produce more engaging content for your audience.

Cost Comparison

Budget considerations will naturally be a key factor when shifting your advertising strategy from TikTok to YouTube Shorts. While YouTube claims a 6% higher share in ad spend compared to TikTok, you might assume this means higher advertising costs—but that’s not always the case.

We analyzed Strike Social’s U.S. YouTube and TikTok campaigns, focusing on clicks and actions to determine how campaigns would perform if transferred. The reason behind this is simple: YouTube’s diverse campaign formats and objective options allow for greater precision in targeting your goals.

Instead of being limited to just one video view format, such as YouTube Shorts, you can also take advantage of other placements where your ads could perform even better.

Here’s a quick breakdown of the costs for TikTok ads vs. YouTube ads, helping you make a more informed decision:

YouTube’s CPC and CTR, while fluctuating, tend to be more stable and predictable than TikTok’s. This makes budgeting and campaign planning easier, giving advertisers more confidence in their decisions.

While YouTube CPC levels are not immune to the holiday seasons, TikTok also shows a rise, especially during Q4. As seen above, even with YouTube ad costs rising, driving clicks is managed well, as long as brands are partnered with the right YouTube advertising agency. 

Differences in Campaign Setup and Management

If you’ve worked with other ad management platforms like Facebook or Snapchat Ads Manager, you’ll notice some similarities in system navigation.

However, if your experience is primarily with TikTok ads, transitioning to Google Ad Manager for YouTube Shorts may require additional guidance. Here are the key differences to keep in mind:

Campaign Goals

In TikTok Ads Manager, campaign objectives are straightforward and tied to specific goals, with a simple setup process and consistent feed placements.

As for Google Ad Manager, you’ll need to select the appropriate campaign objective and format tailored specifically for YouTube Shorts ads. Here are some of the relevant formats for YouTube Shorts:

• Awareness & Consideration
  • Demand Gen
  • Video (Video views, Efficient reach)
• Conversion Goals
  • Demand Gen
  • Video (selecting Video as a sub-objective would also direct to Demand Gen due to the transition from Video Action Campaigns)

Targeting Options

Apart from the usual audience targeting features such as location, age, and interests, you can create Custom Audiences or Audience Segments. While this feature is also available in TikTok through Saved Audience, you’d have to prepare your audience list in the TikTok Business Center as there’s currently no option to do it within the campaign setup page.

• For YouTube, you can use a previously saved audience list or create a new one immediately without leaving the setup page. 
• YouTube advertising now allows users to target Nielsen DMA regions. TikTok launched this feature in 2021, and Google followed suit in 2023.

Ad Placements

Did you know that with CTV views growing 130%, YouTube has been thriving on both short-form and now bigger screens? Thus, there’s no harm in being flexible with where your ads can appear.

Although there isn’t a specific option to exclusively place ads on YouTube Shorts, with proper optimization, you can focus your efforts on this placement. Achieving this is made easier with the right software and a skilled team to help maximize your performance while staying within budget.

For example, during the Q4 season, we helped an HVAC brand leverage the power of YouTube Shorts ads, achieving 59% cost efficiency and generating up to 5.3 million total video views during the campaign flight.

Shifting Gears From TikTok Ads to YouTube Shorts

Transitioning from TikTok ads to YouTube Shorts is a significant shift, especially if TikTok has been a primary source of leads or sales, delivering strong results for your brand. However, the uncertainty surrounding TikTok’s future in the U.S. raises questions about its long-term viability. Marketers and brands must adapt quickly, rather than waiting until it’s too late.

The good news is that your current TikTok ad campaigns can be successfully transitioned to YouTube Shorts, opening up copious opportunities. Ready to take the leap and thrive on a new platform? Send us a message below, and let us help you elevate your ad performance as you move from TikTok to YouTube Shorts ads.

YouTube Ads for Traffic and Action Campaigns: Do They Work?

YouTube is well known for brand awareness, and the numbers speak for themselves. Take Pringles’ Super Bowl bumper ad campaign—it generated 120 million impressions, proving the platform’s strength in reach-focused advertising. This is just one of many success stories demonstrating why YouTube ads are effective for awareness campaigns.

And it’s not just major brands that can maximize YouTube ads’ effectiveness. With the right strategy, businesses of all sizes can drive both brand awareness and bottom-funnel actions by using YouTube ads for website clicks, lead generation, and sales.

YouTube Video Campaigns For Every Stage of the Funnel

Indeed, YouTube is widely known for its strength in brand awareness campaigns, but its advertising capabilities go beyond just reach. 

Whether your goal is to drive website traffic, generate leads, or increase conversions, running ads on YouTube can be effective at every stage of the marketing funnel. Let’s break down how YouTube ads work across different campaign objectives.

Awareness – Top of the Funnel

Consideration – Middle of the Funnel

Conversion – Bottom of the Funnel

Why YouTube Ads Are Effective for Lower-Funnel Campaigns

YouTube stands out in lower-funnel advertising by combining intent-driven user behavior with AI-powered ad delivery, making it a highly effective conversion tool. This unique combination proves YouTube ads’ effectiveness by serving ads to the right audience at the right time, strengthening engagement, and driving conversions.

Here’s how YouTube ads drive results for your traffic and action campaigns:

Leveraging User Intent and Behavior

One of the biggest advantages of YouTube ads for traffic and conversion campaigns is the platform’s ability to align with user intent. Unlike passive social feeds, YouTube users actively search and engage with video content, making them more likely to take action when presented with relevant ads.

For example, if you’re preparing YouTube traffic ads for Amazon Prime Day, positioning your watch brand alongside videos featuring “Best Amazon Prime Day Deals” or “Top Influencer Gift Ideas” makes sure your ad reaches high-intent shoppers at the right moment.

Beyond standard targeting options like location, device, and language, Custom Audiences allow advertisers to build highly specific audience segments that can be used and refined across multiple campaigns. This is particularly valuable for seasonal and holiday-focused YouTube campaigns, where granular audience segmentation can improve ad relevance and engagement.

By building Custom Audiences, you can tap into users’ existing intent to watch and engage with video content, with the ability to link your products or services to relevant user behavior. Even more, Demand Gen campaigns extend this reach beyond YouTube, providing broader brand visibility and higher conversion potential.

Integration with Google and Its Vast Ad Network

Another key factor making YouTube ads effective for traffic and conversion campaigns is its integration with Google’s advertising network. This allows precise targeting through in-market audiences and remarketing, allowing you to expand your reach to individuals who are already familiar with your brand or have profiles similar to your current customer base.

For lower-funnel campaign types like Demand Gen or YouTube video conversions, you can maximize your reach across a broad range of placements, including:

• YouTube (In-stream, In-feed, Shorts)
• Google Discover
• Gmail
• Google Display Network (GDN)

Even for awareness campaigns, YouTube’s reach extends beyond the app itself. For instance, Connected TV (CTV) placements on Google TV and YouTube TV provide even greater exposure with larger screen placements.

By opting into Google’s Display Network video partners, your ads can reach a broader audience, bringing your brand to users in various contexts and increasing the potential for both awareness and conversions.

Designed for Engaged Views Gearing Toward Conversions

YouTube campaigns like Demand Gen and Video View Campaigns are specifically designed to drive conversions, not just views. As highlighted in the full-funnel strategy earlier, YouTube’s closed-loop attribution creates a seamless synergy between each stage of the funnel—from awareness to conversion.

To help illustrate how this works, let’s walk through an example of a full-funnel YouTube ad campaign for a fast-food restaurant (QSR). This will show how initial awareness views can be nurtured into website traffic and ultimately drive purchases.

Full-Funnel YouTube Ad Campaign Strategy: Fast-Food Restaurant (QSR)

Funnel Stage	Goal	Target Audience	Creative Assets & Messaging	Ad Format & Optimization	Targeting Strategy	Bidding Strategy
Awareness	Maximize reach and brand awareness	Sports fans (NFL, NBA, Olympics) Foodies, late-night eaters	6s Bumper Ad: Quick visuals of specialty burgers with brand tagline. 15s Skippable In-Stream: Showcasing seasonal burgers, CTA for brand recall.	Video Reach Campaigns (to optimize reach and frequency efficiently)	YouTube Audiences (sports fans, fast-food lovers) Affinity and Custom Audiences Broad reach with frequency capping (2-3x per week)	CPM-based bidding for maximum reach at lowest cost
Consideration	Drive engagement and educate audiences	Sports fans Foodies, late-night eaters Remarketing Segments: Users who viewed Awareness campaign ads	Skippable In-Stream & In-Feed Ads: Showcasing seasonal specialty burgers, linking to landing page. Shorts Ads: Optimized vertical format with fast visuals.	Video View Campaigns (to optimize for high engagement and ad recall)	Custom Audiences (users engaging with food delivery apps, sports content) Remarketing (users who watched Awareness ads) YouTube channel engagement audiences	Maximize Views (to drive high intent audience engagement)
Conversion	Drive online orders	Sports fans Foodies, late-night eaters Remarketing Segments: Users from Awareness & Consideration campaigns, website visitors, engaged users	Skippable In-Stream & In-Feed Ads: 1:Kitchen staff preparing specialty burger, linking to delivery page. 2:Family receiving delivery while watching sports. Shorts Ads:Optimized vertical versions.	Video Action Campaigns / Demand Gen (to drive direct conversions)	Website visitors & cart abandoners Users who engaged with Consideration campaign ads Lookalike audiences based on past purchasers	Maximize Conversions (to optimize for online orders)

The expected outcomes of this full-funnel YouTube ad strategy include increased brand awareness and ad recall among sports audiences and food lovers during key seasonal events, ensuring a strong top-of-mind presence. Engagement rates will rise through interactive ad formats and remarketing efforts, driving users from awareness to consideration.

From here, using optimized bidding strategies and audience targeting, the campaign will maximize online orders, particularly during peak periods like the holidays and the Super Bowl. Ultimately, the strategy ensures cost efficiency while maintaining high performance across all funnel stages, creating a continuous loop of audience engagement, re-engagement, and conversion.

Achieving Your Target ROI with Strategic YouTube Advertising

By now, we hope we’ve shown you just how effective YouTube ads can be—not only for brand awareness but also for traffic and action campaigns. Driving website clicks, online orders, and in-store traffic through YouTube ads is entirely achievable. Many brands have done it successfully, and with the right strategy, you can do it, too.

Partnering with an experienced YouTube ads agency can help you build a full-funnel campaign tailored to your goals and maximize your YouTube ads ROI.

Ready to take your YouTube campaigns to the launching stages? Get in touch with us below, and our team will be happy to reach out and guide you through your YouTube advertising journey.

Guide to Transitioning Your TikTok Ads to Instagram Reels

If the TikTok ban proceeds without a resolution, advertisers will need a new platform to reallocate their ad spend. With 170 million U.S. TikTok users, now “TikTok refugees”, seeking a new home for short-form content, Instagram Reels is emerging as the top alternative.

Instagram Reels offers an experience that closely mirrors TikTok’s feed, making it a natural transition for audiences and advertisers. Plus, with Instagram’s foundation in photo and video content, brands gain expanded opportunities beyond short-form video.

For advertisers looking to move TikTok ads to Instagram Reels, the transition may seem straightforward. And with the right tools and strategy, it can be. This guide will walk you through everything you need to run ads on Instagram Reels and successfully make the switch.

Why Choose Instagram Reels

Did you know that Reels now make up 38.5% of the content on users’ Instagram feeds? That’s nearly on par with the platform’s original focus—photos, which account for 39.8% of shared content. Despite launching later in August 2020, the growth of this content format is surely not going unnoticed.

Rising Popularity and Engagement

In the plight of the news of TikTok restrictions from 2024, Reels was already the first choice of U.S. users. Based on MGH, Inc.’s survey, about 60% say they will jump to this platform if it totally closes down.

Instagram Reels can easily be seen as TikTok’s competitor, with its significant share of the short-form video audience. While TikTok leads with a 5.53% engagement rate, Instagram Reels is closely behind at 4.36%. The platform is also seeing consistent growth, with a 3.7% YoY increase in user count, further boosting its appeal.

For brands leveraging influencer marketing, Instagram has introduced new updates. One of which is Trial Reels, which allow content creators to A/B test their videos before releasing them to the public.

Additionally, Instagram Reels now allows videos up to 3 minutes long, providing more time for creators and advertisers alike to connect with audiences.

Meta’s Robust Ad Ecosystem

While TikTok captures about a third of the U.S. population, Meta’s dominance in social media advertising is unmatched. With Facebook and Instagram holding 77% and 56% of the U.S. social media market, respectively, TikTok trails behind in fourth place at 45%.

Meta also leads in digital ad spending with a 21.3% share in the U.S. and commands an even larger 74.5% of social media ad spend. This makes advertising on Instagram Reels a strategic move, allowing brands to tap into Meta’s extensive ecosystem.

Beyond Instagram Reels, advertisers gain access to Facebook video placements, Feeds, and Meta Audience Network, which extends its reach across over 10 million publishers.

Stability Amid Regulatory Challenges

With TikTok facing ongoing scrutiny in the U.S., advertisers need a reliable and stable platform to continue reaching their audiences. As part of Meta, Instagram offers a more secure advertising environment, backed by an established U.S. presence and strong financial performance—Meta stocks saw a nearly two-thirds increase by the end of Q4 2024.

Even before the January 19 TikTok ban, creators were already directing their audiences to Instagram as their new content hub. This shift underscores Instagram’s role as the primary beneficiary of ad spend reallocation and the trust and long-term stability the platform provides for brands and advertisers.

Is Instagram Reels the Right Choice?

TikTok has built a unique space in short-form video, but does Instagram Reels truly compare? If you’re considering shifting from TikTok ads to Instagram Reels advertising, it’s important to understand the similarities and differences.

Let’s break down how these platforms align for advertisers and what you need to consider when making the switch.

Audience Demographics

Instagram Reels ads reach users starting at age 18, and Instagram’s audience closely mirrors TikTok’s, especially among younger demographics. In fact, 78% of U.S. adults aged 18-29 use Instagram, compared to 62% on TikTok. Here’s how the two platforms stack up across different age groups:

Age Group	Instagram	TikTok
18-29	78%	62%
30-49	60%	38%
50-64	35%	25%
65+	15%	10%

While younger users are active on both platforms, Instagram has a notable advantage in reaching older demographics—particularly users 30 and above, such as parents, families, and professionals. This makes Instagram Reels a strong alternative for targeting a wider age range beyond Gen Z.

Diversifying Ad Spend

According to eMarketer data, Instagram is set to capture up to 22% of ad spend reallocation. This puts Instagram ahead of its partner app, Facebook (17%), and YouTube (10%), making it the top alternative for advertisers shifting budgets from TikTok.

But what about ad costs? Does transitioning from TikTok ads to Instagram Reels mean a higher cost with the incoming competition? Jump to our costs and budget discussion for an in-depth look at Strike Social’s ad cost data for TikTok and Instagram.

Instagram Reels vs. TikTok Ads: Key Differences to Consider Before the Move

You’ve noticed the similarities—where TikTok and Instagram overlap, the shared features, and the advantages you can leverage. Now, let’s examine how the actual campaign preparation and setup differ. We’ll explore the creative process, ad campaign setup, and optimization as you transition from TikTok to Instagram Reels advertising.

Creative Adjustments

While both TikTok ads and Instagram Reels use a 9:16 vertical format, their safe zones, ad specs, and text placements differ. Optimize your video ad creatives for Instagram Reels’ layout to ensure a smooth transition. For a clearer view, let’s visualize this:

A side-by-side comparison reveals that moving your ad from TikTok to Instagram Reels offers a larger safe zone. TikTok’s ad layout accommodates up to four lines of text, requiring additional space at the bottom—an area that should be kept free of calls to action (CTAs).

Additionally, primary text on Instagram Reels appears in a smaller font size compared to TikTok, providing more space when transferring your video ad.

Refer to the table below to make sure your TikTok ads are compatible with Instagram Reels’ specifications. It outlines the minimum requirements to guarantee that when you switch from TikTok to Instagram Reels advertising, you’ll maintain (or even improve) the visual resolution for your audience’s view.

With the data above in mind, you can now tweak your image or video ad creatives to be more compatible before you launch your paid ads on Instagram. Keep in mind that you are entering a more aesthetically coordinated type of content platform, and it’s important to make the right impression with your Instagram Reels ads.

Costs and Budget

As you finalize your transition from TikTok to Instagram Reels ads, ad spend and campaign budget will definitely be important factors to consider. Without understanding how competitive Instagram advertising can be, you might be concerned about the potential increase in costs when making the switch.

To help you make an informed decision, let’s take a look at Strike Social’s campaign data:

CPM and CTR Trends

Many brands are vying for brand awareness on TikTok, leading to historically higher CPMs on the platform. Although TikTok’s CPM for Q1 2025 is projected to drop to $4.20 due to the impending ban, you can also expect lower engagement, especially if your primary audience targeting is largely or exclusively U.S.-based.

This trend has already been observed at the end of Q4, when TikTok’s CPM began to narrow the gap with Instagram CPM. Strike Social’s data further shows that while TikTok’s click-through rates (CTR) have been higher, there is a noticeable drop as the January ban approaches. During the same period, Instagram’s CTR continued to rise, highlighting the growing effectiveness of Instagram Reels advertising and demonstrating that it can now compete on equal footing with TikTok.

As indicated in the data, if impressions and brand awareness are your primary goals, based on our data (and with the steady user growth on IG),  Instagram offers lower CPM trends compared to TikTok. While Q4 does show an uptick in rates—likely due to the holiday season—these higher CPMs are still relatively close to the previous month’s levels, rather than a drastic peak.

TikTok vs. Instagram Cost Benchmarks

To give you a better sense of the cost differences, here’s a quick comparison of cost benchmarks for various campaign types on TikTok and Instagram:

Cost Metrics	Instagram Benchmarks	TikTok Benchmarks
CPM	$1.28 to $4.63	$8.62 to $12.00
CPC	$0.38 to $2.94	$0.89 to $2.00
CPV	$0.0060 to $0.0208	$0.10 to $0.30

It’s clear that Instagram can now match TikTok’s cost levels, particularly in terms of CPM and CPV. While you’ll need to adjust your campaign budget for Instagram advertising, the data suggests it will ultimately be a more efficient investment.

However, competition is likely to increase as more brands consider making the switch, which could raise these costs over time. With the right agency partner, you can optimize your costs while ensuring campaign performance stays strong. Learn more about how we can help you make the switch by scheduling a personalized walkthrough of our AdTech services.

Ad Setup, Targeting, and Campaign Management

While ad management software is generally easy to understand once you’re familiar with how it works, there will be some unfamiliar terms and tools that differ from what you’re used to.

One basic thing, though, is that both TikTok and Meta Ads Manager funnel down starting from Campaign to Ad Groups or Ad Sets and Ads level. However, for instance, TikTok classifies views as 2-second views, 6-second views, and video view-through. For Instagram (Meta), the classification for video views goes from 2-second video plays to 3-second video plays and ThruPlay.

To help simplify your process, we’re going to give you some of the things you can adapt to while shifting your ads over from TikTok to Instagram Reels:

Ad Placements

• TikTok: Available ad placements include TopView (the first ad shown upon opening the app) and In-Feed (For You, Search, Profile). In TikTok Ads Manager, you cannot specifically choose which placement you want your ad to appear in. However, you can deselect the tick box if you do not want your ads to appear in the Search Feed or search results.
• Instagram: Available ad placements include Reels, Explore, and In-Stream (post-loop). In Meta Ads Manager, you can choose to promote exclusively on Instagram Reels or expand to other placements. If you select Advantage+, Meta will automatically determine the placements where your video ad will perform best within the Meta Audience Network.

Audience Targeting

• TikTok and Instagram Reels offer similar audience targeting options. Meta recently added DMA targeting (introduced in 2023), which was already available on TikTok since 2021.
• A key distinction lies in Custom Audiences:
  • TikTok requires a minimum of 1,000 users in a Custom Audience to begin targeting matched users.
  • Meta only requires a minimum of 100 users, making it easier to refine your ad audience with smaller lists.

Ad Monitoring and Management

• Both TikTok Ads Manager and Meta Ads Manager provide comprehensive ad monitoring tools designed for their respective platforms. For a quick comparison, here’s a side-by-side view of TikTok Ads Manager and Meta Ads Manager:

• Getting familiar with a completely new platform may take some time and require adjustment. Browse through our Meta Ads Manager guide to begin your learning.

Make the Switch to Instagram Ads Without Sacrificing Performance

TikTok is still very much active to this point, that much is true. But for U.S. advertisers, your local audiences can still be reached through other mediums that don’t compromise your costs and keep traffic and sales coming through. Your priority now is to never let your ad campaigns go dark, and moving TikTok ads to Instagram Reels may just be the best decision you make.

Simplify this transition by partnering with the right experts and using the right tools. Strike Social specializes in ad activation and management, easing the burden on your in-house advertising team and taking care of the heavy lifting for you.

Ready to make the move to Instagram Reels? Contact Strike Social today to get your Instagram ads up and running.

The digital marketing landscape is constantly evolving. Each year brings exciting new technologies, strategies, and shifting consumer behaviors that compel marketers to adapt and innovate. As we enter 2025, this dynamic field presents even more opportunities and hurdles you need to embrace and overcome to stay competitive.

From artificial intelligence (AI) advancements and social media marketing evolution to the rise of short-form videos, staying ahead of these trends will help you connect with your audience in creative and meaningful ways.

In this article, I’ll discuss seven transformative digital marketing trends set to shape the industry and how you can leverage them to thrive in a competitive landscape.

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What’s Next in Digital Marketing: 2025 Trends to Watch

1. Voice and Visual Search 

How consumers search for information online is one of the digital marketing trends set to revolutionize the industry. Tools like Alexa, Siri, and Google Assistant have made voice search an integral part of our lives, while visual search options like Google Lens and Pinterest Lens are unlocking new ways to discover products and services.

You’ll need to create visually rich and voice-friendly content to adapt to this shift. Here are some tips to optimize for voice and visual search and improve your SEO strategy:

• Use descriptive image tagging and alt text to ensure visuals are discoverable
• Include long-tail conversational keywords that mimic natural speech for voice SEO
• List your products on visual-heavy platforms like Pinterest and Google Shopping

2. Short-Form Video Content

Attention spans are growing thinner, and platforms like TikTok, Instagram Reels, and YouTube Shorts are thriving. These platforms prioritize quick, captivating, and value-packed videos. This explains why 39% of marketers find short-form videos lasting 30-60 seconds as the most effective, as shown below.

Short-form videos grab attention quickly, delivering your message concisely. The best part? Modern video-making tools empower you to create professional-quality content without advanced technical skills or costly equipment. Get started with a comprehensive guide to streamline your video creation process.

Here are some short-form video ideas you can incorporate:

• Focus on storytelling. Create compelling narratives that evoke emotions, humor, or thought-provoking messages within a brief moment
• Invest in skippable ads and sponsored reels to increase visibility without annoying users
• Leverage trends like challenges, memes, and popular audio tracks to stay relevant

3. Generative AI in Marketing 

The rise of AI is among the digital marketing trends revolutionizing every aspect of modern business operations. In fact, 56% of organizations look forward to improving productivity and efficiency with AI, while 35% anticipate reducing operation costs, as shown below.

Generative AI, in particular, allows you to create content and designs, use text to create images, and even strategize in a fraction of the time you usually take.

For instance, you can use ChatGPT Plus to draft high-quality content for your startup pitch deck slides, Midjourney to design stunning visuals, and Synthesis to produce high-quality voiceovers.

Other ways you can use generative AI to scale your marketing efforts include:

• Use AI-powered analytics tools to predict customer behaviors, measure campaign performance, and optimize ad targeting
• Utilize DALL·E to create custom images, infographics, or ad visuals 
• Leverage AI tools to create personalized email campaigns, ad copy, and blog content tailored to your audience segments

4. Social Media Advertising 

Digital marketing trends are stretching as far as disrupting generic social media ads. Thanks to AI and machine learning, social media advertising is becoming more personalized, engaging, and data-driven.

You can now create hyper-personalized ads that resonate deeply with your target audience while using data-driven insights from AI-powered analytics tools to refine your campaigns and maximize ROI. 

For instance, you can enhance your LinkedIn lead generation strategy by targeting specific job titles, industries, and company sizes to reach decision-makers and influencers.

What’s more, platforms like Instagram and TikTok now feature shoppable ads, where users can buy directly from their feeds.

To get the most out of your ad campaigns in 2025:

• Emphasize personalization while respecting user privacy. Tailor your ads using anonymized data to balance relevance with trust.
• Explore new ad formats, like augmented reality experiences or product demos in reels
• Test, analyze, and refine your ads constantly to keep up with algorithm changes

5. Community Building 

Instead of chasing every potential lead, brands are now cultivating loyal, engaged communities where meaningful interactions flourish. Platforms like Discord and private Facebook groups offer intimate spaces for organic interactions and engagement.

A thriving community can amplify your reach organically by sharing your content, offering testimonials, and defending your brand in these public forums. 

To build a vibrant community:

• Engage in genuine interactions and respond to feedback and concerns
• Offer exclusive perks, such as loyalty points or early access to products or special events
• Focus on niche interests to attract the right people, not just more people

6. Interactive and Immersive Content 

Consumers now want to be part of a brand’s experience. That’s why interactive and immersive content will be one of the biggest digital marketing trends this coming year.

Interactive experiences like polls, quizzes, and live webinars or Q&A sessions can captivate your audience, keep them engaged longer, and leave lasting impressions. In fact, about 35% of marketers globally reported polls and quizzes as one of the most effective types of interactive content, as shown below. 

You can also take it up a notch with augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR). These tools allow potential customers to try products and experience virtual showrooms virtually. And you don’t have to do it alone—leveraging a well-trained virtual assistant can help you manage and moderate these interactive experiences seamlessly.

7. Sustainability and Ethical Marketing 

Today’s consumers don’t just care about what you sell. They support brands that care about the environment, practice ethical business, and value transparency. According to a Nielsen report, 17% of consumers purchased from sustainable brands, while 14% chose transparent brands.

Brands like Patagonia are already leading with eco-friendly initiatives, as illustrated below.

With the help of a sustainability business mentor, you can follow suit. Here are some tips to help you get started:

• Infuse your marketing with messages of transparency, ethical practices, and environmental consciousness
• Publish sustainability reports and share progress on eco-friendly initiatives authentically
• Showcase eco-friendly sourcing and manufacturing practices, such as carbon-neutral shipping or sustainable packaging
• Collaborate with organizations or causes that align with your brand values

Conclusion 

The future of digital marketing is packed with possibilities, but success depends on your ability to stay agile. Whether it’s harnessing the power of AI, embracing short-form video, or committing to sustainability efforts, each digital marketing trend offers a chance to connect more deeply with your audience.

So, which of these digital marketing trends will you embrace first? Start experimenting today, and let 2025 be the year your brand takes the lead in digital transformation.

Have some great content up your sleeve? We invite you to reach out to us. We are excited to collaborate with talented writers and feature high-quality content on our blogs.

Feel the Love With Our 2025 Valentine’s Day Advertising Guidebook

As the first major holiday following the Q4 rush, Valentine’s Day offers the perfect opportunity to kick off your 2025 advertising efforts with fresh ideas and dynamic campaigns. Known as a season of love and thoughtful gifting, it’s a time for brands to connect with audiences on an emotional level and celebrate relationships.

This year, we’re bringing you the latest trends and actionable strategies to lock in your Valentine’s Day ad campaigns capture hearts—and deliver results.

Top Valentine’s Day Trends for 2025

Before we discuss specific advertising insights, let’s first explore what consumers are thinking about this Valentine’s Day. Understanding what shoppers are searching for, where they’re shopping, and how they plan to celebrate provides guidance for shaping your paid social strategies.

Ideas for Valentine’s Day Gifts

When it comes to Valentine’s Day gift ideas, sweet treats like chocolates and candy continue to reign supreme, with 52% of consumers listing them as their go-to choice. Flowers and gift cards take second and third spots, hinting at celebrations that range from intimate dinners at home to outings at restaurants or bars.

Shopping Destinations

Online retailers remain the top choice for Valentine’s Day shoppers, with 36.55% favoring Amazon for gift purchases. However, physical stores are not far behind, as 36.37% of consumers still prefer shopping in-store.

Interestingly, even with a projected rise in overall spending, about 3 in 10 U.S. consumers prioritize affordability, opting for lower-cost gifts. This trend makes discount stores, alongside department stores and local businesses, a key destination for Valentine’s Day shoppers.

Choice of Celebrations

Will your audience be staying in or heading out this Valentine’s Day? According to Statista, more than 20% of U.S. consumers plan to celebrate with a home-cooked meal. Interestingly, many celebrations are expected to occur before or after February 14, as consumers aim to avoid crowded restaurants and high costs associated with peak Valentine’s Day activities.

Valentine’s Day isn’t just for couples. In 2024, 29% of Valentine’s Day spending was dedicated to celebrating with friends, coworkers, and classmates. This growing trend of “Galentine’s Day” or group celebrations highlights that love comes in many forms—romantic, platonic, or professional.

Love is indeed everywhere, and this just proves that advertising during Valentine’s Day is not just for flowers and chocolate brands, right?

Valentine’s Day Advertising Insights on Paid Social Media

Even if your brand doesn’t offer traditional Valentine’s Day gifts or experiences, there’s still ample opportunity in social media advertising. Whether you’re a sports brand or an industrial service company, your Valentine’s Day ad campaigns can be tailored to resonate with a wide audience.

As mentioned earlier, Valentine’s Day is not only about romantic love. People celebrate various forms of love, making Valentine’s Day ad campaigns highly versatile. Check out these insights and trends to guide your advertising strategy this year:

YouTube Ad Trends for Valentine’s Campaigns

As with other major holidays like Halloween and Thanksgiving, Valentine’s Day sees a significant spike in activity, particularly during the week of the event. But how much of a spike can you expect? Let’s take a look at our YouTube data for Awareness campaigns:

If you’re mainly advertising on YouTube for your Valentine’s Day 2025 ads, expect higher CPM (cost per thousand impressions) during the event week. CPM starts to rise during the last two weeks of January, stabilizes for a short period, and then spikes back up on Valentine’s Day week.

For YouTube bumper ads, the optimal period for awareness campaigns is two weeks before Valentine’s Day, continuing through the first week of March.

Views-focused campaigns follow a similar pattern during the week of Valentine’s Day. The cost-per-view (CPV) trend favors Video View Campaigns more, showing steady movement during Q1. 

Early spikes are also seen by the last week of January. As February progresses and into March, YouTube VVC shows more stable results.

Facebook Advertising Insights for Valentine’s Week

With online shopping dominating this Valentine’s Day, Facebook, the largest social media platform in the U.S., should definitely be part of your advertising strategy. If you’re considering launching your Valentine’s Day ad campaigns on Facebook, our data indicates you’re in good hands.

During Valentine’s Day Week, Facebook campaigns tend to show relatively stable performance in both top and mid-funnel efforts. Let’s take a closer look at the data:

Last year’s Valentine’s Day campaigns proved successful, with both awareness and click-focused campaigns performing well during the event week. Our Facebook advertising cost benchmarks for CPM ranged from $2.78 to $9.60, and our Q1 data shows an average of $3.51 to $5.91. For the Valentine’s Day week specifically, our Campaign Lab insights show CPM levels between $3.95 and $5.82.

Click-focused campaigns also showed positive trends, with Q1 CPC ranging from $0.14 to $0.72 (vs. $0.14 to $0.72 benchmarks). We expect Valentine’s Day 2025 trends to exhibit an identical pattern, especially with the 8.5% increase in ad spending as 2024 closed.

As we previously indicated from our Valentine’s Day 2024 trends, being specific in the target audience interest may raise costs. However, Valentine’s Day ad campaigns on Facebook show that February sees a lower cost level right after the mid-January peak. Costs stabilize as we approach March Madness and the end of Q1, creating an optimistic outlook for Valentine’s Day campaigns on Facebook.

While it’s common to see high peaks in ad activity during the event itself—just like any other holiday—this shouldn’t deter you from focusing on your campaign goals and driving more traffic or sales during Valentine’s Day.

Stay ahead of every holiday event by knowing the best times to ramp up or scale back your campaigns. Subscribe to our newsletter for the latest advertising news, trends, and updates on paid social media.

Leap Into Success with Your Valentine’s Day 2025 Advertising

It’s a given that paid social media advertising is not for the faint of heart. Thus, your Valentine’s Day ad campaigns should also be resilient and adaptable to make sure you get the best results at the best costs.

Strike Social offers a data-driven approach to maximize the effectiveness of your paid social campaigns. With over 10 years of machine learning combined with our proprietary tool, Campaign Lab, and the expertise of our media buyers, we’re here to help you surpass your Valentine’s Day 2025 campaign goals. 

Schedule a demo with our team to discuss your campaign targets and how we can help you succeed.

Your Ultimate 2025 Super Bowl Ads Strategy From Kickoff to Touchdown

The 2025 Super Bowl is just around the corner, with the Detroit Lions and Kansas City Chiefs emerging as fan favorites for this season’s championship showdown. But while the NFL playoffs heat up, the real competition for advertisers happens off the field—fighting for coveted Super Bowl commercials and top social media ad placements.

With over two-thirds of Americans tuning in as NFL fans, the Super Bowl’s cultural impact is undeniable. From Taylor Swift’s appearances at Chiefs games to Jason Kelce’s post-retirement ESPN broadcasts, and Kendrick Lamar’s highly anticipated halftime performance at Super Bowl LIX in the Caesars Superdome, the event is as much a pop culture phenomenon as it is a sports event.

For brands, this presents an extraordinary opportunity to connect with sports audiences and more. However, with intense competition in TV and social media ad spaces, creating a winning campaign requires a strong 2025 Super Bowl ads strategy.

How Are Social Media and the Super Bowl Connected?

Short-form video content has transformed the way sports fans engage with events like the NFL playoffs and the Super Bowl. Platforms like YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram have become go-to destinations for fans to consume bite-sized highlights, real-time updates, and behind-the-scenes moments. 

While NFL games are traditionally TV-driven spectacles, social media amplifies the experience, keeping fans engaged between games and hyping up major events like the Super Bowl. The buzz intensifies online as the big game approaches, connecting brands with highly engaged audiences eager to interact with Super Bowl-related content.

Early Super Bowl Buzz Since Q4

The Super Bowl conversation starts long before game day. Brand24 data reveals that by December 2024, mentions of the Super Bowl had already reached a social media reach of 94 million. Additionally, spending on 2025 Super Bowl ads reached an estimated $31.55 million, highlighting how brands have embraced the hype to secure their place in the conversation.

Super Bowl Social Media Reach by Platform

Each social media platform has its moment to shine during the Super Bowl. Here’s a breakdown of the engagement stats from the 2024 Super Bowl, showcasing how each network plays a unique role in connecting with audiences:

How Will Brands Use Social Media in Super Bowl Advertising This Year?

Social media advertising’s versatility is vast now—from the usual video ads to AR filters, interactive add-ons and stickers, and more. Brands can take advantage of many features in social media advertising platforms when preparing for their 2025 Super Bowl ads strategy. 

Here are just a few of the ways that brands can engage NFL fans in Super Bowl advertising campaigns:

Break into Cross-Device Experiences

Mobile devices dominate YouTube viewership, with an estimated 47.9% share for 2024. However, Connected TV (CTV) is proving to be a formidable contender. According to Strike Social’s Q3 2024 report, CTV campaigns boasted a 76% view rate, edging out mobile’s 73%.

The takeaway? A successful Super Bowl ads strategy for 2025 should target both mobile devices and CTV screens to maximize reach across large and small-screen audiences.

Further, Brian Wieser of Madison and Wall projects a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 7% for sports programming spending through 2026, encompassing major events like the NBA, Olympics, NASCAR, and the NFL. This surge in spending signals the rising demand for sports content across all platforms.

Advertisers should also consider YouTube TV’s growing share of game-day viewership. During the 2024 Super Bowl, YouTube TV accounted for 14% of viewership, translating to over 17.3 million viewers out of the total 123.7 million audience. These figures highlight the value of targeting mobile users and CTV viewers to capture diverse audiences on game day.

Tapping Into the eSports and Gaming Community

Super Bowl ad audiences extend far beyond stadium-goers and social media followers—they also include eSports enthusiasts and the gaming community. These groups share a natural connection to competitive sports and team dynamics, making them an untapped audience for Super Bowl ads.

The U.S. eSports market is thriving, valued at approximately $1.07 billion in 2024. Moreover, the video game industry in the U.S. includes around 190.6 million players, 76% of whom are aged 18 and above—making them prime targets for Super Bowl advertising.

Another layer to consider is the sports betting community, which adds even more opportunities for brands to connect. NFL fans placing bets on Super Bowl odds represent a highly engaged audience subset. Localized campaigns can be particularly impactful in states where sports betting is legal, aligning your ads with state-specific opportunities outlined by the American Gaming Association.

The “Taylor Swift Effect” Still Going Strong

Taylor Swift has proven to be an ultimate force capable of boosting brands to unprecedented recognition—a phenomenon famously dubbed the “Taylor Swift effect.” Her influence spans diverse industries, from small businesses to established brands. Her recent appearances for boyfriend, Travis Kelce’s, NFL games have expanded football’s reach to the dedicated “Swiftie” demographic, bridging the gap between sports and pop culture.

Swift’s endorsements are often subtle yet highly effective, showcasing products regularly found across platforms like Amazon and TikTok Shop. Here are a few examples of her influential picks over the past year:

Even during the 2024 Super Bowl, brands have seen success by tapping into narratives that resonate with Swift’s audience. For instance, Cetaphil’s 30-second TV ad spot featured a father and daughter reconnecting, which received acclaim partly due to its emotional relevance to NFL fans and Swifties alike.

Similarly, by capitalizing on influencer collaborations, you can use the same playbook for your 2025 Super Bowl ads strategy. Partnering with influencers can help expand your reach and engage audiences more effectively. Start by identifying accounts with strong followings and high engagement in sports and lifestyle spaces.

Here’s a short list of top influencers to consider for your campaigns during Super Bowl 59:

Super Bowl Marketing Strategies for Paid Social Ads

Now that you know how paid social can help you reach NFL fans, here are 2025 Super Bowl ads strategies to help you connect with engaged audiences this season:

Promoted Super Bowl Ads on X (Twitter)

Align Promoted Ads with the Game Moments

• Stay ahead of the game by sharing relevant Promoted Tweets that engage your audience in real-time. There’s no need to wait for the Super Bowl champion—capitalize on the excitement as the NFL playoffs kick off on January 12. With predictions circulating about which teams will make it to the big game, this is the perfect moment to join the conversation.
• With X Promoted Ads, you can position your brand at the top of search results when users look up “Super Bowl” or related content. Your ads can also appear within sports-centered feeds, reaching users whose interactions are focused on NFL-related tweets.

Super Bowl Advertising on Instagram

Partner Up with Nano Influencers

• Instagram is the top platform for influencer collaborations, with 72% of marketers choosing it for their campaigns. To add, influencer partnerships on Instagram yield the highest ROI at 30%, surpassing Facebook’s 20%.
• Focus on influencers whose content revolves around the NFL playoffs, Super Bowl ad predictions, or sports content in general. This allows you to tap into their engaged audience through Partnership Ads, extending your reach.
• On average, influencer partnership campaigns on Instagram see a 2.2% engagement rate. Partnering with nano influencers can increase this to 5%. With 65% of influencer accounts being nano influencers, there’s a large pool of potential collaborators for your Super Bowl ads.

Using Super Bowl in TikTok Advertising

Drive UGC with Branded Hashtag Challenges

• For their 2023 NFL Super Bowl marketing, Doritos launched the #DoritosTriangleTryout challenge. To join, users must create a “triangle-inspired dance” for a chance to be featured during the big game. TikTok influencers like Josh Killacky and Lizzie Lu quickly joined the trend, resulting in the branded hashtag amassing over 12 billion views.
• Get creative with your own branded hashtag to promote your 2025 Super Bowl ads. For example, Quick Service Restaurants (QSRs) are popular on game day, with 1 in 7 Americans ordering takeout during the game.
• Encourage customers to share their favorite game-day snacks with a hashtag like #[YourRestaurantName]SnackChallenge. UGC will help spark buzz and expand your reach, as your patrons’ communities share their videos, spreading your brand’s presence.

Super Bowl Ads on YouTube and its Networks

Big Screens for the Big Game

• YouTube is now a major player in Connected TV, alongside platforms like Roku, Amazon, Hulu, and Netflix. By 2026, YouTube’s revenue from CTV is projected to quadruple. When compared to other U.S. streaming services, YouTube holds the top share in both ad time (4.6%) and time spent (9.9%).
• Advertising on YouTube allows brands to tap into ad inventory across various networks, including YouTube TV and Google TV. With YouTube TV’s 8 million users and Google TV’s 20 million, brands can make a significant impact without the high cost of advertising during the Super Bowl.

YouTube Shorts for Fast, Shareable Content

• Let’s not forget that YouTube is a mobile app first, and thus, mobile users should never be ignored. Our data from Q1 encompassing the 2024 Super Bowl, showing the share of impressions and views, highlights how mobile and CTV placements level the playing field:

• Along with CTV placements, focusing on short-form content on YouTube Shorts can help you reach more sports-engaged audiences, boosting your Super Bowl ads’ performance even further. If you’re focusing on a Views-centric approach, a good 2025 Super Bowl ads strategy would include a YouTube Video Views Campaign, where you can take advantage of YouTube Shorts, skippable in-stream, and in-feed placements.
• Based on our 2024 Campaign Lab data, here’s a snapshot of view rates for different industries during January to March:

• As we can see, industries like gambling (which ties into sports betting), adult beverages, and food are big draws for NFL fans watching the Super Bowl. However, even if you’re a non-sports brand like automotive or finance, our YouTube data shows you can still effectively reach Super Bowl fans and sports audiences.
• By utilizing precise audience targeting and segmentation, paired with continuous optimization, you can ensure your 2025 Super Bowl ads strategy succeeds.

Is Your Paid Social Ads Strategy Now Super Bowl-Ready?

The 2025 Super Bowl will be a highly competitive arena, with both sports and non-sports brands vying for ad space. Let’s be honest—while the $7 million price tag for a Super Bowl ad is out of reach for many, paid social media advertising offers a more cost-effective way to reach the same audience, at a fraction of the price.

Working with an experienced ad agency can significantly enhance the performance of your Super Bowl campaign. Share your 2025 goals with us, and let’s discuss how our SwaS (software with a service) solutions can help optimize your Super Bowl campaigns.

The Beginner’s Guide to YouTube Ads

Aside from the usual video content, one thing that’s probably more common is the amount of YouTube ads you see. While they may seem interruptive to some viewers, these ads actually introduce audiences to your brand and can even encourage them to visit your website or watch your ads in full. With an average of 48 minutes spent daily by users on the YouTube app, there are multiple ways to reach them across various formats and ad types.

Learn the basics of YouTube advertising, from targeting strategies to optimization techniques, to see how this platform can help you get your brand out there.

YouTube Ads Explained

As part of the Google ecosystem, YouTube has more reach than ever, with ads appearing not only on the YouTube app but also on YouTube TV and across the Google Display Network (GDN). 

If you’re familiar with YouTube ads at a surface level, we’ll guide you through every aspect of utilizing YouTube as an advertising platform for your business.

What Are YouTube Ads?

YouTube ads are video or animated ads that promote a brand through engaging content on YouTube and across Google’s Display Network. They can introduce audiences to your products, highlight services, or feature current promotions in a way that captures attention and drives action. 

When done right, a well-crafted YouTube ad strategy can reach up to 11 million views, achieve 2,000 conversions, and deliver as much as 7x ROAS.

YouTube Advertising Formats, Specs, and Safe Zones

YouTube offers a variety of ad formats that help you reach audiences across different screens and contexts. Whether you want to make a quick impact or engage viewers with a longer story, here’s a breakdown of the main YouTube ad formats:

• In-stream ads
  • YouTube in-stream ads play before, during, or after a YouTube video, often aligning with the viewer’s current video content or viewing habits.
  • Types of in-stream ads on YouTube:
    • Skippable In-Stream Ads
    • Non-Skippable In-Stream Ads
    • Bumper Ads
• In-feed ads
  • When browsing through the app or related videos of the current video you are watching, YouTube in-feed ads are inserted as you scroll through. These may auto-play without sound as viewers scroll, encouraging them to stop and engage.
  • Types of YouTube in-feed ads:
    • YouTube app in-feed
    • YouTube watch feed
    • Masthead ads (by reservation only)
• YouTube Shorts ads
  • Ads on YouTube Shorts appear in between videos as you scroll through the Shorts feed. For example, while enjoying a quick video on a new dance trend, an ad might pop up as you swipe to the next clip, offering a brief interlude before you continue browsing more Shorts content.
• Outstream ads
  • Your ads can reach audiences beyond YouTube through “outstream” placements on Google Video Partners (GVP) and the Google Display Network (GDN). These ads are shown on both mobile devices and desktops, allowing you to engage viewers who may not be actively browsing the YouTube app.
• Other formats
  • Mid-roll ads: Shown within videos longer than 8 minutes.
  • Back-to-back ads/ad pods: Two consecutive ads shown before or during a video.

The YouTube ad specs vary based on your campaign objectives and chosen formats. Whether targeting placements within the YouTube app or looking to advertise on YouTube TV and Google TV, ads can appear in either 16:9 or 9:16 formats. 

Here’s a quick overview of the essential YouTube ad video specs and technical requirements:

* For optimal quality, we recommend using HD resolutions whenever possible (vs. SD).

When complying with the YouTube ad sizes, take note that your entire ad might not be fully visible. Both the YouTube app and YouTube TV interface feature elements like the Skip Ad button and engagement options (like, share), which can obscure portions of your video.

To help with this, we’ve created YouTube ad safe zone guides to show you where to avoid placing text or CTAs, ensuring your ad remains fully visible within the safe zone.

Types of YouTube Advertising Campaigns

With a wide range of options for both organic and paid marketing on YouTube, it’s essential to choose the right type of paid ad campaign that aligns with your specific goals.

No matter your video advertising objective, there’s a YouTube ad campaign type designed to help you succeed—here’s a breakdown of your options:

Video Reach Campaigns (VRC)

• By its name, VRC is perfect for Awareness and Reach objectives. In addition to broad visibility across the YouTube app, VRC now also allows advertisers to extend their reach to Google TV and YouTube TV channels. Available YouTube ad formats for VRC include in-stream (bumper and skippable), in-feed, and Shorts. 
• VRC campaign types:
  • Efficient reach
  • Non-skippable reach
  • Target frequency
• With on-point creatives, precise targeting, and the right social media advertising agency, Strike Social’s 2024 data shows a 41% lower CPM for VRC than YouTube Trueview.

Video View Campaigns (VVC)

• Designed to maximize views, Video View Campaigns uses Google’s AI to strategically place YouTube ads where they are most likely to be watched and engaged. Placements include in-stream (skippable ads), in-feed, and YouTube Shorts feed.
• Since its launch in Q3 2023, VVC has shown significant cost efficiency, with our campaigns demonstrating up to 56% savings.
• For brands looking to tell their story through YouTube video advertising, our data on Video View Campaigns show great view-through rates (VTR), particularly on Connected TV and mobile devices, where audience engagement and viewer retention are highest.

Video Action Campaigns (VAC)

• Video advertising on the YouTube platform prompts viewers to take action by purchasing, visiting the website, or subscribing to a service. Video Action Campaigns (VAC) can be used to promote YouTube shopping ads through your Google Product Feed or generate leads and sign-ups from engaged viewers.
• VAC will be upgraded to Demand Gen by Q2 2025, and we recommend that advertisers begin transitioning early to take full advantage of the enhanced capabilities it will offer.

Performance Max

• Another way to promote through YouTube ads and expand across the Google Search Network, Gmail, Display Network, and Discover channels is to use Performance Max campaigns (commonly known as PMax). 
• Previously, Google PMax ads have caused some turmoil with brand safety and ad suitability due to appearing on unauthorized websites and YouTube Kids videos. It takes scrutiny and making sure ad placements are visible to make sure you are fully aware of when and where your PMax campaigns show up. 
• Since then, significant improvements have been made to enhance transparency for YouTube advertisers. During the Google Marketing Live 2024 announcements, it was announced that YouTube placements and exclusions will now be visible to brands running Performance Max campaigns.
• Moreover, YouTube’s parent company, Alphabet, has been enhancing the AI capabilities of PMax ads. This includes innovations such as a text-to-image model for creative assets and ‘page-specific assets’ that help better align ads with placement websites and improve engagement with audiences.
  

YouTube Ad Placements

When advertising on YouTube, you can be seen on more than just the mobile app or the website itself. Your YouTube video ads can conquer everything from small smartphones to bigger Connected TV screens. 

Here in our YouTube ads guide, we show you the platforms and placements available for your YouTube campaigns:

• YouTube app: Users can download the YouTube app from their smartphones, tablets, or desktop devices. The same ad placements when users visit the YouTube website across their devices. 
• Connected TV: Yes, your YouTube paid ads can also appear on TV! Through Connected TV advertising, you can tap into an audience of over 300 million monthly users. CTV ads have proven highly effective, with some campaigns achieving up to 65% video ad completion, even with skippable ads.
  • YouTube TV: YouTube TV is a subscription-based service that provides live television channels and content such as shows, sports, and events. It currently boasts over 8 million subscribers and continues to grow. Yet another way to reach audiences on YouTube TV is through Pause Ads, which allows your ads to appear on viewers’ screens while they pause content.
  • Google TV: Similar to YouTube TV, Google TV is also a streaming platform accessible through devices like Chromecast, smart TVs, mobile devices, or the new Google TV Streamer. As of September 2024, Google TV’s network already offers 150 channels, with more to come.
• Google video partners (GVP): Google video partners are trusted, high-quality websites and apps where your YouTube ads can be displayed outside of the YouTube platform. Partnering with Google has advantages, as YouTube can use Google’s inventory to get more video views and impressions even when the intended audience is not using YouTube itself.

What You Need to Know Before Launching Your YouTube Ad Campaigns

As we move forward in this YouTube advertising guide, it may seem that running ads on YouTube sounds easy. But before anything else, you must iron out your YouTube ad strategy before going to Ads Manager to start running your campaigns.

Audience Targeting

YouTube ad targeting can take many forms: device, location, gender, age, interests, etc. There are two primary audience segments within Google Ads where you can define your target audience for YouTube campaigns:

• Audience: Targeting the who, when, where, and what—gender, age, parental status, household income*, interests, locations
  • In simpler terms, YouTube audience targeting is simply targeting your target market. With a potential audience base of 238 million unique users in the US, the key here is being specific about who you want your YouTube ads to be viewed by.
  • For instance, an HVAC brand trying to take advantage of the demographic’s interest in sports using YouTube Custom Intent audiences can effectively acquire 11 million views through its campaign despite being a non-sports-related brand.

*Targeting by household income (HHI) is only available in Australia, Brazil, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand, Singapore, South Korea, Thailand, United States.

• Content: Targeting the YouTube content your audiences are engaged with—keywords and topics they are searching for, devices and platforms they are browsing or seeing content on
  • YouTube contextual targeting allows your video ads to appear on your chosen relevant content so it blends better with the user’s viewing experience. 
  • For example, during a holiday advertising campaign, retail brands can target shoppers looking for product reviews. YouTube is the top social media platform for researching holiday purchases, and 76% of shoppers say product review videos help them make better purchases. Contextual ad targeting is the way to go to make sure you get into audiences’ YouTube screens. 
  • In this example, a gaming brand can select these options under Topics so their YouTube ads can appear within these contexts and related videos:

The key is refining the scope of your audience to ensure you are paying for impressions and views from engaged audiences only, but not so narrowly that you inflate costs or harm campaign performance.

To find out how you can analyze and take advantage of each YouTube ad targeting method, here’s a quick guide:

Optimizing YouTube Ads Cost

YouTube advertising costs will vary based on numerous factors, but the hard part is ensuring you’re only paying for engaged views while keeping your budget under control.

How to optimize the cost of ads on YouTube?

• Know the prevailing YouTube ad costs by industry
  • According to our Q3 YouTube Ad Benchmarks Report, costs in industries such as finance and travel have been 13% and 9% lower than in Q3 2023, despite the busy holiday season and the U.S. elections.
• Continuous monitoring and optimizations
  • Launching your YouTube video ads is not a one-and-done process. It needs to be checked constantly to ensure that your ads are delivering and that costs are not going over.
  • For video reach or awareness campaigns, keep CPM costs in check. For campaigns with Views objectives, watch CPV and YouTube ad view rates closely.
• Utilize optimal creatives and YouTube ad placements
  • As YouTube evolved with its advertising enhancements, advertisers must adapt as well. Skippable YouTube ads leveraging on reach are doing really well on Connected TV placements, outperforming mobile and other devices by 10-20% based on our 2024 Q1 report. 
  • Depending on the cost and performance of your YouTube ads during your campaign flight, study the data for the best insights to make an informed decision on how you can lean on better costs by utilizing your outperforming creatives and placements.

Performance and Cost Benchmarks

Along with setting your goals for what you want to achieve with your YouTube ads, such as views or conversions, you should set a criterion for the range to which you want your campaign results to match or even exceed. 

Using our successful campaigns on YouTube advertising, here are the key YouTube ad metrics to set your sights on:

• YouTube ad cost benchmarks
  • Cost Per Mille (CPM): $5.70 to $12.36 ¹; $2.87 to $8.02 ⁴
    • CPM for CTV Skippable Ads: $7.39 to $10.01 ⁵ 
    • CPM for CTV Non-Skippable Ads: $4.74 to $7.09 ⁵ 
  • Cost Per View (CPV): $0.01 to $0.03 ²
    • CPM for CTV Skippable Ads: $0.0128 to $0.0220 ⁵ 
  • Cost Per Click (CPC): $0.34 and $1.42 ³
• YouTube ad views and performance benchmarks
  • Click-through Rate (CTR): 0.07% to 0.17% ¹; 0.11% to 1.22% ³; 0.01% to 0.11% ⁴
  • View Rate (VR): 43% to 57% ²

¹ Based on 2023 US YouTube TrueView InStream Non-skippable Campaigns
² Based on 2023 US YouTube TrueView InStream Skippable Campaigns
³ Based on 2023 US Video Action Campaigns
⁴ Based on 2023 US YouTube Bumper Ads
⁵ Based on Connected TV ad rates, 2024 US YouTube TrueView Ads Campaigns

Brand Safety and Suitability in YouTube Advertising

Even major brands with YouTube video ads can be criticized if they are displayed with inappropriate, unsuitable content that gives the brand a negative perspective. Thus, ad suitability and brand safety on YouTube are key to making sure your ads are shown with related content and away from the explicit content that may be lurking within the platform.

What brand safety features does YouTube have?

• YouTube inventory types: Choose from expanded, standard, or limited inventory. The recommended setting is “Standard”. “Expanded” extends your reach across more inventory, while “Limited” ensures your ads avoid more suggestive or explicit content.
• Third-party brand safety technology: With the help of carefully vetted third-party providers, YouTube continues to develop brand safety measures to maintain integrity in impressions and views generated through YouTube ads. These providers include Integral Ad Science, DoubleVerify, VuePlanner, and more.

How to ensure YouTube ad suitability with my campaigns?

• The difference between brand safety and brand suitability is that the latter focuses more on aligning your brand values with your target audience to strengthen the connection. Brand safety starts the process, and ad suitability fortifies it.
• YouTube has developed many tools for content suitability, which include the following:
  • Negative keywords
  • Topic exclusions
  • Category exclusions
  • Trending negative keywords
  • Video and channel placement exclusion
  • Content theme exclusions
• One key concern is appearing on YouTube Kids videos, as these are primarily viewed by children who do not have purchasing power. This means that clicks or views from these videos do not contribute to YouTube ads’ ROI. Ad suitability is achieved by excluding Kids channel placements and reallocating these views to more relevant audiences who can make a purchase or remember your ad for future decisions.

Step-by-step Guide to Publishing Your YouTube Campaign

Feel like you have everything you need and are ready to start video advertising on YouTube? Here are the basic steps to follow:

1. Set up your Google Ads account. You can use your existing Gmail account or use your business account. If you need to add access for your social media advertising manager or media buyer, you can do so by adding and editing Google Ads users to allow your team to help you manage your ads.

2. If you do not have one yet, create a YouTube channel for your brand and upload the video ad you will be using for your campaign. You’ll need the YouTube link to your video to add it to your campaign later.

7. Set up your video ads. Paste the YouTube URL so it retrieves the video from the platform. Add your target URL, CTA, ad headline, and description. You can add more creatives as desired and set them up using the same process, abiding by the YouTube ad copy specs.

8. Finally, set up your bid strategy. For an awareness campaign, the target CPM bid is the amount you are willing to pay for each 1000 impressions, which will be your entry in the ad auction. 

9. Review your campaign setup. Once done, click on Create campaign.

Most YouTube ad campaigns are reviewed within 1 business day. Once your ad is approved (or rejected), you should receive a notification via Google Ads or your Gmail account. 

Do You Need a YouTube Advertising Agency for Better Results in 2025?

After publishing your YouTube video ads, the real work starts during the monitoring and adjustments phase. Your social media advertising team must monitor cost levels, bid adjustments, and ad performance to ensure the best possible results.

This is a full-time endeavor that requires a dedicated team. If you think your YouTube ads strategy may be too heavy for your in-house team, consider hiring a YouTube advertising agency. 

Benefits of Partnering with a YouTube Ads Agency

• Reduced In-House Workload
  • YouTube advertising, particularly YouTube TV, requires significant resources. An agency can help by managing large-scale campaigns, freeing up your in-house team to focus on other platforms that require less effort.
  • YouTube TV advertising, in particular, may be new to teams accustomed to traditional social media ads, making agency expertise invaluable for optimizing Connected TV placements and providing round-the-clock monitoring.
• Knowledge of Prevailing Costs and Performance
  • A YouTube marketing agency continuously analyzes campaign performance data and industry benchmarks, always aiming for better results.
• Access to Advanced AdTech Solutions
  • Our proprietary AI tool, Campaign Lab, utilizes more than 13 years of machine learning to help us with YouTube advertising campaigns from start to finish. It also performs its own monitoring and checks, alerting our teams to optimization opportunities across running YouTube ad campaigns.
• Proven Experience with Client Success Stories
  • Having worked with various brands across multiple industries gives a YouTube ads agency a broad perspective on what strategies work best for different audiences and objectives. From a portfolio of successful campaigns, here’s a handful of our successful YouTube campaigns with exceptional results:
    • 13% lower CPM than guaranteed for a YouTube CTV-focused campaign
    • 28% CPM reduction for QSR TrueView Ads In-stream and Connected TV placements
    • 5.3 million total video views for the Q4 HVAC brand campaign using Video Views Campaign

Achieve Greater YouTube Ad Results This 2025

Video advertising is rapidly growing, and YouTube continues to outpace other streaming and TV services, becoming an even more powerful platform for reaching your target audience. It’s the perfect time to capitalize on this opportunity and make the most of YouTube’s inventory and reach.

Start planning your YouTube ads strategy for 2025. Contact us today for a personalized walkthrough and start driving better results with your YouTube campaigns.

Partnering with a Meta Ad Agency for Optimized 2024 Holiday Advertising Costs

The peak 2024 holiday season is fast approaching, and with Meta restricting political ads a week before the election date, the ad space is again available for brands to compete.

Some brands may have paused their ads in October in anticipation of the influx of 50% of the political ad budget. We previously recommended against pausing your ads during this period; instead, it’s better to maintain an always-on approach while guiding your Facebook and Instagram audiences through awareness, engagement, and conversion campaigns.

To help you achieve peak performance during this busy season, here’s why a Meta advertising agency is key to optimizing your Q4 2024 holiday advertising costs.

How A Meta Ad Agency Can Improve Your 2024 Holiday Advertising Costs

In addition to assisting you in activating and managing your holiday ad campaigns during Q4 2024, partnering with a Meta ad agency to enhance your holiday marketing offers numerous advantages. Even with limited time for the learning phase, the expertise of a Meta advertising agency can serve as the foundation for steering your holiday ads toward success.

Expert Knowledge of Meta Holiday Ad Costs

A key priority for a social media advertising agency is making sure your ads deliver results and keeping your holiday advertising costs within your campaign budget—or even lower.

Consequently, we recommend building awareness in the months leading up to Q4, specifically in September and October. Then, ensure that you guide these audiences toward your lower-funnel campaigns, such as post engagement campaigns and traffic and conversion efforts. By October, shoppers are already searching for brands to consider for their holiday purchases.

However, awareness campaigns should follow an always-on strategy, as CPM levels tend to stabilize at a lower rate when Q5 begins at the start of the year. Meanwhile, lower-funnel campaigns show positive trends from Q4 through Q5, making this an ideal period for your holiday advertising efforts to shine, including capturing last-minute shoppers.

Hypergranular Targeting for Audience Segments That Drive Engagement

Just as you can utilize Facebook Audience Insights to identify target demographics such as age, gender, and location for your paid ads, a Meta ad agency leverages extensive insights gained from hundreds to thousands of previous successful campaigns.

An experienced agency specializing in Meta advertising possesses extensive knowledge from managing numerous Facebook and Instagram campaigns. Historical data from past campaigns is a valuable reference for understanding which audience segments perform best for specific industries and determining the optimal breadth or narrowness of targeting to achieve your desired views and clicks.

With over a decade of campaign experience on Meta and other social media advertising platforms, we have access to billions of data points that inform our decisions about ideal audience sizes and costs for precise targeting.

Based on insights from Strike Social’s Campaign Lab data, here are our recommendations for the top Meta ad placements and advertising formats for your Q4 2024 holiday campaigns:

24/7 Execution of API-led Bid Optimization

To enhance this process, our Campaign Lab technology facilitates continuous campaign monitoring every two hours. Notifications are sent to the designated media buying team, making sure there is always vigilant oversight on your Facebook and Instagram holiday campaigns.

Strike Social’s Proven Success on Meta Advertising

We can confidently say that you should choose us to manage your holiday advertising campaigns this year, but what is our promise without the backing of our clients’ success?

How Targeted Meta Ad Placements Produce 34% CPLC Efficiency

As part of its anniversary collection, a luxury watch brand’s Facebook advertising campaign needed to introduce its new product line. While their brand represents luxury and prestige, the goal was to effectively reach a broad audience that would likely engage with their Facebook ad campaigns.

Results: The campaign successfully combined targeted placements to drive engagement and cost efficiency. Facebook overlay ads on Reels captured 77% of overall impressions and generated 48% of link clicks, proving highly effective in reaching a wide audience. Feed placements provided an additional 15% of impressions and accounted for 36% of link clicks, while Instagram Stories, though a smaller contributor, added 3% of impressions and 8% of link clicks. 

In terms of cost efficiency, each format demonstrated significant savings: Reels overlay ads reduced the cost per link click (CPLC) by 49%, Feed placements by 44%, and Instagram Stories by 38%. Altogether, this strategic mix resulted in a 34.69% reduction in overall CPLC compared to the projected rate, highlighting the advantage of targeted ad formats and thoughtful budget allocation for achieving high engagement at a lower cost.

Achieving 28x Facebook ROAS Through Data-Driven Monitoring

For a leading financial services provider, Strike Social executed a comprehensive campaign focused on acquiring conversions and leads, going through a meticulous approach from setup to ongoing optimization. It was a large-scale endeavor for a Facebook campaign and presented challenges, especially being far from the Thanksgiving and Christmas advertising surge.

Results: The conversion campaigns went live within 48 hours, swiftly generating impressions, clicks, and leads. Ongoing monitoring of the Meta Pixel was essential to maintain its effectiveness, allowing us to quickly resolve any issues in collaboration with the client. We also kept a close eye on cost per acquisition (CPA) and auction bids, which helped us meet our campaign objectives while staying within budget.

Thanks to this strategic approach, the Meta ad campaign achieved an impressive 28x Facebook ROAS, resulting in 66,000 leads and over 7,000 purchases through Facebook ads.

Your Go-To Meta Advertising Agency Partner is Just a Click Away

Choosing Strike Social as your Meta advertising agency means gaining access to unparalleled expertise, advanced tools, and proven strategies designed to optimize your Q4 holiday advertising costs.

Planning Your Q4 2024 Facebook & Instagram Holiday Ads

As you prepare for the busiest shopping season of the year, Meta is gearing up to meet the surge in holiday ad campaigns across Facebook and Instagram. The Q4 holidays — Thanksgiving, Cyber Five, Christmas, and New Year’s — represent the most critical window for capturing audience attention and driving performance.

With ad spending peaking during this period, competition in the auction is becoming fierce, and the stakes are high. To maximize your campaign outcomes while managing costs, advertisers must stay ahead of the trends shaping consumer behavior, creative strategies, and targeting tactics. Here’s how to strategically plan your Facebook and Instagram holiday ad campaigns towards the end of the year.

Q4 2024 Holiday Ad Trends Advertisers Should Watch Out For

Before the celebration continues, let’s take a sneak peek at what to expect this year and how it’s different from previous years to fully prepare you for your holiday campaigns.

Key Peak Advertising Periods in Q4 2024

By anticipating shifts in ad spend and key peak periods, you can optimize your strategy and control costs while driving results for your Q4 2024 holiday ad campaigns:

As more advertisers vie for auction space during the Q4 holidays, we can certainly see spikes in ad spending during this time. Historically, Q4 sees the highest ad spending, particularly on Facebook and Instagram (Meta), with Google following a similar trend. TikTok, on the other hand, tends to have a more unpredictable and sporadic pattern. This heightened competition across industries inevitably drives up Facebook and Instagram ad costs. We’ll explore this further as we go along.

Online Shopping and Spending Trends

Adobe forecasts that U.S. online sales will reach $240.8 billion from November 1 to December 31, up from $221.8 billion last year. In addition, Mastercard’s Spending Pulse data indicates a projected 7.1% growth in retail sales during this holiday shopping season compared to 2023. The rise in consumer spending will likely kick off early, with shopping ramping up as early as Halloween and peaking through Christmas, driven by big-ticket purchases during the gift-giving season.

Further, Numerator’s research shows that many Christmas shoppers are starting as early as three months before the holidays. For advertisers, this means awareness campaigns need to launch well before November to capture early interest and effectively guide potential buyers down the funnel in time for peak holiday ad campaigns.

Meta’s Holiday Ad Trends for Q4 to Q5

Data from Meta’s campaigns affirm this, as 41% of consumers continue making purchases from holiday ads well beyond the peak shopping season. Last year, CPM-focused Facebook and Instagram ads peaked around Thanksgiving, while CPA-focused campaigns were more cost-efficient during the same period.

Insights for Effective Holiday Advertising Strategy on Facebook & Instagram

Now that you have a clear view of the holiday ad trends and consumer behavior for Q4 and Q5 2024, it’s time to review the actionable strategies that will drive results and deliver outstanding performance for your Facebook and Instagram holiday advertising campaigns.

Start Your Holiday Ad Campaigns Earlier

More Aggressive Holiday Advertising for Both B2B and B2C

The competition for ad space for Q4 2024 holiday ad campaigns is not limited to retail brands. Both B2B and B2C advertisers are aggressively vying for inventory, particularly on Meta platforms and Connected TV, as the holiday season ramps up with key events like Cyber Five and New Year’s advertising.

Lead Customers from Top-to-Bottom Funnel Holiday Campaigns

By Q4, your awareness holiday ad campaigns from earlier in the year—starting as early as Halloween—should have built enough momentum to drive audiences into your lower-funnel holiday campaigns. While awareness ads are crucial, by this point in the holiday season, your focus should shift toward consideration and conversion campaigns to capitalize on the peak of the 2024 holiday shopping season.

Not only are lower funnel campaigns more cost-effective, but we’re also seeing high engagement rates, especially in Facebook advertising campaigns focusing on post engagement, clicks, and link clicks, aligned with Q4 holiday trends. Reels are particularly powerful, with short-form video content on Instagram reaching up to 30% of users, reflecting its growing dominance across Meta’s advertising network. 

According to Adobe Analytics, mobile devices are expected to drive 53% of online sales during the 2024 holiday season. Therefore, it is crucial to focus on mobile-first conversion strategies to achieve your campaign goals.

Diverse Creative Formats to Keep Holiday Ads Fresh

As competition heats up during the holiday season, brands often find their ads competing for the same audience’s attention. When users encounter the same ad multiple times, their engagement tends to wane, leading to missed opportunities.

When running top-to-bottom funnel holiday ad campaigns, Facebook and Instagram users can quickly become fatigued by seeing the same creative, sometimes after just two impressions. This leads to users scrolling past or swiping away from your holiday ads.

Incorporate a variety of creative formats in your strategy to avoid ad fatigue and ensure your Black Friday and Christmas advertising campaigns remain effective. Facebook and Instagram offer dynamic options such as Reels, carousels, and videos that can significantly boost engagement and keep your brand fresh in consumers’ minds. 

• Pro tip: Adhere to the Facebook and Instagram ad specs so your ads fit seamlessly within users’ screens.

Explore how to optimize your placements using manual selection in Meta Ads Manager to find the formats that best align with your brand messaging:

Shine Bright on Shoppers’ Lists with Twinkling Facebook and Instagram Holiday Campaigns

“It’s the most wonderful time of the year” – as it should be for both consumers and Meta advertisers alike. Indeed, the Q4 to Q5 periods can be a balancing act, where the need to scale budgets must align with the goal of achieving an impressive return on ad spend.

With Strike Social’s SWAS (software with a service) AdTech expertise, our aim is to deliver better results for you at lower costs for savings. Our proprietary tool, Campaign Lab, is designed to keep a close eye on your ads, ensuring that the full process from setup to campaign management is streamlined and optimized before your holiday campaigns even launch.

Learning the holiday ad trends and suggested strategies is just the beginning. Let us become an extension of your in-house team, helping you finish the year on a high note. Contact us today to request a personalized walkthrough of our AdTech service and see how we can enhance your holiday advertising performance.

Here’s a fun fact for you: 55% of marketers say that social media has directly helped them increase their sales. 

That’s not all. 

Marketers also cite other benefits of using social media for marketing purposes as increased traffic, exposure, and leads.

These statistics clearly show that social media marketing is one of the best ways to increase brand awareness and, most importantly, maximize ROI. 

In this post, I’ll explain five expert-trusted strategies for maximizing ROI with social media marketing. 

Let’s begin.

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Understanding Social Media Marketing ROI

ROI stands for return on investment. In this context, it refers to the measurable outcome from your social media marketing strategies. It’s basically what you get from investing your time, money, and effort in social media marketing. 

Social media ROI is important because it helps you assess whether you’re making enough profits from your marketing strategies or running at a loss. 

Your ROI can result from organic efforts or a direct monetary investment. 

This means that you can build your social media audience organically without any paid promotions. Meanwhile, you can also directly invest money by paying for ads or influencer marketing collaborations.

5 Effective Strategies to Maximize Your ROI With Social Media Marketing

Maximizing ROI with social media marketing can be accomplished using compelling social media ads, influencer marketing, and leveraging certain marketing tools.

Let’s expand on this below.

1. Use Compelling Social Media Ads

One of the most effective ways to expand your content’s reach is by using social media ads. 

Tracking Specific Demographics

With popular platforms like Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook, you can create ads that target specific demographics. For example, the Instagram Ad Manager allows you to run targeted ads for specific locations, age groups, and genders. 

Targeted social media ads increase the relevance of your content and enhance their effectiveness. This reduces your wasted ad spend and maximizes ROI in the long run.  

Tracking Ad Performance

Additionally, with tools like Google Analytics, you can easily track the performance of your social media ads. It provides a URL campaign builder where you can generate URL parameters for your ads and track metrics like conversion, reach, and engagement rate. 

You’ll be able to determine what works and what doesn’t. This helps you optimize future ads to maximize ROI. 

Using Relevant CTAs

Speaking of improving the effectiveness of your social media ads, you should also use compelling and relevant CTAs in your sponsored ads. Use clear CTAs like “Shop Now” or “Learn More” to clearly convey action you want your audience to take. 

Here’s an example of a clear “Shop Now” CTA.

Here’s another example of a YouTube ad with a clear “Learn More” CTA:

2. Use Social Media Marketing Tools

The next expert strategy for maximizing ROI is using social media marketing tools.

To increase your social media ROI, post consistently. This can be quite challenging to achieve if you have to manually post your content. 

This is where tools for social media management come in. You can use them to:

• Automate Posting Schedules: This allows you to plan your content and post in advance. This way, you can maintain a consistent posting schedule, even during holidays and off-hours. 

• Identify the Best Time to Post: Tools like Hootsuite and Buffer don’t just help you automate posting content. They also help you identify the optimal times to post to increase the relevancy and effectiveness of your content.

Take a look at Hootsuite’s dashboard showing the best days and times to publish.

• Measure ROI: Tools expelled in various social marketing guides can help in tracking and measuring your social media ROI. It analyzes your social media presence and helps you identify ways to increase your ROI. I recommend exploring this blog for more social media marketing tools for measuring ROI. 

• Automate Ad Management: With ad management tools like Facebook Ads Manager and Google Ads Manager, you can automatically receive data-driven insights. You can then use these insights to identify how to improve your ads, thereby increasing your ad revenue and overall ROI.

3. Engage With Your Audience

Another strategy for maximizing ROI with social media marketing is engaging with your audience. Regularly doing so helps you build and nurture a relationship with them, there by increasing your social media presence and online visibility. 

For example, a specialist divorce lawyers firm can promote its business by regularly posting informational and engaging posts and connecting with its audience by responding to their comments. This helps them to learn how to choose the right divorce solicitor for their family court cases.

A good way to engage with your audience is by:

• Responding to comments, messages, and mentions. Leverage online chatbot to set up automated responses on Facebook and Instagram to speed up your response time.
• Building an online community where you can easily interact with your audience and build a relationship with them.
• Creating content that encourages them to interact with your brand. For instance, live events, polls and feedback surveys.

Here’s an example of how a clothing brand, Topperzstore, uses polls to engage its customers on Instagram.

4. Leverage Influencer Marketing

According to Influencer Marketing Hub, 85% of marketers believe that influencer marketing is an effective form of marketing. It’s a great way to build trust with your audience and increase your brand’s credibility. 

Influencers have a niche audience comprised of thousands or even millions of followers depending on what type they are. For example, micro-influencers have anywhere from 1,000 to 10,000 followers on any platform. 

They play a huge role in maximizing ROI with social media marketing because they create impactful content that targets a specific audience.  

Influencers can create user-generated content for your brand, which appears authentic and trustworthy. This leads to more people purchasing your products, thereby, increasing your ROI. 

Before you choose an influencer to work with, assess their beliefs and values to ensure that they align with your product frameworks and brand. This will increase the relevancy and authenticity of the content they create for your brand. Consider the different types of influencers available to select the perfect match for your marketing goals.

Here’s an example of how a skincare brand, CeraVe, collaborates with an influencer who’s also a skincare enthusiast, effectively expanding its reach.

5. Track, Analyze, and Optimize Performance

Finally, you must keep a close eye on the performance of your social media strategy to ensure that it’s yielding positive results. Identify relevant metrics according to your campaign objectives and track them. 

For example, the right Instagram metrics to track for awareness are impressions, video views, and more. For insights into engagement, track likes, comments, click-through rates, and shares. 

Tools like Sprout Social allow you to easily track key metrics on a centralized dashboard. You’ll also get in-depth reports regarding your social media ROI and identify areas for improvement. 

Here’s a view of the metrics you can track via Sprout Social.

Conclusion

And there you have it! Some tested strategies to boost your social media ROI. 

When creating targeted ads, use compelling, relevant CTAs that clearly convey the next steps you wish the audience to take.

Embrace social media marketing tools to track and measure ROI and identify ways to boost it. 

Finally, as you implement these strategies, remember to track, analyze, and optimize your performance. Take it one step at a time, remain consistent, and you’ll become a pro at maximizing ROI with social media marketing in no time!

Have some great content up your sleeve? We invite you to reach out to us. We are excited to collaborate with talented writers and feature high-quality content on our blogs.

The world’s top 5 social media platforms are Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and Snapchat. Notice anything about these sites? That’s right, they all feature videos as the core part of their feeds. 

So, why are these platforms so dedicated to video content? The answer is that videos grab people’s attention and keep them engaged. Research has shown that even on cross-media platforms like Facebook, people spend 50% of their time watching videos, and platforms like TikTok and YouTube are almost entirely dedicated to the medium. 

Today, we will look at how you can grab your share of people’s attention by leveraging video marketing techniques to drive engagement, improve your click-through rates, and propel your brand forward.

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What is video marketing?

Video marketing on social media is very different from advertising on TV. While they both use the same medium, social media demands content that interests your customers. You want to entice and entertain. This is because people can scroll past content that doesn’t immediately grab their attention or skip through in-stream ads.

This presents many challenges, but it also offers businesses a huge opportunity to reach and connect with customers in a way that wasn’t previously possible. With the right approach, you can find customers in many new ways, from offering educational content to expanding your reach with a fully holistic omnichannel and multichannel experience for your customers.

How video marketing drives brand growth

It’s clear that people can’t get enough of videos on social media. Let’s look at how this can help you grow your brand.

Captures attention and increases audience engagement

Mediums that incorporate visuals and sound to tell a story have taken the world by storm for over a hundred years. There’s a reason—videos capture our imagination. We use sight to navigate the world and hearing to communicate. In short, we’re audio-visual creatures, and videos perfectly combine both to capture our attention. X (formerly Twitter), for example, found that posts with videos get 10 times more engagement than those without.

Video also has the power to capture atmosphere and portray feeling in a way that static images can’t, which drives audience engagement. Compare the reaction you get from seeing a picture of a skier with the feeling of watching an epic ski run down the sunlit slopes of Aspen. That photo might showcase the landscape or clothing, but it’s your creative video editing skills that will truly capture the atmosphere and tell a story.

Demonstrates products, leading to higher conversion rates

Because we absorb information so much better when it’s presented to us in a visual medium, videos are a fantastic way to showcase your product. Product demos are a perfect example of this and a particularly effective SaaS video marketing strategy. 

Instead of selling your product, demonstrate it and let people make up their own minds. Using a screen recorder, you can create engaging demonstration videos that allow potential customers to see your product in action. When you get people to engage voluntarily, you can go so much deeper into the benefits of your product, leading to vastly improved conversion rates. A huge 90% of people say that demonstration videos are helpful in purchase-making decisions.

Conveys brand story, fostering emotional connection

Video content excels in engagement due to its ability to convey stories visually, tapping into our natural preference for visual information. On social media, storytelling fosters emotional connections, as people are curious about others’ lives, from friends to celebrities to fictional characters. 

For instance, if you’re promoting event venues, you shouldn’t just share generic shots of each room. Instead, show people having fun there – both during events, and ‘backstage’. You’re selling an experience as much as a place, so your videos should make viewers feel like they’re a part of it already.

By sharing your authentic story, including your motivations, your team’s passion, and what customers value about your product, you can create meaningful bonds with your audience. People are eager to listen to genuine stories, making storytelling a powerful tool to connect.

Expanding social media reach through more shares

Research shows that videos are 52% more likely to be shared than any other form of content. It makes sense. If you concentrate on making content that entertains, amuses, or moves your audience, they’ll want to pass on that feeling to others.  

Content on social media is becoming increasingly creative. Today, users are able to share real-time online photo booth pics on platforms like Facebook and Instagram instantly, create interactive polls, use VR and AR, and so much more. So creating innovative and impactful video content that’s highly shareable is a great way to stand out.

Enhances SEO performance, driving organic traffic

Videos are favored by search engines like Google, boosting a site’s ranking for two notable reasons. 

Firstly, videos keep visitors on your site longer, a metric tracked by tools like Google Analytics, and affect how Google ranks your page.

Secondly, video content is highly shareable and can encourage clicks to other sites, such as YouTube, enhancing your site’s performance on search engines, and your SEO strategy. Sharing videos on platforms like TikTok also improves page rankings.

9 video marketing techniques to propel your brand forward

Let’s look at some practical steps you can take to drive engagement with your brand. 

Use trending formats and visuals for engaging, shareable videos

Understanding the dark arts of online algorithms can be tricky. But being one of the first to get on board with trends or a new hashtag can give you a massive boost in visibility and shareability, leading to a snowball effect. You have more shares and likes because you are one of the first, which leads to your content being pushed in the rankings, more shares and likes, and so on.  

This can work well for content in the real world, too. If you spot a news story or political event related to your product, use the free searches by creating content that will appear when people search for it. 

Include keywords to improve search rankings and discoverability

Making sure your webpage has the right words and phrases is crucial for SEO and your search ranking. Similarly, picking the right keywords is critical to ensuring social media algorithms include your video content on your customer’s feed. 

Choosing the right hashtag is even more vital on TikTok, where subscribers can ‘Favorite’ hashtags based on their interests. Do your research: find out what’s trending in your field, and maximize your reach. Start using the creative center, but don’t forget to note what your competitors and existing customers already use. A host of automated marketing tools can also help you find the right information.

Create attractive thumbnails to encourage video clicks

Effective video promotion goes beyond relying on autoplay or algorithms. To truly capture attention, focus on crafting an engaging thumbnail for your video. Here are key points to consider:

• Choose a captivating image:  It doesn’t necessarily have to be a clip from your video, but it must grab attention. 
• Opt for the right size: Use an image with a 1280 x 720 resolution (16:9 aspect ratio) as recommended by YouTube.
• Incorporate text: Since video descriptions often go unnoticed, add brief, compelling text to your thumbnail.
• Maintain consistency: Build a recognizable brand image through consistent styling or templates, which will make your videos easier to identify.
• Ensure contrast: Given that many users watch on mobile phones, make your thumbnail stand out by using high contrast.
• Be honest: Your thumbnail and video content should match to build trust and encourage repeat views.

Remember, the aim is not just to get more clicks, but to grow a loyal viewer base by being genuine and visually appealing.

Encourage user-generated content with hashtag challenges

People who have grown up online demand authenticity from their videos. They’ll spot a fake veneer a mile away. That’s why user-generated content (UGC) can be a great way to put out more content without bombarding your audience or coming across as pushy.

Perhaps the best way to do this is by running a competition to encourage users to post content. A great example of this comes from e.l.f. Cosmetics, who came up with the #eyeslipsface challenge. The challenge soon went viral, and their videos were viewed over a billion times in just two days, two billion times within two weeks.

It’s also worth looking at customer review examples that incorporate videos. When asking for feedback and reviews, incentivize customers to add videos of them using your product or service. This is a great way of using UGC to build trust and market your brand without being overly promotional.

Design videos for seamless mobile viewing with vertical formats

When producing videos, it’s crucial to consider the format and device they will be viewed on, as audiences increasingly watch content on mobile devices. 

This means choosing the right aspect ratio is key—vertical formats work well for quick viewing, while horizontal might be better for longer content that benefits from more detail. Additionally, leveraging mobile devices offers significant advantages, not just for viewing but also for engagement.

Finally, remember that using mobile devices offers some huge benefits. After all, phones aren’t just social media devices, even if it does often seem that way. Suppose you have a customer with a problem. In that case, you could email them. Or, you could use text messaging to send links to demonstration videos or push notifications to tell your audience when you have a new video out. 

Target specific demographics with precise ad campaigns

Social media platforms are designed for advertising. Users aren’t the customers; they’re the product. That means that while a social media platform is designed to keep people engaged, the clever stuff is all behind the hood, and it’s there for you, the real customer, to use. 

Instead of simply posting your videos, make sure you figure out who your target audience is. Figure out their age, economic status, and other demographics to help you reach the right people. Filter using interests, too, or use contextual targeting to ensure you get your video content to the people who want to see it. 

Invest in different ad formats to maximize reach and engagement

From the outside, ads on social media can look pretty standard. In reality, it’s more complicated. It pays for you to diversify your ads to make the most of your money and ensure you get the best reach and engagement without bombarding customers.

For example, to extend your YouTube video reach, you can use in-feed ads, which you pay to have pop up in your customers’ feeds for them to click on when browsing. These skippable and non-skippable in-stream ads appear before, after, or during the middle of other longer videos.

TikTok also has various types of ads, including in-feed ads, branded hashtag challenges, and TopView ads, which play when users open the platform, as well as other features, such as branded effects that can encourage user-generated content.

Engage with comments and build a sense of community

Finally, don’t forget the social aspect of social media. Posting videos is just the beginning of the conversation. A great video can hook customers, but there is always the opportunity to interact with your customers and build a community. This can help personalize your brand and create loyalty while boosting your click-through and conversion rates.

It can also be a great and non-intrusive way to give customers a little nudge to remind them that you’re still there. Instead of sending a “just checking in” email that will inevitably annoy your customers who are too busy to respond, you can gently remind them that you’re there and ready to listen. 

Remember to respond to both positive and negative comments, too. Even if you’re never going to get a sale out of those people who post negative things, your comments won’t go unnoticed by others. Of course, you can still feel free to ignore the trolls. It’s best not to give them any attention at all.

Summing up

Video marketing can be a fantastic way to connect with your audience. We’re hardwired to respond to visuals and audio, and people spend more time watching videos than ever before. With the right story and carefully crafted content, you can improve your brand’s reach and get your message out to people in a way that can emotionally engage potential customers. 

But be sure to put the work in to make your video content hit home. Figure out your ideal customers and target them. Take the time to format your content correctly, and create thumbnails that attract your audience.

Use the myriad tools that social media platforms offer to ensure that you’re getting maximum reach. These techniques allow you to reach new audiences, drive engagement, and propel your brand forward.

This article is written by J.P. Walti, Vice-President of Marketing, Creative, and Web at RingCentral, an AI-powered communications software provider. He has two decades of experience in marketing and creative fields. Visit his LinkedIn page here.

We invite you to contact us for guest posting opportunities. We are excited to collaborate with talented writers and feature high-quality content on our blogs.

The real win when advertising on social media is having reliable ad management services that provide comprehensive solutions and cutting-edge technology to streamline your efforts. While placing ads on social media platforms may seem straightforward, effective ad management requires skilled professionals, adequate resources, and the right advertising technology to ensure your campaigns are on track.

Why Ad Management Services Are a Smart Choice for Efficient Social Media Advertising

When evaluating ad management services, it’s important to look beyond basic tasks like campaign activation, routine checks, and reporting. Effective ad management involves a range of advanced features that can significantly enhance your social media advertising efforts.

Advanced Tools for Targeting and Audience Segmentation

Comprehensive Ad Monitoring Tool for KPI Measurement

91% of businesses use multiple social media platforms when advertising online. Thus, you need ad management services that can offer something that covers a measurement tool to make sure that all social media platforms are being monitored to make sure that they are continuing to deliver results. 

You should be able to compare results, for instance, TikTok vs. YouTube advertising, to determine which video ad platform performs better. This will allow you to present these results to your client and make informed decisions about where to focus your efforts.

What to look for:

• Comprehensive and transparent reporting tools that offer real-time data on key performance metrics.
• Clear and easy-to-understand data on impressions, view rates, engagement, conversions, CPM, CPV, CTR, etc.
• API integration with major social media advertising platforms and third-party analytics platforms.

Flexibility in Supporting Different Advertising Formats and Creatives

What to look for:

• Support for a variety of ad formats (e.g., skippable ads, non-skippable ads, bumper ads, etc.)
• Advanced ad technology that helps determine which social ads can be combined or should be run as separate campaigns for optimal delivery and to avoid internal competition
• Extensive knowledge of safe zones and ad specifications to ensure your creatives are displayed in the correct format without concealed information.

Efficiency in Cost and Budget Management

One of the issues with social media advertising services is the lack of knowledge, for instance, about the average CPM for an awareness campaign. It can be easy to get lost when managing ads in programmatic advertising, and it may be unclear whether costs can be optimized.

Inefficient budget allocation can result in poor cost efficiency and wasted ad spending. Therefore, an effective ad management services agency should help control costs while improving results.

What to look for:

• Tools and features that enable precise budget management, cost control, and optimization strategies to maximize ad spend efficiency.
• Tools to monitor campaign pacing to ensure the full campaign flight is delivering and spending at an efficient rate.
• Transparent pricing models and bidding strategies that align with campaign goals.

Alignment with Brand Safety Standards and Compliance with Ad Platforms

Another concern in digital marketing is ensuring that your brand’s advertising campaigns comply with each platform’s guidelines. It is also important to prevent ads from appearing alongside inappropriate or non-brand-safe content, which can damage your brand’s reputation. 

For example, a school supplies brand should avoid having ads shown with alcohol or extreme activities content, while ads for a children’s charity should not appear with content related to war, drugs, or sexual material.

What to look for:

• Knowledge about brand safety measures and compliance with industry standards.
• Ad tech that provides content filtering, whitelisting/blacklisting capabilities, and is partnered with reputable brand safety organizations.

Once you identify your specific needs, the next step is to understand the strengths of these ad management services before inquiring. This is where Strike Social steps in, helping you address these concerns and turn them into your strengths.

Social Media Solutions Offered by Strike Social’s Ad Management Tools

Strike Social proudly presents the capabilities embedded in our digital marketing software, Campaign Lab, which has powered thousands of successful campaigns. As we approach a decade of delivering high-level optimization and results, let’s explore the ad management services that Strike Social provides to our clients.

Combining the machine learning and AI capabilities of Campaign Lab with the expertise of our media buying teams, we ensure campaigns run efficiently and can adapt to necessary optimizations. Below are our proprietary technology tools and expert optimizations:

Precise Audience Targeting with Campaign Generator

Setting Pricing Benchmarks with Data Insights

How Strike Social’s Ad Management Services Deliver Results

Strike Social’s ad management tools and expert media buying teams have achieved remarkable results across thousands of successful campaigns. Here are some standout examples showcasing the effectiveness of our solutions:

YouTube Advertising Solutions for Aquarium Park Sign-Ups and Sales

By utilizing YouTube VAC, the team effectively engaged mobile-centric users and ensured that the most effective ad placements were focused on for budget. 

With optimal campaign pacing using our Pacing Dashboard, our media buying experts were able to monitor how the spending is tracking to ensure that both spending and returns are maximized throughout the campaign flight, driving the performing ad creatives to achieve more clickthroughs and conversions for the campaign.

Facebook Advertising for a Fitness Club Using DMA Geo-Targeting

The Facebook campaign aimed to drive sign-ups to their fitness club across their 200+ locations. By ensuring our ad management tool targets only the desired locations, we focused on demographics and location to attract highly qualified leads with strong sign-up intent. 

With a clear understanding of the target audience, we utilized our ad management services tool to create the audience profile without manual research.

Maximizing Video Views for an HVAC Brand’s YouTube Campaigns

Recognizing Canada’s strong sports culture, we tailored our strategy to target sports audiences for an HVAC brand. By using YouTube Video View Campaigns (VVC) along with Custom Intent and Custom Affinity audiences, we achieved impressive view rates and engagement levels, even for a non-sports brand.

How Can Our Ad Management Services Help You?

The expertise of our media buyers, combined with the advanced data science in our social media advertising tools, makes Strike Social a trusted social media advertising agency for brands in the US and worldwide.

Whether you need support for a seasonal campaign or a year-round advertising strategy, our ad management services can meet your needs. Contact us to discuss the type of social media advertising services you require, and we will provide a personalized walkthrough to help you achieve your brand’s goals. 

For quicker results, request a demo and one of our sales representatives will reach out within 24-48 hours.

Recent developments are poised to significantly change the trajectory of the elections and political advertising in general. To make informed decisions about your ad strategies and budget allocations, we must first analyze the key events and what they mean for the 2024 political ad spending trends.

What Are the Major Events Impacting 2024 Political Ad Spending?

Several events have already influenced – and will continue to influence –  political ad spending during this U.S. election cycle. Currently, the projected U.S. political ad spend for 2024 is expected to exceed $12 billion, reflecting a 24% increase from the 2022 midterm elections. However, given the dynamics of recent political events, there is still potential for significant changes as we approach election day. 

June 27: The First Presidential Debate Sparks Hesitation Among Biden Supporters

The initial presidential debate between former President Donald Trump and President Joe Biden revealed notable weaknesses in the latter’s performance. His lackluster delivery, characterized by a hoarse voice and unclear responses, raised concerns among his supporters. 

“What we witnessed was a very ill Joe Biden struggling to make sense of his own jumbled and meandering thoughts.” – Sean Tully, Baltimore

“Why hasn’t President Biden been evaluated… so we can all know… about his state of health and his ability to carry out his duties as president?” – Susan Talbott, Tuscany-Canterbury

“Biden’s problems aren’t momentary and aren’t merely because of a bad debate performance.” – Harry Enten on X

July 13: Attempted Assassination of Former President Trump During Pennsylvania Rally

As Republican presidential nominee Trump spoke during a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, multiple shots were fired toward his direction, barely missing him, with one of the shots injuring him on his right ear. Trump was pronounced safe, but the incident has been classified by the FBI as a potential act of domestic terrorism. 

July 16: Dismissal of One of the Three Remaining Criminal Cases Against Trump

In mid-July, Former President Donald Trump was cleared of one of the three remaining criminal cases against him. This dismissal follows a different fate in another case: a conviction on 34 felony counts related to the 2016 election. 

Despite these convictions, Trump’s ability to continue his presidential campaign remains intact, especially as sentencing has been postponed until September.

July 21: President Joe Biden Drops Out of the 2024 U.S. Presidential Race

President Joe Biden, initially committed to running for re-election, officially withdraws from the 2024 presidential race. Biden has since nominated Vice President Kamala Harris as the new Democratic presidential candidate.

July 23: Vice President Kamala Harris Steps In as the Democratic Nominee

Vice President Kamala Harris officially accepted the Democratic Party’s nomination for President. With this endorsement, Harris is set to challenge Former President Donald Trump and four independent and third-party candidates.

Budget Allocation in U.S. Political Ad Spending for 2024

Given the significant events that have already occurred and the many more expected leading up to the election, how will the budget for political ad spending be allocated? With increased funding for both Donald Trump and Kamala Harris, we need to step back and examine the overall distribution of funds for the 2024 political ad campaigns.

Has a U.S. Election Candidate Dropped Out Before?

Advertisers should not be surprised by Joe Biden’s withdrawal from the presidential race. This is not the first time a major candidate has exited the race close to the election. In 1972, Democratic candidate George McGovern’s running mate, Thomas F. Eagleton, withdrew and was replaced by Sargent Shriver just three months before the election. The Democratic ticket of George McGovern and Shriver lost in a landslide election defeat to Republican President Richard Nixon and Vice President Spiro Agnew.

In Kamala Harris’s case, this shift signifies a reallocation of the Democratic Party’s ad spending budget. With Election Day just over three months away, Harris faces a compressed timeline to transition the Biden-Harris campaign to focus on her candidacy. This will likely lead to a more concentrated and targeted ad spending strategy to maximize impact in the limited time available.

How Will the Democratic Party Adjust Their Campaign Strategy and Rebranding?

Under Biden, Democratic ad spending was expected to ramp up from September to October. With Harris taking over, spending is expected to increase much earlier. Harris has already raised $200 million for her campaign and is set to inherit $100 million from the Biden-Harris campaign. This rapid fundraising effort will likely result in a significant push in ad spending to rebrand and promote her candidacy.

Historical Perspective on Political Ad Spending

Along with traditional advertising mediums, digital advertising for political campaigns is expected to rise, accounting for 25% of total spending on presidential advertisements and other political ads.

CTV and Digital Political Advertising on the Rise

The 2024 Olympics and political ad spending are major drivers of CTV advertising’s growth this year. While broadcast and cable are still projected to receive the highest budget allocations for 2024 political ad spending, CTV is expected to account for up to 45% of the digital ad spending budget, with social media advertising at 17.5%. 

Google TV and YouTube TV ads are the top destinations for increased CTV spending, primarily due to their extensive reach.

Social Media’s Role in Digital Marketing for Politicians

Despite paid social media advertising accounting for a small portion of the total political ad spending for 2024, it remains a key medium for candidates to promote themselves and their parties. Many U.S. adults are wary of using their information for political advertising and believe social media platforms should not allow such ads.

This creates limited space for political advertising on social media. However, this also presents an opportunity for those willing to navigate the restrictions, as there may be less competition in the social media ad space.

Platform	Allowed	Allowed with restrictions	Not allowed
Facebook	✔ (authorization required)
Instagram	✔ (authorization required)
YouTube		✔ (verification required) (with targeting restrictions)
TikTok			✘
X (Twitter)	✔
LinkedIn			✘
Snapchat	✔
Pinterest			✘

What Advertisers Should Be Aware of Amidst the Surge in Digital Political Ad Spending

This information is not just for political advertising agencies; digital media buyers in general must be aware of these movements in the digital ad space to position their advertising strategies effectively. Here are the key strategies and considerations for media buyers and advertisers during the height of political ad spending on paid advertising platforms.

Swing States Likely to Increase Political Ad Spend

A “swing state” is a U.S. state that can likely determine or turn over the results of the presidential election, possibly due to unbridled support for one candidate or extremely high poll results leading to the election. In 2016, Trump won 7 out of 11 swing states against Hillary Clinton. 

This year, six swing states are being considered:

• Arizona
• Georgia
• Michigan
• Nevada
• Pennsylvania
• Wisconsin

As of May 2024, here’s how the ad spend for these states has been going:

The Democratic Party, led by Kamala Harris, has taken an early lead with plans to invest $50 million in political advertising across six key states. Meanwhile, MAGA Inc., a pro-Trump group, is set to spend $32 million on negative campaign ads targeting Harris’ record as a prosecutor. These attacks will begin in her home states of Pennsylvania, Georgia, Nevada, and Arizona. 

As Harris’ poll numbers rise among Pennsylvania voters, the competition for ad spend in this state is expected to intensify.

What This Means for Media Buyers:

Geo-targeting-wise, the impact of political campaigns on your brand’s existing campaigns can drive CPM rates higher, especially leading up to the election peak periods.

If budget is an issue, nationwide brands can focus ad spending on non-swing states, where the competition will be lighter on the political ad side and similar to non-political periods.

Here are our CPM projections on how political ad spending will affect CTV advertising costs in the months leading to the 2024 US presidential election:

As shown above, CPM costs are projected to rise from September to October due to heightened political ad spending. Traditionally, October is a peak month for efficiency in Q4, but the surge in political advertising is expected to drive up costs during this period.

CPM costs are anticipated to decline in November, particularly in the final week before Election Day. This decrease is attributed to platforms like Meta instituting bans on political ads during the final week of the campaign and after the polls close, possibly lowering CPM costs at that time.

Quick tip to optimize ad spending:

When running a long-term campaign, utilize always-on advertising.

If you’re concerned about overspending, there’s no need to turn off your ads during the election period. Instead, reduce budgets and spending during this campaign duration for consistent performance, focusing on your top-performing ads and campaigns. 

When the election period winds down, likely around November, you can increase your auction buys to get that extra push. You can achieve your desired results with proper campaign pacing while maintaining efficiency.

Capitalize on Targeting Strategies Restricted for Political Ad Campaigns

Depending on the social media advertising platform, several restrictions are imposed to balance advertising policies and the safety of user information. Regular paid advertising campaigns already have an edge against political advertising, as the latter faces multiple restrictions on audience targeting.

What This Means for Media Buyers:

For example, U.S. political campaign ads on Google and YouTube can only use the following targeting methods:

• Geographic location (except radius around a location)
• Age, gender
• Contextual targeting options such as ad placements, topics, keywords against sites, apps, pages, and videos

Thus, media buying teams should focus their ad spend on campaigns directed towards other targeting strategies such as:

• Interest targeting
• Household income
• Custom audience and segments
• Custom search terms
• First-party data such as website visitors, customer lists, etc.

Video Advertising on YouTube and CTV Will Be Maximized

CTV advertising for political ads received a huge leap from just 19% of the digital ad spend budget allocation in 2020, primarily because it provides a more targeted, personalized ad experience. Additionally, the completion rate for CTV ads can reach up to 96%, making it an excellent medium for ensuring video ads are fully viewed by audiences.

As competition for video ad placements increases on YouTube, YouTube TV, Google TV, and Connected TV, advertisers must adapt to maximize their media buys during the height of the 2024 political ad spending.

Strike Social has demonstrated the efficiency of CTV in YouTube campaigns, proving it to be the most effective medium even when compared to mobile platforms.

What This Means for Media Buyers:

CTV ad inventory is vast, including not only Google TV and YouTube TV but also major streaming apps like Pluto TV, Hulu, Crackle, and Netflix, along with CTV app devices like Roku, Chromecast, Firestick, Apple TV, and other connected devices.

If you haven’t expanded to CTV advertising yet, especially in YouTube campaigns, know how you can do so to broaden your reach and achieve increased efficiency. 

Managing Your Ad Spending During the Political Campaign Season

The 2024 political ad spending surge is inevitable, and so is the increase in digital ad space spending. Brands and advertisers must be ready to adjust and adapt to the changing dynamics of the U.S. elections during this period.

While increased budgets and spending are projected, they can be managed effectively with the right media planning and support from a reliable social media advertising agency.

Contact our team today for a personalized walkthrough and see how Strike Social’s technology can help you achieve your desired results at efficient costs.

What Are Meta Advantage+ Placements?

We must understand its meaning to determine whether Meta Advantage+ placements are right for you. Advantage+ placements are part of Meta’s complete campaign solutions, using AI to maximize each ad impression and exposure on the Meta platforms.

What Are the AI Solutions Within the Meta Advantage+ Suite?

Here are the various Meta Advantage+ functions advertisers can utilize in ad campaigns across Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, and the Meta Audience Network.

Meta Advantage Solutions	Purpose	Function
Advantage campaign budget	Budget Automation	Distributes your budget across ad sets based on performance.
Advantage+ audience	Audience Targeting	Utilizes Meta’s AI to find your audience matching your selected audience profile automatically.
Advantage custom audience	Audience Targeting	Builds custom audiences from website visitors, customer lists, app activity, etc.
Advantage lookalike	Audience Targeting	Builds custom audiences from website visitors, customer lists, app activity, etc.
Advantage detailed targeting	Audience Targeting	Provides advanced targeting options to expand where Meta’s AI sees better performance beyond basic demographics such as location, age, and gender targeting.
Advantage+ placements	Audience Targeting	Automatically selects the best ad placements within the Meta ads network to maximize performance.

Where Will Your Ads Appear with Meta Advantage+ Placements?

Depending on your campaign objective, your ads can appear in various placements and formats across Facebook, Instagram, and other Meta ads platforms.

When Should You Use Meta Advantage+ Placements?

Now that you know which platforms and placements your ads can appear on, as well as which objectives and ad formats are compatible with Advantage+ placements, it’s time to determine if it’s the right fit for your brand and advertising goals. 

If you meet one or more of the following criteria, we recommend turning on Meta Advantage+ placements to maximize your advertising efforts on Meta platforms fully.

New to Facebook and Instagram Advertising

• For advertisers new to the platform who lack sufficient data to determine effective placements, Advantage+ placements utilize Meta’s extensive data and algorithms to identify the best ad placements automatically.
• This way, you can rely on Meta’s AI to distribute your campaigns across all available placements based on your ad format and objective. Meta will gather data to help you determine which placements work best.
• For instance, if you’ve been advertising more on YouTube and TikTok with video ads, Advantage+ placements can help identify the most effective ad placements within Meta’s advertising ecosystem.

Testing New Placements

• If you want to experiment with new placements or ad formats within the Meta Business Suite, Advantage+ can automatically include them in your campaign and measure their effectiveness.
• For example, if you have been primarily advertising on Instagram and are considering expanding to Facebook ads to acquire a new audience, such as promoting a new line of mocktails for a younger demographic, Advantage+ placements can help determine if Facebook placements are worth adding to your media plan or if maximizing Instagram ad placements would be more effective.

Expand Ad Reach for Awareness and Traffic Campaigns

When Should You Choose Manual Ad Placements Over Advantage+?

Manual ad placements can be advantageous when your advertising goals on Meta require a more tailored approach. If your objectives or concerns align with the following points, consider using manual placements:

Specific Placement Goals

• When you have specific goals for particular placements, choosing manual placements provides better control and precision, allowing for more targeted optimization.
• For instance, if your brand’s strategy revolves around video ads and you’ve seen positive results from this format, manual ad placement allows you to focus exclusively on high-performing Meta ad placements like Reels ads and other video-centric options.

Low-Quality Actions

• If you notice that certain placements are resulting in low-quality actions or conversions, such as accidental clicks or clicks from bots, it may be wise to exclude those placements manually. The algorithm does not inherently recognize low-quality clicks, so manual adjustments are necessary.
• For example, a study by a major B2B company found that while Meta Advantage+ helped them acquire more leads, their quality was lower than those leads acquired through traditional targeting and placement controls. In such cases, manually managing placements can help you focus on channels that yield higher-quality results.

	Leads	Qualified leads	% of Qualified leads
Advantage+	211	12	5.68%
Manual targeting 1	141	20	14.18%
Manual targeting 2	105	39	37.14%

Opting In and Out of Meta Advantage+ Placements

You can set up your campaigns once you determine whether to use Meta Advantage+ or manual placements. Here’s a step-by-step guide to help you configure your Meta ad placements before the campaign launch:

How to Turn On Meta Advantage+ Placements

1. Log in to Meta Ads Manager. Ensure you are logged into your Facebook account and have access to the Ads Account on which you will be setting up the campaign.
2. Click Create at the Campaign level, then choose your campaign objective.
3. For the campaign setup, choose Manual campaign.
4. Proceed with the usual campaign setup. At the campaign level, you can decide whether to turn on the Advantage campaign budget (formerly campaign budget optimization) before moving to the Ad set level.
5. You can toggle between Advantage+ and manual placements on the Ad set level. The default setting is Advantage+ placements. To keep Advantage+ placements active, do not make any changes.
6. Continue with the rest of your campaign and ad setup.

How to Turn Off Advantage+ Placements and Switch to Manual Ad Placement

1. Follow steps 1-4 as outlined above.
2. Once on the Ad set level, scroll to the Placements section and click Edit to switch to manual ad placement.
3. Toggle the button to turn off Advantage+ placements and click on Manual placements.
4. You can choose the specific ad placements you want within Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, and the rest of the Meta Audience Network.
5. Once you have selected your desired placements, proceed with the rest of your campaign and ad setup.

It’s best to decide upfront which option is best for your campaigns, as changing your ad placement setup mid-campaign can disrupt the learning phase and lead to inconsistent ad performance. By determining the best ad placement strategy before the campaign flight, you can steer your campaigns more effectively and develop a clearer plan for optimizing results.

Is Advantage+ Really Beneficial for Your Meta Campaigns?

Are you ready to leverage the power of Advantage+? You’ve seen various perspectives, and by now, you should be able to evaluate whether Meta Advantage+ placements can truly enhance your brand’s results. The next step is to test it and determine how much control you need over your campaigns versus letting Meta’s AI optimize your ad placements. The real answer lies in taking action.

If you have questions about using Meta Advantage+ for your campaigns and how Strike Social can combine our expertise with AI to drive better results for your brand, reach out to our team for a personalized walkthrough of our tools and technology.

Now that you’ve successfully shipped off many orders and achieved substantial sales during Amazon Prime Day, it’s time to reassess your inventory stocks and strategize how to push the excess stock using paid social media advertising. Whether you have high inventory levels remaining or simply want to maintain the momentum from Amazon Prime Day, we’ve compiled these tips to extend your post-Amazon Prime Day sales well beyond the event.

5 Tips to Maximize Your Sales After Amazon Prime Day Ends

Retaining interest and keeping Amazon shopping purchases flowing can be a significant challenge after major retail events like Halloween, Thanksgiving, or the 4th of July. Consumers typically tighten their purse strings and wait for big discount events like Amazon Prime Day in the summer, the back-to-school season, and Black Friday and Cyber Monday. 

According to Salesforce’s data, 23% of all online holiday sales occur during Cyber Week, with average discounts reaching up to 27% of unit prices. However, sales remain steady seven weeks before the peak retail holiday and even four weeks afterward.

Here are five tips to keep up the momentum, secure Amazon shopping cart checkouts, and seal the deal on those Prime Day sales.

1. Analyze Your Amazon Prime Day Sales Data

Once Amazon Prime Day concludes, the first step is to evaluate the performance of your sales campaigns during the 48-hour event.

❓ Determine which ad or ad group received the most link clicks.
❓ Identify which ad or ad group generated the highest engagements.
❓ Evaluate which ad format was most effective for each product or collection.

Understanding the success of your top Amazon Prime Day ads will guide your strategy for effectively marketing the remaining inventory.

Let’s convert this data analysis into a visual to offer a clearer view:

Based on this data, here are quick insights and recommendations to improve your post-Amazon Prime Day sales campaigns:

• Refine Targeting:
  • Luxury: Expand targeting beyond the top 10-20% HHI bracket. Consider broader income brackets or interests like art and travel that align with luxury watch buyers.
  • Sport: Test different interests within the “outdoor activities” category (e.g., running, hiking, swimming).

• Bidding & Budget Adjustments:
  • Classic: Given the high VR and CTR for several Classic Collection ads, consider increasing bids to capture more impressions and potential sales.
  • For ads with consistently low CTR and engagement (e.g., Diamond-Studded Watches, All Sport Collection Watches), consider reallocating budget to better-performing ads or ad groups.

To further evaluate the effectiveness of your Amazon Prime Day ads, collaborate closely with your sales team to gather metrics such as:

• Items added to cart;
• Items purchased

These metrics provide insights into customer behavior post-Amazon Prime Day, helping refine strategies to maximize sales after the event. It’s crucial to correlate your ad performance with actual sales numbers to develop strategies that effectively boost your post-Amazon Prime Day sales.

Audience targeting tip:

54% of customers doing their Amazon shopping will likely complete their purchase when they see a discounted price for items left in their abandoned shopping carts. To capitalize on this, focus on retargeting audiences who showed interest during the event but didn’t make a purchase. During your Amazon Prime Day campaign, gather enough data to create an audience list for remarketing immediately after the event.

For instance, if you used a landing page for your Amazon product links, ensure your platform pixel (e.g., Meta pixel) is installed to capture website visit data. This allows you to retarget users who clicked on your landing page and find similar customer profiles who are likely to choose you for their Amazon shopping.

Campaign optimization tip:

Maintain consistent campaign pacing throughout the entire campaign duration. Start your campaign before Amazon Prime Day 2024 and ensure it continues smoothly after the event concludes. 

Allocate peak budget specifically for the 16th and 17th, with higher auction bids during Prime Day week. Afterward, adjust your bids to regular levels for consistent campaign delivery.

3. Sustain Brand Recall Post-Prime Day

After Amazon Prime Day concludes, leverage your campaign insights to drive future awareness and consideration-focused campaigns. If you’ve achieved your sales goals during this period, now is the time to ensure your brand remains prominent outside peak Amazon shopping seasons.

One effective approach is using a Video Reach Campaign with targeted frequency settings, allowing your Amazon shopping ads to be shown up to 4 times weekly or 8 times monthly to the same viewer.

Sales campaign:

Did you know that after a customer’s first purchase, there’s a 27% chance they will buy again? This likelihood increases to 49% after their second purchase and jumps to 62% after their third. Don’t halt your sales efforts just yet — capitalize on post-Amazon Prime Day sales to clear excess inventory and retain customer loyalty.

Temptations, a cat treat brand, effectively utilized Amazon Prime Day to boost customer loyalty. During the 2023 event, they secured 74% of direct purchases, with the remaining 26% made through their Amazon store. Additionally, 28% of all purchases were from repeat buyers, showcasing the effectiveness of their promotional strategies.

4. Re-identify your Targeting Segments

A social media advertising team that optimizes your campaigns around the clock allows you to shift from broad to highly specific targeting once you identify successful market segments or demographic audiences. Conversely, you can broaden your audience to increase impressions or views.

Eliminate Irrelevant Placements, Boost Effective Ones

When running YouTube ads, analyze which topics and channel placements yield the best results for your Amazon shopping ads. Pause or remove placements that underperform during your post-Amazon Prime Day sales push. Conversely, optimize bids for YouTube channel placements, driving clicks and conversions to maintain top ad spots.

Furthermore, Amazon Prime Day data from the event’s second day indicates that over 60% of average household spending fell within the $100 to >$200 range, with each order averaging $10 to $40. This suggests that consumers shop via mobiles and place multiple orders after discovering better deals or offers on different devices.

Understanding your top-performing devices enables strategic decisions post-Amazon Prime Day. Whether expanding to Google TV or focusing on mobiles, align your strategy with campaign data to maximize post-event sales before the next retail cycle.

5. Coordinate your Post-Amazon Prime Day Sales Strategy with The Team

Once you’ve gathered all campaign data and identified successful and unsuccessful strategies, you can convene with your client or agency to strategize for post-Amazon Prime Day sales. 

Aligning your media buying team’s strategy with your target Amazon shopping sales is essential for maximizing your brand’s ROAS (return on ad spend) and achieving optimal results from your paid social media ad campaigns. This alignment ensures that both teams are on the same page. In contrast, the media buying team optimizes Amazon shopping ad performance using machine learning and AI; the sales team can provide insights and direction to enhance overall effectiveness.

A significant advantage is having a responsive media buying team capable of 24/7 optimization. At Strike Social, our teams leverage advanced technology and media buying expertise to achieve desired KPIs while optimizing costs. This approach ensures that your Amazon Prime Day advertising campaigns perform well even after the event, maintaining strong brand visibility and audience engagement.

Explore how Strike Social’s data-driven approach delivers measurable results for your campaigns. Contact us here and find out how our experienced team can help you reach your social media advertising goals.

5 Back-to-School Advertising Strategies That Generate Sales

The winter holidays may be the biggest advertising event throughout the year; however, back-to-school marketing promotions come to a close second. Hence, competition can be fierce as school and college necessities are among the first items that back-to-school shoppers seek. But you should be good to go if you have the right back-to-school ad strategy to tap into those markets and appeal to those interests.

Whether you’re running a back-to-school weekly ad for college dorm furniture or recurring social campaigns for the trendiest school bags, these strategies for your back-to-school ad campaigns are designed to drive your audience from their screens to their shopping carts.

1. Develop Funnel-Focused Campaigns

Here’s a sample media plan that takes your audience from awareness to conversion:

To optimize your back-to-school ads timeline, here’s a comprehensive breakdown of our Facebook benchmarks spanning Q2 to the start of Q3:

Using Advantage+ audience targeting, you can expand the reach of your back-to-college ad campaigns while applying detailed targeting options such as age, gender, interests, demographics, and behavior. Custom audiences, such as lookalikes and those based on Meta engagements, can also be utilized with Advantage+.

2. Implement Advanced Audience Targeting

Expand the Summer Sales

Target “summer” searches and interests while integrating summer themes into your ads to blend with users’ searches and browsing activity.

Shoppers have already started as early as the 4th of July, with others waiting until Labor Day. These periods provide the best opportunities to capture shoppers’ attention and drive purchases for school and college supplies.

3. Excluding Negative Keywords and Topics

With regard to YouTube brand safety and suitability, it is imperative to remain informed about any potentially adverse issues that may arise, particularly when employing a specific geo-targeting strategy. It is essential to avoid any association with negative news or controversial topics, as such headlines can harm brand perception and reputation.

Video & Channel Placement Exclusions

You can exclude your ads from appearing on news channels. While news channels can be an effective way to reach parents, they can also negatively impact your brand if your back-to-school ads are shown alongside undesirable news. 

Additionally, exclude your ads from YouTube Kids channels to prevent unintended clicks that can skew your ad performance.

Negative Keyword Targeting

Similar to keyword targeting, you can create a list of negative keywords that you don’t want your ads to appear with. Set this up at the account level to apply a default set of negative keywords to all your back-to-school and back-to-college YouTube campaigns. 

You can also create negative keyword lists at the campaign and ad group levels.

Category Exclusions

Using category exclusions in YouTube ads gives you greater authority over the contexts in which your advertisements are displayed. By excluding categories like tragedy and conflict, profanity, rough language, sexually suggestive content, and other sensitive topics, you can ensure that your back-to-college and back-to-school ads appear alongside content that better aligns with your brand’s image and values.

4. Boost Your Sales Using Spark Ads and UGC

Spark Ads on TikTok allow brands to promote User-Generated Content (UGC) and their own organic content as sponsored ads within the platform. According to TikTok’s data, Spark Ads have a 20% higher landing page arrival rate than non-Spark Ads. Additionally, brand recall on TikTok increases by up to 27% when brands partner with TikTok influencers.

• Promote Trust: Utilize content from TikTok users who post about your product or service to build trust in your brand.
• Provide Authenticity: Showcase authentic experiences with your brand, enhancing credibility.
• Foster Collaborations: Develop good relationships and potential collaborations with TikTok users who can promote your brand to their audience.

For example, a mini printer brand showcased its product by demonstrating how cleanly it prints a skeletal system diagram, which the student in the video could easily stick to their notes.

Another example is a portable stove pot, where a college student shows how easy it is to prepare a quick meal without leaving the dorm bed.

5. Maintain Brand Recall with Proper Campaign Pacing

Utilize always-on advertising to keep your brand top of mind for back-to-school shoppers. While you don’t need to be the top bidder or show up constantly, it’s crucial to be visible during peak back-to-school sale days. With proper campaign pacing and strategic timing, you can maintain a consistent presence on users’ feeds, increasing your impact when they decide to purchase.

Take note of these peak retail events, during which 68% of shoppers plan to make their purchases for school and college supplies. These are the times to increase bids within your campaign duration:

• 4th of July
• Prime Day
• Labor Day

Boost Your Returns with Effective Back-to-School Sales Ad Campaigns

As you prepare, launch, and monitor your campaigns during the back-to-school marketing season, remember that while all funnel stages are important, the ultimate goal is to generate sales and keep the cycle going. To ensure your social media advertising efforts pay off, you must partner with experts who can help you maximize your profits by optimizing your campaigns for better results.

At Strike Social, our goal is to drive results for your campaigns. With over 10 years of successful campaign data, we help you achieve your goals by setting up tailored segments based on data science and ensuring transparency in outcomes. We can help you maximize your campaign performance on YouTube and other biddable social platforms. Contact us here to discuss how we can boost your sales campaigns.

We prioritize regular training sessions to ensure our strategies are up-to-date and aligned with the newest updates on the paid social media ad platforms we manage for our clients.

Our annual media buyer training has commenced, and we are excited to share the key highlights and insights from our digital marketing training with you.

Strike Social’s Key Digital Marketing Training Modules

Our expert leads have compiled the latest updates in digital marketing across various social media advertising platforms. Here’s a detailed look at each training session, the best practices shared, and the critical updates discussed.

Reviewing YouTube Advertising Strategies

Raising the Bar on Digital Advertising Campaigns on YouTube

Our experts discussed the various campaign types we endorse as part of the YouTube strategy within our digital marketing agency. Given the diverse client goals, our media buyers must be well-versed in the different video advertising campaigns available on YouTube. This allows them to select the most compatible campaigns to achieve specific objectives.

Identify the unique comparisons that distinguish various YouTube campaign types from one another:

Campaign Type	Placements	Reporting	Targeting
Video Reach Campaigns (VRC)	Can select single placement	Segmentable delivery reporting (skewed if only one placement is chosen)	All targeting options available
Video View Campaigns (VVC)	Fixed – multi-ad format placement	Segmentable delivery reporting	All targeting options available
Video Action Campaigns (VAC)	Fixed – multi-ad format placement	No segment in delivery reporting	All targeting options available except contextual targeting

Audience Targeting Updates

The Audience Manager tool in Google Ads aids our YouTube media buyers in organizing distinct audience groups for various campaigns. This eliminates the recurring task of manually setting up audience targeting for each campaign, saving our media buyers valuable time. As a result, they can swiftly proceed with the subsequent steps.

Our YouTube expert provided valuable insights on audience targeting setup during the digital marketing training. Here’s a summary of the key updates shared:

• If you want to target audiences based on interests, purchase intentions, or Google search terms, you can save them as Custom segments. You can also expand a Custom segment by including individuals who browse similar websites or use similar apps that you choose.

• The Custom segment you create can then be added to the Audience list, which includes all audience targeting setups established by our media buyers for a particular YouTube advertising campaign they will launch for the client.

Note: If you want to test a Custom segment on the Reach planner before starting the campaign draft, save it first so it appears on the Reach planner platform.

Questions from Our YouTube Media Buyers

TikTok Marketing for Advanced Media Buyers

Understanding TikTok’s Learning Phase

The learning phase for TikTok ad campaigns can extend longer than that for other platforms. Typically, this phase lasts around 10 days, during which TikTok’s ad delivery system experiments to identify the most effective audience and optimize performance. To successfully exit the learning phase, TikTok aims for at least 50 conversions within this period.

In contrast, Meta’s learning phase generally lasts 7 days or requires 50 optimization events, while YouTube’s learning phase is much shorter, spanning 1-3 days.

Ad Budget Management on TikTok

Aside from setting up a campaign or ad set budget, TikTok requires you to add funds through the Finance section on the TikTok Business Center. 

To begin, navigate to the “Finance” section of the TikTok Ads Manager and link the ad account you are managing. From there, you can add funds to your account balance using a credit card or other supported payment method.

Mastering Digital Advertising in Meta Platforms

Meta Advantage’s Edge

Advantage+ Shopping Campaigns: Designed for e-commerce businesses, Advantage+ shopping campaigns aim to maximize conversion likelihood, optimizing your advertising budget in the process. By generating multiple ad variations and evaluating their performance, Meta’s IG and FB ads management system ensures that the best-performing ads are deployed. 

If your brand meets the following criteria, incorporating Meta Advantage into your digital marketing strategy can yield significant benefits:

• Growing your audience: If you aspire to expand your business, Advantage+ shopping campaigns are your trusted partner. Powered by machine learning, these campaigns optimize your ad delivery, ensuring your products reach a broader audience.
• Introducing new products or collections: Launching a new product or collection? Advantage+ shopping campaigns are the ideal solution. The system generates a range of ad variations, evaluating their performance with different audiences. The most effective variants are then strategically deployed in the market.

In addition to advanced campaign management, Advantage+ also offers the ability to optimize your budget. Discover more about Facebook Campaign Budget Optimization here.

Additional Advantage+ Features for Media Buyers to Consider

Meta continues to allow media buyers to incorporate specific audiences into digital marketing campaigns but to maximize Meta’s capabilities, more Advantage+ features are available for use:

Advantage+ Audience: This feature utilizes Meta AI’s extensive flexibility, offering the largest potential audience and allowing your ads to reach a diverse range of viewers.

• Advantage Detailed Targeting: Broadens your campaign’s reach by allowing you to target a wider, relevant audience. Start by selecting specific interests, job titles, or other detailed targeting criteria that align with your desired audience. From there, this Advantage+ function automatically expands your targeting to include related audiences who may not meet the exact criteria but are nonetheless relevant to your brand.
• Advantage Custom Audience: Optimizes your ad delivery beyond the custom audience you initially defined. When you create a custom audience based on website visitors, for example, Advantage Custom Audience will show your ads to similar users who weren’t included in your original targeting. This optimization ensures that your ads reach a broader audience while maintaining relevance to your initial custom audience.
• Advantage Lookalike Audience: By using your customer list, Advantage Lookalike Audience enables the identification of additional users who share similar characteristics to your original lookalike. This can potentially enhance your campaign’s reach and performance by targeting a broader audience that aligns with your existing customer base.

Advantage+ Placements: By utilizing historical data and understanding your audience’s behavior, the system increases inventory availability, which lowers costs. Meta’s system can place your ads on multiple digital advertising platforms, such as Facebook, Instagram, Meta Audience Network partners, and other available placements. Ads Manager delivers your ads to all available placements, optimizing results across them.

Exploring the Vast Advertising Capabilities of DV360

During our digital marketing training sessions, participants engaged in captivating discussions centered around the know-how of DV360. Explore the key takeaways and insights from these discussions right here:

Key Benefits of Using DV360 as a DSP

Automated Real-Time Bidding (RTB): DV360 enables RTB to automatically bid on ad inventory in real-time, ensuring brands get the best possible prices while reaching the target audience.

Wider Inventory Reach: Gain access to a vast network of premium publishers and ad exchanges, maximizing campaign reach and impact.

User Targeting: With DV360’s advanced targeting capabilities, you can reach specific audiences based on demographics, interests, behaviors, and locations. These targeting options include those exclusive to DV360’s partnered networks, providing advertisers access to a diverse audience.

Reporting & Optimization: Through in-depth reporting and advanced analytics tools, media buying teams can gain valuable insights into campaign performance. This robust system empowers them to create data-driven reports and propose strategic optimizations.

Best Practices for Setting Up Campaigns on DV360

DV360’s interface can be overwhelming for media buyers who are still getting acquainted with the platform. As a crucial tool for digital advertising, DV360 requires a strategic approach to campaign setup. To assist media buyers, our digital marketing and advertising agency experts have compiled a guide with practical tips and tricks to help create effective campaigns on DV360.

Campaign Naming Conventions: When managing multiple campaigns for clients, media buyers must adopt specific and clear naming conventions to locate previous campaigns easily. Avoid using generic names like the “brand” alone. Here are some examples:

• Basic Structure:
  • [Brand] – [Year] – [Month/Quarter]
• With Objective and Format:
  • [Brand] – [Year] – [Month/Quarter] – [Objective] [Format]
• With Objective and KPI:
  • [Brand] – [Year] – [Month/Quarter] – [Objective] [KPI]

Note: If the client has a preferred naming convention, try to obtain and use it. Aligning with the brand’s existing or previous campaigns can ensure consistency and clarity.

Managing Budget and Pacing: To ensure accurate tracking of budget utilization, media buying teams are encouraged to activate the “Show Actualized” option in DV360. With this setting enabled, DV360 displays the actualized budget for completed campaign segments, reflecting the actual amount spent.

This feature gives media buyers visibility into the remaining unspent budget available for reallocation to other segments. It’s essential to note that this budget should only be used after each campaign segment has concluded, allowing media buyers to make informed decisions about reallocating unspent funds. 

Conversely, if “Show Actualized” is not ticked, DV360 will solely display the initial total budget, disregarding the funds expended. This can lead to miscalculations and overspending.

To illustrate this more clearly, see the example below:

Scenario	“Show Actualized” Enabled	“Show Actualized” Disabled
Campaign 1 Budget (Initial)	$10,000	$10,000
Campaign 1 Spent	$8,500	$8,500
Campaign 1 Remaining Budget	$1,500	Not Calculated
Campaign 2 Budget (New)	$1,500	$1,500
Total Budget Displayed by DV360	$10,000	$11,500

Important notes:

• After a media buyer sees the actualized unspent amount for a segment, it must be manually reallocated to another campaign segment to take effect.
• Actualizing a budget segment while active will set its remaining budget to 0, stopping bidding for all line items until the next segment begins.
• Accurate unspent budget figures may be delayed up to 48 hours after a budget segment concludes.

In addition, DV360 provides various pacing options to customize how your budget is distributed throughout your campaign. To ensure that the pacing setting applies to the entire campaign duration, we recommend setting it to “Flight“.

When selecting a campaign pacing setting, you have three options:

• ASAP: This option prioritizes spending your budget as quickly as possible. While required for YouTube campaigns, it’s generally not recommended for real-time bidding (RTB) campaigns, as it may lead to budgets being exhausted too early within the campaign flight.

• Even: Even pacing distributed your budget evenly across the campaign period. For example, a $10,000 budget over 10 days would spend $1,000 per day.

• Ahead: This option front-loads 20% more of the ideal daily spending, aiming to exhaust the budget faster than even pacing. For instance, with a $10,000 budget over 10 days, it will spend $1,200 on the first day and adjust the remaining daily budget accordingly. This can be advantageous when advertising costs increase towards a month’s or quarter’s end.

Implementing Brand Safety Exclusions: By default, the following content labels should be excluded from digital marketing campaigns on DV360:

• DL-MA: Content suitable only for mature audiences.
• Not yet labeled: Content that has not been labeled.

For Strike Social’s media buying teams, we recommend excluding all sensitive categories. However, if we’re handling an alcohol brand campaign, for example, alcohol exclusions should not be ticked unless the client requests otherwise.

DV360 also allows the client to apply additional brand safety options with third-party verified partners. However, opting for these additional settings can lead to higher ad spend due to associated costs, including a CPM upcharge for each selected brand safety option. Thus, media buying teams must inform and guide clients to ensure full awareness before proceeding.

Strengthening Strategies with Ongoing Digital Marketing Training

At Strike Social, we foster a culture of continuous learning and collaboration, ensuring alignment and maintaining efficiency across our media buying teams in different markets. These sessions occur throughout the year, allowing the teams within our digital marketing and advertising agency to reconnect, foster interdepartmental connections, and stay up-to-date with the latest industry trends.

We prioritize our annual digital marketing training sessions for several key reasons:

Staying Ahead of the Trends

Digital marketing evolves rapidly, much like how viral videos swiftly gain millions of views. To address this fast-paced environment, we emphasize ongoing communication and updates between Strike Social and our partners. This allows our digital marketing and advertising agency to proactively respond to industry shifts and promptly relay them to media buying teams for immediate implementation in their advertising campaigns.

In addition to our annual digital marketing training, we keep our media buying teams informed with regular catch-ups and quick updates through our communication channels. Major digital advertising updates are also shared in our newsletter, which you can sign up for here.

Team Alignment and Collaboration

Empowering our teams with the latest knowledge on digital marketing platforms creates a more skilled, confident, and collaborative marketing team capable of achieving greater results. 

Check out our recent case study, where our YouTube media buying teams successfully promoted a Quick-Service Restaurant (QSR) while reducing CPM costs and increasing efficiency.

Fostering Human Connection

The annual digital marketing training provides valuable opportunities for personal interaction and relationship building within the team. While our media buying teams may have their own team communication, it’s important to achieve alignment with other media buying teams handling different campaigns and share best practices.

Investing in Success

Our digital marketing training is designed as a strategic investment that provides long-lasting advantages for both individual marketers and organizations. The enhanced optimizations and learned improvements gained from our training empower media buyers to analyze and incorporate new information. This newfound knowledge is then applied to the advertising campaigns we manage for our clients, resulting in increased effectiveness.

It’s a continuous cycle for our digital marketing and advertising agency that consistently delivers positive outcomes, contributing to the overall success of our clients’ advertising efforts.

By openly sharing our digital marketing training insights, we aim to build trust and transparency with our clients and partners. We want you to know the faces behind the campaigns, understand our processes, and see the dedication we bring to every project.

To learn more about our technology and how we can provide efficient results for your digital marketing campaigns, contact us today or request a walkthrough from our sales team.

CTV advertising is becoming increasingly precise with the introduction of Google TV Ads. Google’s new advertising network transforms traditional television ad outreach by enabling more accurate targeting for digital streaming platforms. Streaming TV channels, Advertising-Based Video on Demand (AVOD), and Subscription-Based Video on Demand (SVOD) continuously dominate the living room, outperforming previously loved tubes.

Now that the viewing trends are leaning more toward digital platforms, YouTube is strategizing to boost its CTV (connected TV) traffic by integrating Google TV directly into Android-based smart TVs such as Sony, Philips, TCL, and Hisense. This integration will remove the need for an external device like Google Chromecast to access the Google TV platform, positioning YouTube to compete with other digital streaming platforms like Hulu and Roku.

With the expansion of the Connected TV (CTV) inventory, media buyers looking to extend their reach to living room viewers must incorporate Google TV and YouTube TV into their media plans. But aren’t Google TV and YouTube TV ads the same?

YouTube TV and Google TV Ads Differences and Similarities

Regarding videos targeting viewers interested in streaming content, Google and YouTube TV ads cater to different audience behaviors and provide distinct advantages.

What is a YouTube TV Ad?

YouTube TV ads are part of YouTube’s broader Google ecosystem and are available on its subscription-based live TV streaming service. With over 100 channels, YouTube TV includes the YouTube app, major networks, and cable channels, and provides a mix of skippable and non-skippable ad formats. 

YouTube TV and Google TV Ads Similarities

1. Setup in Google Ads

Media buyers can set up both Google and YouTube TV ads on the Google Ads platform. This integration allows advertisers to create, monitor, and optimize their campaigns from a single interface, streamlining the advertising process and providing a unified reporting system for tracking video ad metrics.

2. Media Buyers Cannot Guarantee Specific Channel Placement

Advertisers cannot guarantee that their ads will appear on specific channels. Both platforms operate on a broader network level, where ads are distributed across various channels based on targeting parameters and auction outcomes. This approach ensures broad reach but limits control over specific placements.

3. Auction-Based Buying

Both Google and YouTube TV ads are bought through an auction-based system. Advertisers bid for ad placements, and the highest bidders win the slots. This system is designed to maximize the efficiency of ad spending, allowing advertisers to reach their target audiences while maintaining budget control.

4. Support for Traditional and Vertical Video Creatives

Both platforms support traditional horizontal video creatives as well as vertical video formats, offering advertisers the flexibility to tailor videos for diverse viewing experiences and maximize engagement across devices.

YouTube Shorts ad creatives are especially gaining popularity among CTV viewers, making it another reason why running Connected TV ads using the YouTube platform can effectively expand audience reach.

5. Measurable Performance

The performance of both YouTube and Google CTV Ads is measurable through detailed network reporting. Advertisers can track key metrics such as impressions, views, view-through rates, and clicks. This data-driven approach allows for continuous campaign optimization and pacing.

YouTube TV and Google TV Ads Differences

1. Ad Cost Models

Media buyers can only purchase Google TV Ads on a CPM (Cost Per Thousand Impressions) basis. This model charges advertisers based on the number of impressions their ads receive, making it ideal for brand awareness campaigns where reach is a priority.

On the other hand, running Connected TV ads using YouTube TV offers both CPM and CPV (Cost per view) bases. The CPV model charges advertisers only when viewers watch their ads, providing a cost-effective option for performance-driven campaigns focused on viewer engagement.

2. Campaign Accessibility

Google TV Ads are available in Video Reach Campaigns, which include Efficient Reach and Non-Skippable Reach sub-campaigns. These campaigns are designed to maximize reach by ensuring ads are shown to a broad audience, utilizing non-skippable formats to guarantee full ad views.

YouTube TV Ads are accessible through various campaign types, including Video View Campaigns. These campaigns focus on reach and leverage viewing and engagement metrics, such as longer watch time and ad retention.

3. Ad Formats

YouTube TV Ad offers marketers a variety of ad formats, including skippable and non-skippable ads and longer ad lengths. This variety allows advertisers to tailor their campaigns based on specific goals and viewer preferences. While Google TV ad currently supports two ad formats:

How To Setup Google TV Ads?

Setting up Google TV Ads involves several steps, from creating a Google Ads account to launching your targeted campaign.

Here’s a step-by-step guide to help you through the process:

Step 1: Create a Google Ads Account

• You’ll need to create an account if you don’t already have one. Visit Google Ads and sign up. If you already have an account, log in.

Step 2: Set Up a New Campaign

• Start a New Campaign:
  • In your Google Ads dashboard, click the + button to start a new campaign.
  • Select “New campaign.”

• Choose Your Campaign Goal:
  • Select a goal that aligns with your advertising objectives. For Google TV Ads, the objective type should be “Awareness and Consideration” or “Create a campaign without a goal’s guidance”
  • Select Campaign Type: Choose the “Video” campaign type. Google TV Ads are part of the video ad format.

• Configure Campaign Settings:
  • Campaign Sub-Type: Select either “Efficient Reach” or “Non-Skippable In-Stream” to maximize the reach on Google TV.

• Network Settings:
  • The “YouTube videos” option is already pre-selected. Tick the “Google TV” option. You may remove the “Video partners on the Google Display Network” to increase the possibility of your video ads appearing on YouTube and Google TV. For device setup, unselect all the devices except for “Connected TV”
• Budget and Bidding:
  • Set your daily budget and bidding strategy. For Google TV ads, you typically bid on a CPM (Cost Per Thousand Impressions) basis.
• Choose Your Ad Formats:
  • Select the ad formats you want to use. Google TV supports 15-second non-skippable in-stream ads and 6-second bumper ads.
• Proceed with Audience Definition, Creative Details, and Review and Launch Your Campaign:
  • Review Settings: Double-check all your campaign settings, targeting options, and ad formats.
  • Launch Campaign: Once everything is set, click “Create Campaign” to launch your Google TV ad campaign.

Expand YouTube Ad Awareness Campaign Reach to TV Viewers

Integrating Google TV ads into your YouTube awareness campaign strategy significantly enhances your ability to reach and engage audiences across multiple devices, including smart TVs, streaming devices like Chromecast, and mobile devices. Google TV ads leverage Google’s new expanded advertising ecosystem, enabling precise targeting based on demographics, interests, and behaviors, ensuring your ads reach the most relevant audiences.

This integration allows seamless management within the Google Ads platform, providing a unified interface for creating, monitoring, and optimizing your campaigns. Additionally, comprehensive reporting tools offer valuable insights into performance metrics, helping you fine-tune your strategy for better ROI.

Google TV ads are primarily non-skippable, guaranteeing full message delivery, which is particularly effective for brand awareness campaigns. In contrast, YouTube ads offer skippable and non-skippable formats, providing flexibility based on campaign goals.

Combining both platforms allows you to mix ad formats to maximize viewer engagement and manage ad spending more efficiently by utilizing CPM and CPV models. This combined approach leverages the strengths of Google TV’s live TV shows and YouTube’s User-Generated Content (UGCs), ensuring your brand message reaches the right people at the right time across various devices, ultimately enhancing the overall effectiveness of your advertising strategy.

Cross-channel strategies are great for engaging customers across different platforms and enhancing brand visibility and sales. This article will explore platform choices and discuss influencer collaborations, advertising options, engagement strategies, and target demographics. 

We will also give you a step-by-step run-down on developing a cross-channel marketing strategy for your business.

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What is cross-channel marketing?

In short, cross-channel marketing involves using multiple channels to reach customers. It integrates various marketing channels (e.g., email, social media, websites). Using different channels and methods creates a seamless experience for the customer and allows businesses to engage with customers in various ways. 

Email newsletter software, such as Mailchimp or Constant Contact, can be particularly effective in nurturing leads and maintaining customer relationships through personalized communication.

This is intended to increase the success of your sales lead generation efforts. It also allows for a more coherent and consistent message across the various platforms, giving customers a better experience with the brand. 

How does cross-channel marketing enhance brand visibility?

The digital era has meant businesses must adapt their outbound lead generation strategies. Gone are the days of just knocking on doors. Granted, that strategy meant meeting customers where they were – literally. But today’s customers are everywhere, so your business must reach audiences in all these places.

Cross-channel marketing enhances brand visibility by ensuring that your brand is present across multiple platforms and channels, which has the benefit of reaching a wider audience than one single platform. 

You can engage with customers who use different channels to conduct their affairs by using a combination of online and offline channels, such as social media and email, websites, and physical stores. 

You also meet customers at different points in their buying journey. This approach’s consistency and cohesiveness help reinforce your brand message. Every channel, be it YouTube advertising, email, or anything else, promotes the same ideas and messages to offer a consistent marketing strategy, regardless of how you interact with your customers. 

Things to consider when choosing a platform for cross-channel marketing

When deciding which platforms to use, you should keep a few key points in mind. We’ll go through these together below.

But before we do, it’s worth noting that managing multiple platforms can get complicated. While some tools can help you stay on track with individual channels like social media or email, consider other tools like Trello, Asana, Monday, or Kanban software. 

The latter can be particularly helpful for marketing as you can create visual boards, add attachments to tasks, and view insights into your workflow. 

Short-form versus long-form content

Depending on who you are targeting (your audience) and your marketing goals (e.g., brand recognition, sales, customer retention), you’ll need to decide whether short-form or long-form content best suits your needs. You will want to choose the most suitable for effectively conveying the message you want. 

Short-form content can include an organic social media post or a static ad. Long-form content focuses more on articles (e.g., blog posts) or videos (e.g., Instagram reels). This is a great choice for quickly capturing someone’s attention and conveying key messages concisely. 

Long-form content, on the other hand, allows you to offer more in-depth information, establish thought leadership, and engage individuals who want real knowledge and solutions to tricky problems.

Opportunities for influencer collaborations

Influencer collaborations can help you to enhance brand visibility and reach a wider audience. This is particularly effective if you’re developing a go-to-market strategy for a new offering or audience. 

What is a go-to-market strategy? It’s essentially a roadmap for launching a new product or feature or introducing an existing product into a new market.

Since influencers have followers who trust their recommendations, they are useful assets for promoting these products and services. You should keep the following in mind if you want to go down this path:

• Relevance: The audience of the influencers you choose should align with your target demographic and brand values; otherwise, they might not engage with you.

• Engagement: You should pick influencers with high engagement rates, not just based on their number of followers.

• Quality: Check that the quality of the influencer’s content, as well as their style and tone, matches your brand image and messaging.

Advertising options and sponsored content

When exploring possible advertising options and sponsored content for your marketing strategy, you want to choose platforms that align with your brand and help you reach your target audience. You should consider the following aspects:

• Platform choice: You should pick the popular platforms amongst your target demographic, e.g., social media platforms like Facebook or Instagram, search engines, and websites.

• Advert formats: Consider the advertising formats available on the platforms, such as display ads, videos, and sponsored posts. This will help you decide which best suits your marketing goals. 

• Measure performance: Monitor and analyze your performance metrics to optimize their success. This will allow you to make data-driven decisions going forward.

Engagement strategies for cross-channel marketing

When developing your cross-channel marketing strategy, you’ll want to consider personalization, in other words, creating tailored content for your target audience. You could employ interactivity within your strategies, such as polls, quizzes, surveys, etc. This would encourage more active participation and engagement from your audience. Utilizing customer engagement software can support these strategies by helping you track user behavior, segment audiences, and automate personalized interactions across various touchpoints.

Further, user-generated content is a great way to make your audience feel involved, all while generating great and authentic content and building a community. 

You should also keep your finger on the pulse of trends, new technologies, and platforms, adapt your strategy as you go along, and remain relevant. This can help you counter challenges such as decreased social media engagement, competing for your audience’s attention, and keeping your brand image consistent. 

Target demographics, interests, and user interactions

When planning your marketing strategy, you need to identify key demographic factors regarding your audience, such as age, gender, location, income level, education, and occupation. This can help you curate buyer personas that collectively represent your target audience. To refine these personas and guide your strategy, use reliable market research tools to track trends, analyze competitors, and gather consumer insights.

Taking it a step further, understanding your audience’s interests, preferences, and hobbies will help you tailor your messaging and content to make it more attractive to them.

Finally, you can check and analyze how they interact with your brand across the channels so that you can learn how to optimize engagement and the user experience. 

Content formats, length, and interactive features

In terms of content formats, you want to choose those that best showcase your brand and that your audience will enjoy. These could be videos on TikTok, blog posts, infographics, podcasts, or even interactive quizzes! Interactivity can encourage your audience to participate and engage more with what you’re putting out there, making you more memorable. 

How to develop a cross-channel marketing strategy

The following 6 steps will guide you through developing a cross-channel marketing strategy that meets your target audience’s preferences so that you can optimize your efforts for success! 

Clearly outline what you aim to achieve

Your first step is to define your goals and objectives. Without this, you are walking around in the dark without a head torch. Your goals could be directed to increasing brand awareness, generating more traffic to your landing page, or increasing sales. Whatever you decide, your aims will be the magnet that pulls you in the right direction when making strategic choices. 

Understand your target audience

Next, you want to conduct market research to identify your target audience’s demographics, behaviors, and preferences—in other words, to gain a deeper understanding of your customers. This step is vital for helping you make tailored marketing choices aimed at your customers’ specific preferences and keeping them in line with who they are. 

Gather this data from robust sources such as your email database, surveys and questionnaires, contact center CRM software, customer feedback, market research, online communities, and social media analytics. The combined data will inform which channels you use and what types of content you produce. 

Choose the most relevant channels

You then want to pick the channels that best align with your target audience’s preferences. This could include social media platforms like Instagram or Facebook, email marketing if your audience uses email, search engine marketing, and many more.

By choosing the most relevant channels, you can create targeted marketing campaigns that potentially increase engagement and conversion rates in the financial services sector. Additionally, integrating a system like Microsoft Dynamics 365 Licensing can boost campaign efficiency by optimizing customer data management, centralizing insights, and streamlining operations across multiple channels.

Different channels offer different content format options, so you can create diverse content depending on your channel of choice.

Maintain a consistent brand message and identity

Make sure you are consistent in your brand messaging, tone of voice, and identity across all channels. 

This will help you build brand recognition, going from the short-term to long-term memory of your customers as well as building trust among your audience. When something feels familiar, people often trust it more. Familiarity is key. 

Create tailored content for each marketing channel

While your style, tone, message, and identity should be consistent across all your channels, you should create content optimized for each channel’s format and specific audience. Instagram, for example, is great for short videos. Email is better with static images. Websites can include blogs and longer articles. 

Using a cross-channel marketing approach could enhance the effectiveness of your strategy, for example, by targeting specific customer segments and tailoring messaging to their preferences within the healthcare insurance sector environment.

Cross-promote your content across multiple channels

Finally, you should cross-promote your content between channels. You can do this by sharing content from one channel to another—e.g., including a link to a video in an email, or linking to an article on your website with a post on Instagram. 

This can help amplify your message and reach a wider audience so that your content gets the most bang for its buck. It also helps you to ensure the consistency that we talked about earlier. 

Social media tools come into their own here, so do your research and consider which software will save you time while helping you be consistent. Some of these tools are beneficial for redistributing content between blogs and social media, some can automate posts across different channels, and others have built-in analytics.

Conclusion 

Cross-channel marketing is a great way to enhance brand visibility. By integrating different channels into a seamless experience for your audience, you can create a cohesive brand image that appeals to diverse customer groups. 

Cross-channel marketing enhances trust and familiarity and improves customer experience through consistency and accessibility. Implement the steps outlined in this article to develop your own cross-channel marketing strategy for your business today!

This article is a guest post. The guest author is solely responsible for ensuring the accuracy and authenticity of the information provided in the article. Any product or service recommendations or mentions made in the guest post are not endorsed by Strike Social.

We invite you to contact us for guest posting opportunities. We are excited to collaborate with talented writers and feature high-quality content on our blogs.

The Latest Back-to-School Marketing Trends for Your 2024 Strategies

Before finalizing your 2024 back-to-school campaigns, review how the 2023 season unfolded to gather advertising ideas. Examine the trends and assess whether your media plan aligns with previous ad seasons, identifying the top strategies to implement.

What’s on the Back-to-School Shopping List

Spending per household is expected to rise, with electronics and computer-related accessories in high demand for up to 69% of back-to-school shoppers.

Additionally, big-ticket items such as dorm and apartment furnishings are popular this year, driven by a projected increase in college enrollment. Public college enrollments are expected to increase by 230,000, while private college enrollments are expected to increase by 80,000.

Drivers of 2024 Back-to-School Spending

In addition to higher prices, 43% of shoppers want to purchase new items this year, such as trendy streetwear-inspired back-to-school outfits for kids, or versatile footwear that complements any school look. By staying in tune with what your audience wants and aligning your offerings accordingly, your brand has the opportunity to attract new customers through innovative products and compelling campaigns. 

Moreover, big-ticket items and additional school supplies are major drivers of spending during back-to-school season. Hence, brands offering packages or promotions on these items should expand their advertising efforts to highlight them effectively.

How to Prepare Back-to-School Campaigns That Hit the Marks

Will your back-to-school advertising campaigns pass the checklist for effective ads that will excel this year? Here’s how your back-to-school social campaigns can pass with flying colors and achieve the metrics you’re aiming for.

Prioritize Mobile Optimization

In the 2022-23 school year, 47% of U.S. parents shopped exclusively on mobile devices. Use short-form videos for Meta Reels, YouTube Shorts, and TikTok. Using the 9:16 ad format, you can take advantage of mobile-first placements and gain better visibility among mobile users. Check out the TikTok benchmarks for this time of year:

With 40.9% of YouTube watch time on mobile devices, YouTube Shorts is a prime spot for ads. The latest Google Marketing Live update allows landing pages to be viewed in-app, boosting user engagement.

Quick tip for your back-to-school campaigns: Ensure your landing pages and websites are mobile-responsive to maintain a consistent layout across all devices.

Maximize Reach with Cross-Device Targeting

In addition to the standard contextual or audience targeting options available for YouTube ads, you can also target specific devices such as computers, mobile phones, tablets, and TVs. Interestingly, despite desktop computers only accounting for 23% of retail website traffic in Q1 2024, they were responsible for 34% of all purchases in the United States.

Quick tip for your back-to-school ads: Use Product Studio to enhance the backgrounds of your back-to-school ad creatives without needing entirely new content. Ensure your Shopping ads are optimized for desktop viewing as well.

Engage Repeat Customers

Don’t neglect visitors who didn’t convert on their first visit. Retargeting on social media helps remind them of your brand, especially during peak shopping. According to Mintel research, dads primarily rely on brand familiarity (32%) and social media (33%) when shopping for back-to-school supplies. On the other hand, moms prioritize school recommendations (41%) and promotions or coupons (40%).

Incorporate discounts and coupons in your retargeting ads. A discount can drive an initial purchase, and a coupon for future use encourages repeat business. Additionally, loyalty or reward programs should be offered to incentivize frequent purchases further.

Quick tip for your back-to-school advertising strategy: To effectively target dads and moms, consider incorporating discounts, coupons, loyalty programs, and rewards into your back-to-school retargeting ads.

A discount can encourage a one-time purchase, while a coupon for a subsequent purchase can increase customer loyalty. A loyalty program or rewards system for frequent purchases can be the cherry on top, further incentivizing customers to continue buying from you.

Additional Strategies for Your Back-to-School Ads

Appeal to Price-Conscious Shoppers

With a consistent presence in the market, discount stores continue to attract price-conscious buyers, accounting for approximately 40-50% of shoppers for the past three years. Furthermore, up to 46% will purchase pre-configured back-to-school kits this year.

Your social media ad campaigns should emphasize discounted bundles and promotional packages to stand out and capture the attention of budget-minded shoppers. This approach effectively appeals to consumers seeking cost-effective and convenient shopping solutions during the back-to-school season.

Tap into the Millennial Parent Demographic

Millennials are now entering the phase where they have children of school age, which means they are a key demographic for your campaigns. 71% of millennial parents prefer to purchase back-to-school supplies online, with YouTube and TikTok being popular platforms for influencer marketing.

The convenience and wide selection of online shopping, coupled with the influence of social media, have made online shopping the preferred choice for many millennial parents.

Advertiser’s Notes for Your Back-to-School Social Campaigns

Don’t wait for the peak period to prepare your media plan and launch your back-to-school campaigns on paid social media. With the help of this Strike Social guide, we’ve compiled key takeaways to ensure your campaigns are a success this peak advertising season:

Keep Your Ads Active Before, During, and After the Back-to-School Season

With the right campaign pacing, maintain a balanced budget and ad delivery throughout the entire campaign period from early July to late August or early September.

Refresh Your Creatives Without Taking New Images or Videos

Google’s AI has made it easier for advertisers to keep their creatives fresh without constantly creating new content. With the Product Studio, you can optimize your back-to-school ads with captivating backgrounds and designs for desktop and mobile placements.

Refine Your Audience Targeting

Age and country demographics are just the beginning of audience targeting for paid ads. Use keywords, retargeting, affinity, and live events to refine your audience and improve ROAS and conversion rates.

Strike Social helps brands optimize performance without exceeding costs. Contact us now to learn more about Strike Social’s services and customized solutions and discover how our data-driven approach can drive measurable results for your campaigns.

How We Manage Campaign Pacing in Social Media Advertising

Campaign pacing in social media advertising refers to the strategic distribution of your advertising budget, ad delivery, and overall campaign efforts over a specific time period. Like a skilled sailor navigating through varying winds and tides, you aim to ensure your resources endure the entirety of your journey, hitting peak performance precisely when needed.

Depending on the objective of the ad campaign, the ad pacing can follow different approaches:

Campaign pacing by objective

This involves controlling the overall spending and delivery of the entire campaign over its duration based on a singular objective. For instance, in a Post Engagement campaign, the goal is to keep the pace of consistent ad delivery for engagement such as views, clicks, or likes, throughout the campaign flight. It’s useful to ensure a consistent presence throughout the campaign period.

Campaign pacing by budget

Focuses on controlling the campaign’s daily or weekly budget. Budget pacing helps ensure that your campaign doesn’t overspend or underspend on a specific day or week, allowing for more granular control over budget allocation.

The Negative Impacts of Poor Pacing and the Benefits of Effective Pacing in Advertising

Proper pacing in your social media ad campaigns can make or break the results of your digital advertising efforts. Let’s explore the good, the bad, and the ugly when it comes to ad pacing for your campaigns:

Advantages of Effective Pacing

Optimized Budget Utilization

• Pacing in digital marketing ensures your budget is allocated efficiently throughout the campaign duration. This prevents overspending or underspending during the early days of your campaign flight and ensures you have resources for ad delivery during peak periods.
• For example, when you run your Father’s Day campaign for the whole month of June, you should ensure that you have enough budget allocated during the peak dates (i.e., June 16 and 1-2 days before and after the event) to maximize your exposure and still have a regular budget towards the end of the month.

Consistent Brand Exposure

• With a well-paced ad delivery, your brand remains visible and engaging throughout the campaign.
• For instance, if your target impressions are 10,000 daily, proper pacing should keep you within this level without exceeding or underpacing so you consistently receive around 10K impressions daily.

Disadvantages of Poor Pacing

Missed Opportunities to Reach the Target Audience at Optimal Times

• Poor ad pacing can cause you to miss key moments when your audience will most likely engage with your ads, leading to lower reach and conversions.
• For instance, in our Father’s Day example, if you allocate excessive funds during the campaign’s early days, you may not have the flexibility to increase your budget during peak times modestly. Similarly, if you constrain the budget too tightly during peak periods, you may spend funds on less relevant days, such as the month’s end, which is not as closely tied to the event.

Difficulty in Identifying Performance Trends and Making Timely Optimizations

• When your campaign lacks a structured pace, analyzing performance data and identifying trends becomes harder. Ineffective campaign pacing can delay necessary optimizations and hinder your ability to improve campaign results.

What Does It Mean When My Campaign Is Underpacing vs. Overpacing?

Understanding the signs of underpacing and overpacing is crucial for maintaining a healthy and effective social media advertising campaign. Recognizing these issues early on allows you to adjust and optimize your campaign for better results.

By understanding the causes and signs of underpacing and overpacing, you can proactively manage your social media advertising campaigns and ensure they perform at their best. Advertising pacing is a dynamic process that requires ongoing monitoring and adjustment to achieve optimal results.

How Strike Social Manages Pacing in Advertising Campaigns

Keeping a constant watch over your social ad campaigns is crucial, but monitoring them around the clock can be exhausting. What works today may not be effective tomorrow, and you need a reliable advertising partner to handle the hard work for you. Strike Social excels in this area, ensuring optimal performance through strategic campaign pacing.

Precision and Efficiency

Strike Social ensures optimal ad spend and consistent pacing throughout the campaign by precisely aligning ad budgets and goals, thus avoiding overspending and underspending.

In a YouTube Video View Campaign, we successfully delivered all of the requested views consistently throughout the campaign flight, with minimal deviations from the average weekly impressions ordered. Furthermore, we managed to achieve a campaign CPV that was 16.67% lower than the requested Max CPV.

Diverse Pacing Strategies

Strike Social employs various pacing methods tailored to the campaign’s objectives:

• Budget order ensures a steady distribution of the budget throughout the campaign duration.
• Outcomes order prioritizes desired outcomes, such as impressions, clicks, or views.

Internal Tech Tool and Expertise

We have developed an internal tech within our proprietary tool, CampaignLab, to facilitate effective campaign management.

Coupled with the expertise of our media buyers, this tool enables our rotating team to monitor all ad campaigns continuously. This constant oversight ensures that campaigns are optimized in real-time and that necessary adjustments are made promptly.

Ignite Your Campaigns with Strategic Ad Pacing

Seeing impressive results at the start of your campaign can be exhilarating, while slow starts can feel disheartening. However, proper ad pacing is the key to sustainable success in social media advertising. By carefully managing your campaign’s pacing, you can ensure your budget, impressions, and clicks last throughout the campaign, allowing for adjustments and optimizations.

While AI tools can assist you in achieving your campaign objectives, the success of your campaign ultimately lies in your hands.

Partner up with Strike Social to maximize the potential of your social media ad campaigns. Reach out to our team and discover how much more you can accomplish with our expert guidance and cutting-edge solutions.

What are Safe Zone Guides, and Why Do They Matter?

In video advertising, the “safe zone” is the area within your video ad that is guaranteed to be fully visible to viewers across different devices and platforms. These safe zones vary across platforms due to different user interfaces and functionalities.

This area is typically centered within the frame and avoids the edges where elements like platform icons, captions, or user interface elements might overlap and obscure your content.

• Placing essential elements like your logo, key messages, and call-to-action buttons within the safe zone guarantees visibility and prevents them from being cut off or hidden.
• 87% of audiences associate trust in a brand with high-quality video ads, which means ensuring your CTAs are free from any obstructions. A clear message not only captures attention but also encourages viewers to engage—whether that’s watching the full video, clicking on links, or taking the desired action.
• Adhering to safe zone guidelines makes your video ads look more polished and professional.

Safe Zone Templates for TikTok, YouTube Shorts, and Instagram and Facebook Reels

Social media platforms have specific safe zone guidelines to ensure the optimal performance of ads. Failure to adhere to these guidelines may result in ad rejection or underperformance.

Video ads on platforms like TikTok and Instagram Reels commonly encounter issues such as icons on the right side, text at the bottom, dead space at the top, and cropped content on the sides. Safe zone guides are crucial to prevent these elements from negatively impacting captions and screen shares.

To simplify the process, we will explore the recommended safe zone guidelines for various short-form video ad platforms and develop a comprehensive safe zone preset that you can easily apply to your short-form video ads. This central guide will provide a clear and concise reference for creating effective short-form video ads that can be seamlessly uploaded to any ad platform you choose.

9:16 Safe Zone Guide for Vertical Video Ads

	Facebook Reels	Instagram Reels	YouTube Shorts	TikTok
Aspect Ratio	9:16
Safe Zone Guide (Keep These Areas Clear)	14% top, 35% bottom, 6% sides	14% top, 35% bottom, 6% sides	15% top, 35% bottom, 4% left, 18% right	14% top, 11% left, 22% right, 45% bottom (up to 4 lines of text)

Download the safe zone guides for 9:16 ads here:

Let’s combine these concepts and establish a universal safe zone template for all vertical video ads across various social media platforms.

Safe Zone Guide for 16:9 Ad Formats

	Facebook Reels	Instagram Reels	YouTube Shorts	TikTok
Aspect Ratio	Not recommended		16:9
Safe Zone Recommendations (Avoid Placing Elements Here)			22% right, 40% bottom	11% left, 22% right, 28% bottom(up to 4 lines of text)

If you’re launching a landscape video ad campaign on YouTube Shorts and TikTok, use this safe zone guide on what areas you should avoid when adding your messages and important branding elements:

Click to download the 16:9 vertical format safe zone templates:

Safe Zones for 1:1 Ad Size And Other Considerations

	Facebook Reels	Instagram Reels
Aspect Ratio	4:5
Design Safe Zones (Leave These Areas Clear)	13% right, 10% bottom	13% right, 10% bottom

While the 4:5 aspect ratio is not among the commonly recommended dimensions for Facebook and Instagram ads, it remains a supported option on the Meta platform. To ensure your 4:5 video ad displays optimally, we have compiled a safe zone preset that you can utilize during the ad creation process:

	YouTube Shorts	TikTok
Aspect Ratio	1:1
Design Safe Zones (Leave These Areas Clear)	17% right	10% left, 22% right, 41% bottom

Another ad size supported by both YouTube Shorts and TikTok is the square format, or 1:1. We’ve converged these safe zone specifications to create a single template for video ads with this ad size.

Commonly Asked Questions On Video Ad Safe Zones

The Role of Safe Zones in Optimizing Ad Campaigns

As media buyers, you may assume that safe zones are solely the creative team’s responsibility. However, since video ads are a crucial part of the advertising campaign process, they also fall under your jurisdiction. Any obstruction in the important elements of the video ad creative can significantly impact your ads’ success or failure. Therefore, you must know and adhere to safe zone guidelines and templates before uploading to the ad platforms.

But what’s next once you’ve ensured your ad creatives perform optimally? Enhance your knowledge by exploring the Strike Social blog. Subscribe to our newsletter and follow our LinkedIn page to stay up-to-date with paid social media advertising trends and insights.

Top 2024 Father’s Day Strategies for a Winning Ad Campaign

The quest for the perfect Father’s Day gifts starts early, with searches spiking as early as the first week of June. Whether you’re a seasoned marketer or a newly-fledged media buyer, there’s ample opportunity to build up your ads before the 2024 Father’s Day frenzy reaches its peak. From consumer behavior to advertising strategies, we’ll cover what you need to know to maximize this retail opportunity.

What Consumers Are Looking For This Father’s Day 2024

While trends may evolve, the timeless nature of our fathers’ preferences often remains constant. If you’ve ever assumed that shopping for dads is a breeze compared to shopping for moms, think again. 

Take a look at the 2023 Father’s Day advertising trends and observe how consumer behavior has shaped over the years:

Where People Shop for Father’s Day Gifts

As you gear up for Father’s Day advertising this 2024, it’s evident that online platforms will continue to reign as the top shopping destination for consumers. Social media platforms are already buzzing with anticipation for this retail event, making it an opportune moment for advertisers to capitalize on the paid social media advertising space.

What Father’s Day Shoppers Are Searching For

Drawing parallels to trends observed during Mother’s Day, “gifts of experience” are increasingly valued during these celebratory occasions. These experiences may include tickets to sporting events, concerts, or indulgent dinners and brunches.

However, for Father’s Day 2023, special outings took precedence, followed closely by clothing and gift cards as the top two choices. Subscription boxes have also emerged as a top pick, offering curated selections ranging from specialty cocktails and shaving sets to golf gear and apparel.

Drawing parallels to trends observed during Mother’s Day, “gifts of experience” are increasingly valued during these celebratory occasions. These experiences may include tickets to sporting events, concerts, or indulgent dinners and brunches.

However, for Father’s Day 2023, special outings took precedence, followed closely by clothing and gift cards as the top two choices. Subscription boxes have also emerged as a top pick, offering curated selections ranging from specialty cocktails and shaving sets to golf gear and apparel.

Father’s Day Advertising Ideas to Lead Your 2024 Campaigns

Now that you’ve gained insights into Father’s Day 2024 shopper preferences, it’s time to translate this knowledge into actionable strategies. Not all brands will have the same offers; thus, you can certainly use these tips to ensure your brand remains at the top of customer’s minds when they see your ads on social media.

Strategic Targeting

Specify your audience

Utilize the advanced targeting options provided by paid social media ad platforms. You can reach highly relevant audiences by leveraging user demographics, interests, purchase history, and even life events (such as getting married).

On YouTube, you can target your video ads to users experiencing specific life events, such as recently getting married or planning to get married soon. Additionally, you can target users who have identified as parents, allowing their spouses or children to see your ads as part of the Father’s Day advertising campaign. Here are the estimated weekly impressions for these audience demographics related to Father’s Day:

Line up the lookalikes

If you have a robust customer file, upload it onto your chosen ad platform to create lookalike audiences. Platforms like TikTok utilize AI to identify similar Father’s Day audiences with shared characteristics, boosting the chances of driving purchase intent.

Shifting family dynamics

Move beyond traditional dad stereotypes and tailor your Father’s Day advertising campaigns to resonate with people buying for single dads, stepdads, grandfathers, or other father figures.

Under a Clicks objective, you can see how your ad drives traffic to your website. Here are the benchmarks for Clicks-focused campaigns on Instagram to gauge your success during the Father’s Day advertising period:

Capture attention on TikTok

60% of consumers trust brands that feature user-generated content (UGC) because it offers social proof from influencers and content creators who share genuine experiences with your product or service.

Incorporate UGC into your TikTok ads by highlighting your Father’s Day gift packages or showing how creators celebrate Father’s Day using your exclusive service. If your main objective is to boost brand awareness, here are some CPM benchmarks to guide your campaign evaluation:

Get Insider Tips on Father’s Day 2024 and More

Father’s Day 2024 is another excellent chance to boost your brand’s visibility on social media. Even though it’s only halfway through the year, you don’t want to miss out on this profitable opportunity. Onto the rest of 2024, we’ll continue to track and share insights on peak advertising trends for upcoming seasons.

For more valuable information, browse our blog and subscribe to our newsletter to stay informed.

How Targeting Sports Audiences Drives Results During Major Sports Events

The meteoric rise of powerhouse women athletes like Simone Biles, Alex Morgan, Sabrina Ionescu, and Caitlin Clark exemplifies the surge of sports on social media. Beyond their remarkable achievements in women’s sports, these athletes have each seen their careers skyrocket and a boost in social media engagement. Comscore reported that women’s sports are becoming mainstream, boosting a 219% YoY social media growth from ESPNW.

This year, the 2024 NCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament shattered viewership records, capturing the attention of sports fans nationwide. The championship game between the University of South Carolina and the University of Iowa drew 18.7 million average viewers, peaking at over 24 million combined on ESPN and ABC. The 2024 collegiate season marked the first time a women’s final surpassed the viewership of the men’s championship game.

Let’s understand how social media’s influence is pivotal in sports marketing. By examining how brands and advertisers can harness sports-centric content strategically, we can uncover opportunities to enhance campaign engagement, establish emotional connections with audiences, and create brand loyalty.

Sports Teams and Athletes are Becoming Brand Champions

Sports teams and athletes possess universal appeal, enabling businesses to engage with enthusiasts and a broader demographic that may not traditionally follow sports.

These types of content transcend various cultures and demographics, capturing themes of unity, perseverance, and victory that resonate with the masses. Notably, sports fans, regardless of their level of fanaticism, often engage with a team or athlete’s social media pages, especially during significant events.

Caitlin Clark, a generational talent in the WNCAA, has experienced phenomenal growth on Instagram, mirroring her exceptional career. In September 2021, she had 46,808 followers. Approximately three years before securing the top pick in the 2024 WNBA draft, Clark has amassed a remarkable 1.5 million followers on Instagram. Her follower count surged during her March Madness stint, with approximately 60k new followers in February-March 2022, 350k in February-April 2023, and a staggering one million in February-April 2024.

The prominence of sports fandom on social media has been amplified recently, particularly with the increasing popularity of women athletes filling our social newsfeeds. As a result, brands can capitalize on this surge of engagement by aligning their advertising campaigns with the trending sports buzz. This strategic placement of ads within relevant sports-related content can effectively capture the attention of a wider audience and enhance brand exposure.

Why Should Non-Sports Brands Add Sports Audiences To Their Targeting?

Given the effectiveness of sports teams and athletes as brand advocates, it’s beneficial to understand why non-sports brands should consider including sports audiences in their paid social strategies.

Looking at the example, Caitlin Clark’s explosive growth on social media exemplifies the individual athlete’s influence and the broader potential for brands to tap into these vibrant fan bases and target highly engaging sports content.

Here are three insights on why advertisers should be targeting sports audiences:

1. Broader Market Reach

Sports and athletes provide a gateway to diverse audiences. Lifestyle brands can have a fresh new set of eyes from sports and athlete followers. Sports content usually shows victory, motivation, and perseverance, and brands can harness these themes to enhance their ad narratives.

2. High Engagement Levels

Athletes like Caitlin Clark demonstrate the potential for quality engagement with sports followers on social media platforms. Brands should be around conversation during key sports events. Interaction with sports followers drives results as it translates into significant brand awareness and recall.

3. Efficient Personalized Messaging Through Localized Campaigns

During events like the NCAA Finals, geo-targeting specific regions or cities where games are being held or where fan bases are located can be highly effective. Localized campaigns allow for more personalized marketing, leading to higher engagement rates at a lower cost than broader national campaigns.

Sports Audience Targeting in Action

The team used custom affinity audiences in a YouTube ad campaign, balancing sports-centric audience targeting and sustainability interests. The campaign achieved a 13% CPM efficiency for non-skippable ads and a 40% cost reduction in CPV for skippable ads.

An important insight gained was that sports-centric audience targeting worked well with non-skippable ads on connected TVs (CTV). Understanding viewers’ viewing intent based on the device can increase efficiency. For non-skippable ads on larger screens, viewers are likelier to stick around and watch the ad, as they’re consuming long-form sports content like condensed games, replays, analysis, or match breakdowns. Unlike mobile viewers, attention spans are shorter, and viewing intent is mixed.

Balancing the ratio of sports-centric and interest-based, matching the right ad formats, and device targeting are factors that advertisers shouldn’t overlook.

Social Platforms Ad Tools That You Can Use In Capitalizing Growth in Sports Viewership

Having established the synergy between the explosion in sports viewership and social media, advertisers can now know how to capitalize on the popularity of high-profile sports events by utilizing social platforms as dynamic advertising toolkits. These platforms allow brands to effectively engage with sports fans at all levels by tapping into each platform’s user base’s unique features and consumption habits.

Apart from targeting sports audiences, below are three refined strategies advertisers can employ:

Streamline Endorsements or Brand Partnerships Process

• TikTok Spark Ads: Collaborate with influential creators to produce authentic branded content. For example, a sports drink brand might partner with fitness influencers on TikTok to create native-looking workout videos that subtly highlight product benefits.
• Instagram Branded Content: Partner with athletes and influencers to integrate branded messages into their content, enhancing credibility and appeal.
• YouTube BrandConnect: Work with YouTube publishers and sports content creators to amplify brand narratives within fan communities, fostering deeper connections.

Leverage Specific Features or Ad Placements for Integrated Campaigns

• Instagram and Facebook Reels, Stories Ads: Use immersive, short-form video content to captivate audiences and drive engagement during major sports events.
• YouTube Shorts Ads: Go for bite-sized, visually compelling advertisements to reach viewers and maintain their attention.
• TikTok Interactive Add-Ons: Boost engagement through interactive elements like stickers, filters, and mini-games, making ad experiences more engaging.

If you’re looking to harness the power of sports fandom in your marketing campaigns and see real efficiencies in targeting sports fans, our team is ready to assist.

We understand the dynamics of sports marketing and the unique opportunities it presents on social platforms. By partnering with us, you’ll access data-centric insights that can transform your advertising efforts.

This post was updated in January 2025 to provide you with the latest information.

Key Instagram Ad Metrics That Drive Successful Campaigns

Every brand approaches asocial media ad campaigns with unique objectives. For businesses with physical stores, Instagram image ads featuring exclusive in-store discounts serve as a lure for foot traffic. Conversely, florist shops leverage Reels to showcase their artistry, aiming to drive online bookings via their website. Consequently, while florists prioritize website clicks and conversions, brick-and-mortar stores assess ad impressions against actual visits.

We aim to elaborate the varied Instagram ad metrics essential for monitoring campaigns and align them with your specific objectives, goals, and brand identity.

Different Metrics for Instagram Advertisers

When managing Instagram ad content, it’s crucial to distinguish between organic and paid advertising strategies. Use the Instagram Insights dashboard to track organic performance, while Meta Ads Manager is your go-to for paid Instagram advertising analytics.

Organic Metrics from Instagram Insights Dashboard

Instagram Insights offers valuable insights into your organic content’s performance. Here are the key Instagram metrics to track on the Instagram Insights dashboard:

• Reach: The total number of unique accounts that have seen your content. 
• Impressions: Impressions indicate the number of times your content has been displayed on users’ screens. 
• Profile Visits: Refer to the number of times users have visited your Instagram profile. It includes direct visits to your profile and external clicks from platforms like Facebook, and other apps from the Meta Audience Network.
• Content Interactions: Content interactions encompass various user engagements with your posts, such as likes, comments, saves, and shares.
• Followers: The followers metric tracks the growth of your Instagram follower count over time.

Instagram Ad Metrics to Monitor in Ads Manager

Meta Ads Manager offers a comprehensive array of metrics for tracking Instagram ad campaigns:

Instagram Metrics by Performance and Clicks

• Reach: The total number of unique users who have seen your ad at least once during the reporting period.
• Frequency: The average number of times each user has seen your ad during the reporting period.
• Impressions: The total number of times your ad has been displayed to users. 
• CPC (Cost Per Link Click): The average cost incurred for each click on the linked landing page on your ad. 
• CPM (Cost Per 1000 Impressions): The average cost for every 1000 impressions of your ad. 
• CTR (Click-Through Rate): Measures the percentage of users who clicked on your ad after seeing it.

Metrics for Instagram Engagement Campaigns

• Post Comments: The number of comments left on your ad posts. 
• Post Saves: The number of times users have saved your ad posts. 
• Post Shares: How often have users shared your ad posts with others.
• Link Clicks: The number of clicks on the URL link included in your ad.

Instagram Metrics to Track for Video Engagement

• Video Plays: The total number of times your video ad has been played by users.
• 2-Second Continuous Video Plays: This metric tracks the number of times users have watched your video for at least two continuous seconds.
  • Cost Per 2-Second Continuous Video Play: The average cost for each two-second continuous video play.
• 3-Second Continuous Video Plays: Similar to 2-second plays, this metric measures the number of times users have watched your video for at least three continuous seconds. In Instagram metrics, a “view” is counted only when the video has been played for 3 seconds or longer.
  • Cost Per 3-Second Continuous Video Play: Cost for each three-second continuous video play.
• ThruPlays: ThruPlays indicate the number of times your video ad has been played to completion or for at least 15 seconds.
  • Cost Per ThruPlay: Calculates the average cost incurred for each completed or 15-second continuous play of your video ad.

How To Determine the Right Instagram Performance Metrics

Now that you understand the corresponding Instagram ad metrics based on your objectives and goals, it’s time to apply this knowledge effectively. Reporting campaign success to your client involves considering various ad types and elements, and it’s not a one-size-fits-all approach.

To effectively tailor your Instagram ad reporting, align your tracking efforts with your advertising strategy. Consider including these standard Instagram ad metrics in your reports:

As media buying experts, tailoring reports to the intended audience is essential for effectively conveying the impact of your Instagram campaigns. Here’s a breakdown of key metrics and core metrics to focus on in different scenarios:

Identifying The Ad Metrics That Matters Most

By now, it’s clear that seemingly simple numbers on an Instagram ad metrics dashboard hold a wealth of information. These metrics extend far beyond the advertising department, impacting various teams within your organization. Tracking the right metrics based on your specific campaign goals fosters collaboration and alignment, creating highly engaging and effective Instagram ad campaigns throughout the year.

Equipping yourself with a deep understanding of key Instagram ad metrics empowers you as a media-buying expert. This knowledge translates to strategic decision-making, campaign optimization, and, ultimately, achieving your advertising objectives on Instagram.

Head over to Strike Social’s blogs for even more valuable insights on social media advertising.

This post was updated in January 2025 to provide you with the latest information.

2025 Instagram Advertising Formats To Integrate Into Your Strategy

Formulating an effective Instagram ad hinges on its ability to engage audiences and align with your brand’s narrative. Should you opt for Reels, static images, or perhaps Collection or Shopping ads? Many businesses grapple with this decision, unaware of the diverse Instagram ad formats you can choose from.

The reality is, each ad format brings its own set of strengths to the table. While a static image ad may excel in launching a new product, a compelling video ad can better convey your brand’s story. By understanding the full spectrum of Instagram ad formats, you can tailor your message to resonate with the right audience and achieve the desired results.

How Many Types Of Ad Formats Does Instagram Offer

Instagram sets itself apart from platforms like Facebook and Twitter with its emphasis on captivating visuals that immediately grab users’ attention. From striking photos to engaging videos, visual content plays a pivotal role in connecting with audiences and conveying brand messages on Instagram. 

Given the platform’s visual-centric nature, understanding how to leverage creative visuals effectively is essential for successful advertising on Instagram. Let’s explore the various ad formats available:

Instagram Explore Ads

• Ads that appear on the Explore page of Instagram, where users go to browse content that is tailored to their interests based on their past behavior and interactions on the platform.
• Positioned within the “similar posts” section, Explore Ads engage users who are actively exploring relevant content.

Instagram Feed Ads

• This ad format appears seamlessly within users’ main feed, alongside organic posts from accounts they follow.
• This type of Instagram ad is designed to blend in with the organic content and can take various forms, such as image posts, carousel ads, and video ads.

Profile Feed Ads

• Allows ads to be displayed within a user’s profile feed as they scroll through the content. These ad formats are specifically shown in the vertical scrolling experience activated when someone taps on a thumbnail on a user’s profile, rather than in the profile grid itself. 
• The ads are designed to blend in with the organic content in a user’s profile feed and offer a new way for advertisers to reach audiences in a more personalized and engaging manner.

Reels Ads on Instagram

• These ads appear between organic Reels on Instagram, presenting full-screen vertical videos.
• With a maximum length of 15 minutes, Reels ads mimic the format of Instagram Stories ads, offering businesses an opportunity to showcase their brand in short-form videos.

Shopping Ads

• Note: As of February 6, 2023, the Instagram Shop tab is no longer available on the app shortcuts.
• Instagram Shopping Ads allow eCommerce brands to showcase their products directly within the app.
• Tagged with product information such as price and description, these ads simplify the purchasing process for users without redirecting them to external websites.

Instagram Stories Ads

• Vertical, full-screen ads that appear between users’ Stories on the Instagram app.
• Unlike organic Instagram Stories, which disappear after 24 hours, Instagram Story ads can be displayed throughout the campaign duration, reaching audiences at the frequency selected via Meta Ads Manager.

How Do These Different Ad Formats Appear On The Instagram App

Let’s embark on a visual journey to better understand how these Instagram advertising formats are integrated into the user experience. To do so, we need to look at each ad format and how it appears within the user interface, providing insights into its placements.

Image Ads

Video Ads

Carousel Ads

Collection Ads

Which Types of Instagram Ads Suit Your Brand’s Objectives

Now that you’ve explored the range of Instagram advertising formats available for your advertising campaigns, it’s essential to align your choices with your brand’s specific objectives. Selecting the right ad formats depends on your advertising goals and the message you want to convey to your audience.

Let’s see how each ad format can complement your brand’s objectives:

Campaign Objective	Ideal Ad Formats & Placements	Advantages	Target Audience
Awareness	Feed Ads (image, video) Profile Feed Ads (image, video)	Captures attention with visuals. Introduces brand identity and values. Reaches a broad audience actively discovering new content.	Audiences interested in topics relevant to your brand.
Traffic	Explore Ads (image, video) Stories Ads (image, video) Reels Ads (video)	Drives website visits or app downloads with clear CTAs. Briefly showcases website/app value proposition. Highlights different features or benefits in a swipe-through format.	Instagram users interested in the problem your website/app solves; users actively browsing for relevant solutions.
Engagement	Feed Ads (carousel) Reels Ads (video)	Encourages reactions with interactive or entertaining video content. Tells a compelling story or asks a question to spark discussion.	Users actively scrolling through feeds and stories; people interested in topics related to your brand or niche.
Leads	Explore Ads (carousel, collection) Stories Ads (image, video) Reels Ads (video)	Briefly explains an offer and uses CTAs for contact details. Highlights offer details with a lead gen form included or through a landing page link.	Viewers actively seeking solutions or resources; people interested in your offer and willing to share contact information.
App Promotion	Feed Ads (video) Stories Ads (video) Reels Ads (video)	Drives app installs with clear CTAs. Utilize sponsored content and partnership ads with content creators and UGC to promote app features. Highlights diverse app functionalities.	Instagram audiences actively browsing for apps that address their needs.
Sales	Explore Ads (carousel, collection) Reels Ads (video, collection)	Showcases high-quality product images and clear purchase CTAs. Demonstrates product features and benefits in action. Creates a buying journey narrative or showcases product variations.	Users actively considering product purchases; those interested in the category or niche your product falls under.

Questions from Instagram Media Buyers

Navigating Your Choices Across the Different Instagram Ad Formats

After exploring this blog, you’ve likely gained a foundational understanding of Instagram advertising, but there’s still much more to uncover. This guide serves as a crucial resource for media buyers seeking to enhance their expertise before launching campaigns.

Remember, mastering Instagram advertising formats requires ongoing learning and refinement. Keep this guide accessible and stay updated by subscribing to our newsletter for additional insights and resources to support your media buying journey.

Next, explore our guide on Instagram ad specs for optimizing your campaigns.

This post was updated in January 2025 to provide you with the latest information.

What’s the State of Sports Betting Advertising Today?

Despite a 21% decline in 2023, sports betting advertising in the U.S. continues to experience significant growth. As of November 2024, the American Gaming Association (AGA) reports an 8.6% year-over-year (YoY) revenue increase for the commercial gaming industry, with sports betting specifically showing a remarkable 26.8% YoY growth. This brings sports betting’s share of the industry to 10.9%.

Preparing Your Sports Betting Ad Campaigns Before Launch

Launching sports gambling and betting ads requires complexities and adhering to specific constraints. Before you hit “publish,” we recommend reviewing this checklist to ensure your campaign is primed for success.

Audience Targeting

Sports audiences have undergone a significant transformation, partly propelled by notable events like the Taylor Swift effect during the Super Bowl. The 2024 NFL season saw record-breaking female viewership, including a 53% surge among teenage girls, a 24% increase among women aged 18-24, and a 34% rise among women aged 35 and older.

On platforms like Facebook and YouTube, sports-related content commands significant engagement rates. Sports teams lead the pack on Facebook with an average engagement rate of 0.27%, followed closely by influencers at 0.23% and higher education at 0.15%. Moreover, the projected surge in sports viewership on YouTube will reach 90 million by 2025.

Limitations: Media buyers must recognize the varying legal age requirements for gambling across different US states, with some jurisdictions prohibiting it altogether. We recommend setting the minimum age for sports betting ads at 21 to ensure compliance and maximize reach. Refer to the table below for state-specific regulations:

Location Targeting

For sports betting apps or websites seeking a global audience, especially during major occasions like the Olympics, you must assess the legal framework of the countries you intend to focus on. Each nation maintains its unique regulations concerning sports betting advertising.

Below is a summary of select countries and their positions regarding sports betting ads on YouTube. If a country is not included, it means that YouTube ads presently do not accommodate gambling ads in that jurisdiction.

For more detailed information on limitations in specific countries, click here.

Ad Platform Considerations

While you may have a preferred platform for advertising where your campaigns typically perform well, note that not all platforms permit sports betting ads on social media, and each has its own set of guidelines to follow.

TikTok, for instance, prohibits the promotion of gambling or any related activities. Meanwhile, on Meta platforms like Facebook and Instagram, advertisers must seek written permission and are prohibited from targeting sports betting ads to audiences under 18 years old.

There’s more flexibility on YouTube, as the platform allows the promotion of sites or content related to online gambling. However, advertisers must undergo Google certification before advertising sports betting apps or websites. If you want to promote sports betting apps or sites on YouTube, you can apply through Google’s official platform certification here.

Best Practices for Promoting Sports Betting on Social Media

After obtaining certifications and permissions and successfully launching your ads on your chosen platform, the next step is to ensure the continuity of your campaign. Here’s a closer look at potential issues that may arise mid-flight and how you can resolve them:

Disapproved Landing Page

• Problem: Your ad links to a landing page that violates platform policies, such as containing excessive gambling references or lacking responsible gambling resources.
• Resolution: Ensure your ad includes clear disclaimers, especially regarding age restrictions. Incorporate prominent visuals or audio reminders indicating that viewers must be of legal gambling age. Additionally, consider “pinning” a comment that outlines responsible gambling practices and resources associated with your brand.

Lack of Transparency or Misleading Claims

• Problem: Ads that lack transparency regarding odds, promotions, or terms of service or contain misleading claims may be disapproved of or restricted.
• Resolution: Avoid making exaggerated claims or omitting crucial information that could mislead users. Use clear and prominent disclosures to ensure transparency and foster trust with your audience.

Targeting Minors or Restricted Audiencces

• Problem: Targeting minors or audiences not permitted to participate in gambling activities.
• Resolution: Be mindful that legal gambling ages vary by state. Consider creating separate campaigns or ad groups targeting states with differing legal ages. For example, one campaign could target states with an 18+ legal age for gambling, while another focuses on states with a legal age of 21+ for online betting.

Policy Changes Mid-Campaign

• Problem: Your chosen advertising platform may implement new policies mid-campaign, restricting your ad content and leading to rejection or disapproval.
• Resolution: Subscribe to alerts or industry blogs to stay informed about platform policy changes. Quickly adapt your campaign creatives and targeting to comply with updated regulations. This proactive approach helps prevent disruptions and ensures the smooth progression of your sports betting app ads.

Assessing the Effectiveness of Gambling Ads in Online Advertising

When it comes to advertising sports betting on social media, it’s natural to be skeptical due to many restrictions and limitations. Will it be too expensive? Can it achieve the same reach and efficiency? Let’s examine this further.

The data from YouTube’s Q1 2024 TrueView Instream Skippable campaigns reveals that gambling ads achieve a 10% lower CPV compared to the overall 2023 benchmarks of our US campaigns. Additionally, CPV for online gambling ads experienced a further 7% reduction, indicating a continued efficiency in cost-effectiveness.

In Facebook campaigns utilizing the Impressions objective, the CPM for gambling ads is strikingly 70% lower than our US campaign benchmark. This stark contrast highlights the potential efficiency that your sports betting ads can attain through paid social media advertising platforms.

Get Your Sports Betting Ads In The Game

Regardless of the restrictions surrounding advertising sports betting on social media platforms, it’s clear that there are strategies to leverage the excitement and expansive reach available through this channel. With numerous upcoming sports events, social media advertising offers a prime opportunity to get your sports gambling ads seen.

Reach out to our team to discover additional ways to capitalize on paid social media advertising to enhance your sports betting campaigns.

This post was updated in January 2025 to provide you with the latest information.

Winning Ad Campaigns for Amazon Prime Day 2024

Exclusive sale events hold a unique allure for shoppers, and the numbers from the 2023 Amazon Prime Day speak volumes: U.S. sales surged nearly 6% year-over-year to $6.4 billion on the event’s first day alone.

As we approach the 2024 Amazon Prime Day, set to rival even the busiest retail holidays like Christmas and Thanksgiving, anticipation is high for what could be one of the largest e-commerce moments of the year. With retailers gearing up to offer substantial discounts, consumer spending is expected to soar. But where do media buyers fit into this equation?

Amazon Prime Day Trends Across Seasons

Amazon Prime Day debuted on July 15, 2015, commemorating the company’s 20th anniversary. Initially accessible in only 9 countries, including the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, and France, the event has since expanded to over 20 countries and now spans a duration of 48 hours.

Shopping by Household

In 2023, over a third (37%) of US households participated in Prime Day, marking a notable increase from previous years. This surge was accompanied by a slight uptick in spending per household, fueled by increased orders.

Shopping by Preference

82% of Amazon Prime Day shoppers in 2023 knew what they wanted to purchase, with 53% specifically holding out for discounted prices during the event. Additionally, 34% of shoppers availed themselves of Lightning Deals, emphasizing the event’s appeal to bargain hunters.

Shopping by Deals

The satisfaction levels among Prime Day shoppers were high in 2023, with two-thirds expressing extreme or high satisfaction with the deals offered. Notably, data reveals that most deals featured percentage-based discounts, with a significant proportion offering discounts of 60% or more.

How To Promote Amazon Prime Day Products On Social Media

When promoting Amazon Prime Day 2024 products on paid social media, there are a few considerations to remember. While Amazon has its advertising platform, Amazon Ads, which offers opportunities both on and off the platform through the Amazon Demand Side Platform (DSP), leveraging social media advertising can enhance your promotional efforts. However, there are some potential hurdles to navigate.

Approaching Audiences

As Amazon Prime Day 2024 approaches, competition intensifies, with fierce competition for ad space and user attention. With an estimated 2.5 million reach as early as two months before the event, precision in targeting is crucial to focus your advertising efforts within your brand’s niche. 

What you can do:

While targeting specific audiences may incur higher costs, social media platforms offer the advantage of precise audience targeting. Utilizing custom audiences, lookalike audiences, and retargeting options enhances your ability to reach those interested in your products.

For example, platforms like TikTok allow the creation of custom audiences based on landing page visits or engagement with your profile.

Since Amazon Prime Day 2024 is expected to occur from July 10th to 11th, consider uploading your custom audience list from previous retail seasons, such as Mother’s Day and the 4th of July.

Furthermore, if your landing page remains active year-round, ensure you embed the TikTok pixel to target a lookalike audience of your landing page visits from the last 30 days.

Technicalities and Backend

Tracking the effectiveness of your social media ad campaigns requires the proper setup of backend analytics to determine whether sales originate from your campaigns. Establishing connections between your ads and landing pages is essential for accurately measuring campaign performance.

What you can do:

Utilize UTM parameters in your landing page URLs to track traffic sources. For instance, if YouTube video ads drive traffic to your Amazon Prime Day 2024 landing page, create URLs with UTM parameters indicating the traffic source.

By tracking these links through Google Analytics, you can assess the impact of your social media advertising efforts and optimize accordingly.

Here’s an example:

https://yourbrand-amazonprimeday.com?utm_source=bumperads&utm_medium=videoads&utm_campaign=amazonprimeday2024&utm_id=youtube

You can obtain this using an online UTM builder. Tracking the link through GA4 lets you determine if you’re gaining landing page traffic from your YouTube ads.

Effective Ad Formats For Your Amazon Prime Day Strategy

When advertising your products on social media for Amazon Prime Day 2024, you must choose ad formats that effectively showcase your offerings. While Amazon ads are straightforward, featuring product images, prices, and details, transitioning these ads to social media can be tricky.

Fortunately, several ad formats are available on social media platforms that can help boost your Prime Day marketing efforts.

YouTube Shopping Ads

Despite Amazon and Google Merchant Center being separate platforms, you can link them to make the most of Google and YouTube’s reach. You can export your Amazon shop catalog to the Google Merchant Center using various external tools.

From there, YouTube Shopping Ads will feature your products on the platform through search partners and suggested products.

TikTok Interactive Add-Ons

To enhance your Prime Day marketing strategy, utilize TikTok’s interactive add-ons to showcase your exclusive 2024 offers effectively. These interactive ad campaigns take on a shorter flight, thus complementing seamlessly with your ongoing brand awareness TikTok campaign. 

Engage with users who have previously interacted with your awareness campaigns through retargeting, gradually building anticipation towards Prime Day. These engaged audiences will be specifically targeted with the gift code sticker ad, enticing them to explore your Amazon Prime Day deals further through the interactive campaign.

During Amazon Prime Days 1 and 2, integrate the gift code sticker interactive add-ons into your video campaigns. As the gift code sticker appears in your ad, viewers can effortlessly click “Redeem Code” to copy it to their phone’s clipboard and redeem the code when purchasing from your Amazon shop.

Prime Your Ads for Amazon Prime Day Sales

E-commerce platforms hold immense power, often underutilized. With Amazon Prime Day 2024 approaching, there’s still time to optimize your listings and social media ads for the platforms we’ve discussed.

While participation in the Amazon Prime Day event promises gains for Amazon sellers, integrating strategic social media campaigns can significantly amplify your results. Curious about how to maximize this opportunity? Contact us today or schedule a meeting with our team. Let’s make it happen.

This post was updated in March 2025 to provide you with the latest information.

How to Create Successful Mother’s Day Advertising Campaigns

In 2024, Americans allocated up to $33.5 billion for Mother’s Day gifts and festivities, according to the National Retail Federation. While this marked a slight dip from the steady increase in Mother’s Day spending since 2019, it still ranked as the second-highest recorded spend for the holiday.

For advertisers, this emphasizes the importance of staying top-of-mind during Mother’s Day advertising season. How can you make your brand stand out and capture more sales? Explore the strategies in this blog to learn how to make the most of this much-awaited holiday.

Analyzing Consumer Behavior for Mother’s Day Marketing Strategies

Before we strategize how your brand can make its mark, you must understand first how consumer behavior shifts during this holiday.

Online shopping remains the top destination for Mother’s Day purchases, making digital ad strategies more important than ever. By analyzing past trends and spending patterns, you can uncover key insights to optimize your 2025 Mother’s Day campaigns.

Shopping Destinations

According to NRF’s survey, online spending surged in 2020 due to limited in-store options. However, the past four years have seen a resurgence in physical store visits, with specialty stores gaining popularity as shoppers seek curated Mother’s Day gifts and unique experiences.

Despite this shift, online retailers continue to attract the most shoppers during the holiday. Thus, your Mother’s Day sale ads must be strategically targeted to the right audiences to drive clicks and engagements where it matters most.

Gift Choices

Flowers, greeting cards, and special outings have remained the top three gift choices for three consecutive years. The allure of “gifts of experience” continues to grow, reflecting consumers’ desire for meaningful presents that foster lasting memories.

Although jewelry and electronics dominate consumer sales and spending, special outings continue to claim the second spot, highlighting the preference for unique experiences. Mother’s Day gifts are increasingly focused on the memories people want to create with their loved ones, as spending on special outings continues to rise in 2024.

Purchase Planning

Unlike other holidays that require extensive planning, most Mother’s Day gifts are purchased within one to two weeks before the holiday.

With Mother’s Day 2025 falling on May 11th, brands should time their Mother’s Day advertising campaigns strategically. While the majority of shoppers buy last-minute, 30% of purchases happen one to two months in advance.

Tapping into this early shopping window allows brands to build awareness, capture high-intent buyers, and maximize conversions leading up to the holiday.

How Advertisers Can Spark Buzz for Mother’s Day Promotions

Explore the cost-per-engagement (CPE) benchmarks during the Mother’s Day purchase planning period:

CPE costs increase by up to 23% in the 1-2 months before Mother’s Day, indicating a competitive period for engagement-focused ads. However, in the 1-2 weeks leading up to the event, CPE drops by 16%, making it a prime window for driving conversions. This trend highlights the importance of focusing on engagement early, ensuring your Mother’s Day ads drive awareness and lead consumers toward making purchases in the weeks leading up to the big day.

While uncertainty around TikTok’s future in the U.S. lingers, advertisers still have an opportunity to capitalize on declining CPMs. See the TikTok CPM benchmarks during this period:

The 2-3 weeks leading up to Mother’s Day is when shoppers actively seek sale ads and gift ideas on TikTok. CPMs rise steadily in March and April as brands compete for visibility, with costs peaking up to 17% higher in the final week. Still, up to 20% of TikTok users make their Mother’s Day purchases during this time, presenting a last-minute opportunity for brands to drive conversions.

To help guide your Mother’s Day ad costs for 2025, here are the Facebook CPC benchmarks for clicks campaigns targeting website traffic objectives:

Cost-per-click (CPC) peaks in March, aligning with the surge in Mother’s Day purchases, before dropping by 37% as the holiday approaches. However, costs spike again at the end of May, driven by early ad spend for 4th of July and summer campaigns, as brands prepare for purchases made 1-2 months in advance, as well.

Celebrate Your Brand This Mother’s Day 2025

While Mother’s Day might seem like just another retail event, it’s a golden opportunity waiting to be seized. With online shopping continuing to dominate this season, there’s no better time to leverage the hype and dive into the frenzy.

We understand your love for your moms and the brands you represent. So, why not make this Mother’s Day 2025 a win-win? Craft compelling campaigns that tug at heartstrings and connect with consumers on a deeper level. By delivering what they want and need, you’ll ensure your brand feels the love it deserves.

As you gear up for Mother’s Day 2025, keep your finger on the pulse of consumer trends, think outside the box, and offer irresistible deals. With the right strategy, you’ll make this Mother’s Day one to remember.

Budget-Focused Strategies for Your 2024 Olympics Advertising Campaigns

Amid the pandemic’s peak, the Tokyo Olympic Games 2021 set a record-breaking 5.5 billion streaming minutes watched on social media and platforms like NBCOlympics.com, the NBC Sports app, and Peacock. Additionally, the International Olympic Committee’s social media accounts gathered 6.1 billion engagements, including video views, shares, comments, and likes during the games.

With such an extensive potential reach spanning different devices, updating your advertising strategies becomes crucial. Identifying your target audience and knowing when and where to reach them best is key to effectively advertising during the 2024 Olympics season without overspending.

How Your 2024 Olympics Advertising Plan Can Look Like

As the 2024 Summer Olympics draws closer, the window of opportunity to promote your brand remains wide open. If your brand is not an official Olympics sponsor or partner, there’s ample time to start your 2024 Olympics social media marketing and test your way into an effective campaign.

Budget and Timeline

Whether you’re presenting Q2 and Q3 marketing ideas to your director or catching up on utilizing your marketing budget, paid social media advertising offers a flexible and effective way to reach your target audience.

The beauty of having a set budget is that platforms’ AI capabilities can adapt to your requirements. Here’s a breakdown of how your sample budget and timeline can look like:

Refined Audience Targeting

To craft a detailed targeting strategy for your 2024 Olympics advertising plan, it’s essential to understand how your audience consumes related content. Aside from the brand you are advertising, what preferences and interests should you be focusing on?

To test how this refines or broadens your reach even further, let’s look back at the table from above:

Case Study: HVAC Company Campaigns Targeted Towards Sports Fans

During last year’s winter season, an HVAC company launched an advertising campaign to target both the US and Canadian markets effectively. However, with distinct demographics, interests, and audience behaviors in each region, the challenge was to devise strategies that could succeed in both markets. 

Canada Strategy

In Canada, the campaign’s approach was tailored to showcase the resilience of the company’s HVAC solutions across various seasons. Additionally, the campaign leveraged YouTube’s audience targeting capabilities, particularly focusing on Custom Intent audiences and Canada’s enthusiasm for sports.

These strategies yielded the following outcomes:

• A 13% increase in CPM efficiency for Non-skippable ads
• A 40% reduction in CPV for Skippable ads, surpassing Strike’s guaranteed rates
• Sports-centric audiences comprised 51% of the campaign’s spending, views, and impressions. Despite being smaller in size, this audience segment delivered equal engagement and value to the campaign.

While the campaign didn’t directly target sports events, it effectively tapped into the audience’s interests, particularly Canadians’ passion for sports. This highlights the versatility of the marketing strategy, which is suitable for year-round implementation in the Canadian market and effective beyond specific sporting events.

US Strategy

For its U.S. campaigns, the HVAC brand aimed to cater to the substantial number of mobile viewers prevalent in the country. To achieve this, the brand adopted Video View Campaigns (VVC), distributing its creative across various formats, including skippable in-stream, in-feed, and Shorts.

The VVC initiatives yielded the following outcomes:

• The campaigns generated 19 million impressions and 5.3 million+ total video views.
• 43% of views and 37% of clicks originated from YouTube Shorts ad placements.
• Connected TVs (CTVs) achieved 94.66% video completion rate (VCR).

This case study showcases the importance of adapting creatives to cater to mobile viewers while also ensuring visibility across other platforms like CTVs. Despite the focus on mobile audiences, the brand successfully reached a substantial number of viewers through both Shorts and CTV placements, highlighting the equal importance of these platforms in the VVC strategy.

Bonus: Creative Strategies for Sustaining Advertising Momentum Post-2024 Olympics

The sports season isn’t just for die-hard fans anymore. Even casual sports enthusiasts and those curious about their country’s performance can be valuable targets for paid social media advertising.

Here are some creative tips to ensure your advertising remains impactful long after the Olympics:

IcyBreeze

e.l.f. Cosmetics

Despite being released on Game Day, the e.l.f Cosmetics ad did not explicitly reference the big event, allowing e.l.f to repurpose it year-round. By seizing the ad spot and leveraging celebrity endorsements, e.l.f ensured its brand stayed at the top of the mind long after the event.

Furthermore, notice how engagement accumulates two months after its initial posting on YouTube, underscoring its ongoing relevance and effectiveness in connecting with the right audience.

Here’s how you can follow suit: Imagine you’re a TV distributor looking to capitalize on the 2024 Olympics buzz. Rather than directly referencing the event, envision a scenario where a family upgrades to a larger TV to enjoy quality time together watching the games. By focusing on the bonding experience facilitated by your product or service, you can resonate with audiences beyond the scope of the Olympics.

High-Impact Strategies for 2024 Olympics Advertising

The strategies outlined in this guide are paramount to your advertising success during the 2024 Olympics. With NBC Olympics securing $1.2 billion in ad sales for the upcoming games, it’s clear that ad space competition will be fierce. However, budget constraints need not limit your reach to Olympic audiences.

This is just the beginning of what you can achieve. For further insights on optimizing your 2024 Olympics advertising strategies, send us a message and discover how Strike Social can elevate your campaigns. Contact us for inquiries or schedule a consultation with one of our experts today.

Instagram Advertising Terms: The Beginner’s Handbook

The initial step in effectively setting up your Instagram advertising efforts is to familiarize yourself with the essential glossary of Instagram terms. That’s where our comprehensive guide comes in. From understanding the essentials of content creation for your brand on Instagram to monitoring your metrics and analytics effectively, our marketer’s glossary for Instagram provides all the guidance you need.

The glossary is thoughtfully organized into categories for ease of use. You can either choose to explore terms by their category or simply scroll down to find the specific terms you need, arranged in alphabetical order:

Foundational Instagram Terminology

Grasp the fundamental elements through this detailed Instagram glossary, which covers the initial terms. If you’re new to advertising on Instagram, this is where to begin:

Instagram Paid Advertising Terms

If you’re gearing up for paid marketing on Instagram, check out this section for essential terminologies used in Instagram advertising:

Instagram Glossary for Ad Metrics & Analytics

Your Instagram Ads’ effectiveness depends on your ability to track and interpret their performance accurately. This section provides you with the crucial Instagram terms needed to understand the analytics of your campaigns:

Ad formats: These refer to the various ways your ad can appear on Instagram. Each format offers unique advantages for specific goals:

Ad placements: Know where your ads appear on Instagram. Here’s a breakdown of the key ad placements:

Algorithm: The system that determines the order in which users see content in their feed. It considers factors in a user’s engagement, relevance, and activity.

Archive: A section where you can hide posts from your profile without permanently deleting them.

Average View Time: The average duration for which users watch your video ad. 

Bio: A short description about yourself or your brand.

Boosted post: Increasing the visibility of an existing organic post through paid advertising.

Campaign objectives: Here are some primary goals you can choose from when setting objectives for your Instagram ad campaigns:

Caption: The text accompanying your post, providing context or details.

Carousel Post: A post format allowing you to swipe through multiple images or videos within a single post.

Carousel Swipe Rate: The percentage of users who swipe through all the images/videos in your carousel ad after seeing the first frame.

Click-Through Rate (CTR): The percentage of users who clicked on your ad after seeing it. 

Comment: A way to leave a message publicly on a post.

Cost-per-Acquisition (CPA): The average Instagram cost you pay for each action acquired driven by your ad.

Cost-per-Click (CPC): The average amount you pay for each click on your ad.

Cost-per-Thousand Impressions (CPM): The average cost you pay for every 1,000 times your ad is displayed.

Direct Message (DM): A private messaging feature for sending messages directly to other users.

Engagement Rate: A metric measuring how well your content resonates with your audience. It’s further broken down as:

Explore Page: A curated page featuring content based on user interests and trending topics.

Followers: Users who have subscribed to see your posts in their feed.

Following: Accounts you’ve chosen to see content from in your feed.

Frequency: The average number of times a user sees your ad during a campaign.

Geotagging: Adding a location tag to your post, allowing users to discover location-based content.

Hashtag: A word or phrase preceded by “#” to categorize your content and help users discover it.

Handle (@username): Your unique identifier on Instagram.

Highlights: A collection of saved stories that appear permanently on your profile.

Impressions: The number of times your post appears on a user’s screen.

Influencer: A social media personality with a dedicated following and the ability to influence purchase decisions.

Insights: The built-in analytics tool on Instagram that provides data on your post performance and audience demographics.

Instagram Live: Streaming live video content where viewers can comment and interact in real-time.

Paid reach: The number of unique accounts who see your content through paid advertising efforts.

Posts: The content you share on your profile, including photos, videos, and stories.

Profile: Your public-facing page showcasing your posts, bio, and follower information.

Profile Picture: The main image representing your account.

Profile Visits: The number of times users visit your Instagram profile after seeing your ad.

Reach: The number of unique accounts who were shown your post.

Reels: Short, engaging video clips with creative editing tools and music options. They can be up to 3 minutes long and include either a single video or a combination of images and videos.

Saved Posts: Content saved by users to revisit later, which can be public or private.

Sponsored Post: A post created by an influencer or media outlet in partnership with a brand, typically disclosed with #ad or #sponsored.

Stories: Short, disappearing photo or video clips viewable for 24 hours.

Story Completion Rate: The percentage of users who watch your entire story ad.

Swipe-Ups/Link Clicks: (For Stories Ads) The number of times users swipe up on your story ad to visit the linked website or landing page.

Tag: Mentioning another user (@username) in your post or comment, creating a link to their profile.

Verified Badge (Blue checkmark): A mark awarded by Instagram confirming the authenticity of a public figure or brand.

Video View: The number of times your video content is played, including replays.

Website Conversions: The number of specific actions users take on your website after clicking your ad (e.g., purchases, sign-ups).

The Essential Instagram Glossary Every Advertiser Needs

The importance of mastering the specific language of each platform cannot be overstated — especially on Instagram, where the visual and dynamic interplay of content creates unique opportunities for brands.

As you move forward, armed with the insights from our comprehensive glossary, remember that the language of Instagram is continually evolving. Staying abreast of new terms and trends is crucial for maintaining the relevance and effectiveness of your advertising campaigns.

Thus, whether you’re figuring out which hashtags to use, where your ads will show up, or how to read your campaign analytics, understanding Instagram’s terminology is the first step toward engaging your audience and boosting your brand.

Amplify Your Campaign’s Impact and
Savings in Every Activation

Seamless End-to-End
Advertising Partner

Strike’s tailored solutions identify savings in your campaigns,
sharpening efficiency and optimizing based on data and machine learning.

What makes Strike Social stand out

Brands we have worked with

This post was updated in January 2025 to provide you with the latest information.

After News of the US TikTok Ban, How Can You Shift Your Social Media Ad Strategies?

The latest U.S. TikTok ban updates include a tentative shutdown date set for January 19, users migrating to another Chinese social app called RedNote, and incoming President-elect Trump planning to attempt saving the app after his inauguration.

Despite the challenges posed by the upcoming TikTok ban, it seems that the concerns primarily stem from lawmakers, attributed to their limited understanding of the technology, rather than from the US audience, which has shown remarkable composure. While significant and deserving of attention, the situation about the US TikTok ban presents an opportunity for us to prepare you for the inevitable and forthcoming shift.

The Uncertain Future Post-TikTok Ban

It all started in 2020 when then-US President Donald Trump viewed TikTok as a national security threat and announced that the government was considering banning the app. Fast forward to March 13, 2024, when the Senate passed the bill approving the legislation that forces TikTok to sell ownership from a Chinese-owned company to a United States-owned one.

While the TikTok app may not be a wholly foreign-owned enterprise (WFOE), ByteDance has a diverse ownership structure: 60% by global investors, including those from the U.S., 20% by its Chinese co-founders, and 20% by its employees, which includes thousands in the U.S.

Despite ongoing discussions and legislative actions in the works for months, TikTok’s popularity remains strong. However, the threat of the U.S. TikTok ban is a real possibility. This raises important questions for advertisers about adapting and preparing for a future that might change TikTok’s operations drastically.

What Does the Bill to Ban TikTok Mean for Future Campaigns?

Should it retain its affiliation with ByteDance, its Chinese parent company, the potential ban of TikTok in the United States presents a complex scenario for advertisers utilizing the platform. Here, we examine what such a scenario could mean for brands and advertisers capitalizing on TikTok views and engagement:

Reach and Targeting Challenges

• With the TikTok app banned, a primary consequence would be the immediate loss of the US audience demographic. Advertisers who have been targeting American users might find themselves asking, “Why can’t I target USA on TikTok ads?”
• The answer lies in the unavailability of TikTok within the United States, compelling those who wish to reach American consumers to pivot towards TikTok local ads. 

How Can TikTok Advertisers Adapt to the Change?

The possibility of TikTok being banned in the U.S. is becoming increasingly likely. Even if a request for another 270-day extension is approved, delaying the ban until October, TikTok advertisers in the U.S. must take proactive steps to adjust their strategies.

Below are key approaches to consider in light of the uncertain future concerning TikTok getting banned in the U.S.:

Adjusting your Audience Targeting Strategy

If the United States is no longer available for targeting, you can adjust your location targeting settings within TikTok Ads Manager. This is particularly useful for international brands, ensuring that budgets are not wasted on an unavailable US audience.

Alternatively, you can identify countries with significant US/American tourist populations as alternative targets. This approach helps maintain engagement with American users indirectly, for example, through their top travel destinations. For instance, the top 5 American travel destinations in 2024 that can be targeted on TikTok are United Kingdom*, Canada, Japan, Indonesia, and Italy.

* Targeting the United Kingdom (GB) is only available for managed accounts in Australia (AU).

Safeguarding Digital Assets

In anticipation of TikTok assets potentially becoming inaccessible, consider migrating them to alternative platforms like Meta and YouTube. Expanding to these platforms secures your assets and opens up new avenues for short-form video advertising.

• Reels is dominating on Facebook and Instagram, with users spending approximately two-thirds of their time engaging with video content. Moreover, Instagram alone is projected to account for over 50% of U.S. ad spend in 2025.
• Advertisers transitioning to Shorts in 2025 should note that 43% of U.S. ad buyers are already active in this space. Optimizing YouTube ad costs is achievable with the support of the right AdTech agency. By leveraging the flexibility to optimize across Shorts, feed, and even CTV, you can achieve high performance at competitive costs.

Keep producing vertical, short-form content to align with your audience’s established viewing habits and preferences, ensuring a consistent user experience across platforms.

Budgetary Considerations and Planning

Anticipate potential changes by formulating a plan that includes TikTok but also consider a strategic reallocation of your budget towards alternative platforms.

For instance, in planning a Super Bowl 2025 campaign where TikTok is a primary channel, consider reducing its budget while increasing allocations for Meta and YouTube. Here’s an example:

This strategy involves adjusting the advertising budget, initially allocating 50% to TikTok in Q3 2024, then reducing it to 40% by Q4 2024. To address anticipated changes proactively, the plan includes further decreasing the TikTok budget to 25% by Q1 2025. The funds saved from this reduction will be shifted towards YouTube advertising, capitalizing on its Shorts feature, which closely mirrors the short-form video format popularized by TikTok.

By proactively adjusting audience targeting settings, migrating digital assets, and reevaluating budget allocations, you can stay ahead and maintain your brand’s advertising strategies with minimal disruption.

What Opportunities Lie Ahead for TikTok Advertisers?

With the US TikTok ban on the horizon, it’s evident that adaptability is key. The risk of TikTok becoming inaccessible overnight highlights the need for proactive planning and strategic foresight. Being caught off-guard by TikTok’s potential exit from the US market could significantly impact your advertising efforts. Still, with the right tools, you can turn these challenges into opportunities for growth and innovation.

Collaborating with an advertising partner capable of navigating these uncertainties is crucial. Our experienced team offers essential insights for expanding your advertising to other platforms, preparing you for any outcome of the U.S. TikTok ban. Arrange a consultation with us to explore how your advertising strategies can continue to thrive.

This post was updated in January 2025 to provide you with the latest information.

Restriction of TikTok in the United States & Marketers’ Next Move

Why Panicking Shouldn’t Be On Your 2025 TikTok Advertising Strategy

The motion for TikTok restrictions in US has caused fear and panic among many users, creators, and advertisers. Headlines scream “Ban TikTok!” while social media feeds are flooded with speculation and lists of “Here’s what to do”. But before hitting the panic button, let’s take a deep breath and separate fact from fiction based on the recent news about the restrictions of TikTok in the United States.

Safekeeping Content

• Similar to having a window to access the data, even in a scenario when complete TikTok restrictions take place, users can download their data –  photos, videos, and other content.

The Fall of the TikTok Influencer

• Geographical restrictions may not signal the end of influencer marketing fueled by TikTok Spark Ads.
• Many influencers and creators are already pivoting to alternative platforms and reshaping their strategies to cultivate fresh audiences from the ground up.

TikTok Community Adaptation

• If a ban happens, it’s unlikely to be immediate. The restriction of TikTok in the United States would give advertisers time to adjust their strategies and explore alternative platforms that might emerge to fill the gap.
• Businesses and creators should be ready to follow where the TikTok Nomads will eventually find their new home.

Short-Term Effects of Full TikTok Restrictions for U.S. Advertisers

Advertisers who have decided to stand still and tell their clients “Business As Usual” right after the news breaks out may reap their rewards.

Surge of Ad Costs on Other Short-Form Platforms

The ripple effect of TikTok restrictions in the US could catalyze a redistribution of ad budgets across paid social platforms.

Once ad money started to steer away from TikTok, advertisers might feel the tilt of price movement when comparing ad cost to other major short-form video platforms such as YouTube and Meta. This heightened activity might initially drive up ad costs.

Loyalty to TikTok May Still Pay Off

Moreover, the departure of brands who advertise on TikTok, anticipating a ban, opens up the floor for lower competition on the platform. This scenario creates a more open playing field for those who choose to stay, offering enhanced visibility and potentially higher engagement rates at lower costs.

Remember, the users did not leave the platform, and TikTok’s average time spent on the platform continues to rise. Isn’t that the land filled with milk and honey for the TikTok advertisers?

New Avenues to Discover when Diverting TikTok Ads

Lastly, the rise of emerging platforms in the wake of TikTok’s challenges could spotlight new advertising opportunities. These platforms will likely introduce innovative targeting options and deeper audience insights, offering fresh avenues to explore and capitalize on.

YouTube has developed its ad solutions by adding YouTube Shorts to its ad placements (Video Action Campaign, Video View Campaign, and Video Reach Campaign).

Further, Facebook is supercharging Reels by adding it to their sales-driven campaign objective, shopping ads.

How Do We React About The Restriction of TikTok in the United States

In today’s lens, the news of TikTok getting banned may seem like a hurdle, but it can also be an opportunity for growth and efficacy. Businesses that remain adaptable and embrace change will be well-positioned to thrive in the evolving digital landscape.

Advertisers should stay on their fingers about the latest developments surrounding the ban and potential timelines.  From a long-term perspective, advertisers can prevent TikTok doom’s day by diversifying their marketing strategies by exploring alternative platforms and tailoring content to each platform’s specific audience and format. Remember, strong content that resonates with your target audience is the backbone of any successful digital marketing campaign, regardless of your chosen platform.

For short sprints of TikTok ad campaigns, media buyers may see efficiency once the room filled with buyers starts emptying some space due to moving ad money away from TikTok. Remaining proactive, creative, and data-driven, you can transform uncertainty into a springboard for success in the ever-changing world of digital marketing.

If you want to talk more about the possible effects and what to do next about the news around the restriction of TikTok in the United States, feel free to contact our Strike experts.

Promote Easter Live Stream Effectively on Social Media

Promoting live streams has become a staple marketing strategy as consumers increasingly turn to online platforms for shopping and entertainment. In the United States, live streaming has captivated a niche, with 3 in 10 shoppers expressing a preference for engaging and purchasing during live events, drawn by the dynamic and interactive buying experience. Facebook Live, YouTube Live, and TikTok are the most sought-after platforms for live video streaming.

Facebook Live stands out, preferred by 45% of US citizens aged between 35 and 54, demonstrating its broad appeal for a more mature audience. Conversely, YouTube Live captures the younger demographic, with 35% of people aged 18 to 34 favoring this platform. 

The entertainment and appeal of live streaming merge with Easter’s festive spirit. Spending in categories such as clothing, candy, gifts, and more increased in 2023 — with clothing rising from $0.7 billion in 2022 to $1 billion and gifts from $1.3 billion to $1.8 billion — leveraging live streaming can significantly amplify brand’s visibility and engagement during the onset of the chocolate bunnies over family gatherings.

Yet, distinguishing live-streaming events amid the bustling social feed filled with the keyword “Easter” calls for a standout strategic media plan that can turn crickets into a busy bunny. 

This blog will help you discover strategies and tips to engage your viewers. It’s time to turn your deserted live streams into a field of engaged viewers. 

Eyeballs Wanted: Overcoming the Live Stream Visibility Hurdle

The challenge of empty seats—or, in social commerce, the empty live stream—is one that no brand or advertiser can afford to ignore. Despite months of meticulous preparation for an online live event, the harsh reality is that even the most engaging content can go unseen, leaving seasoned marketers questioning where they went wrong.

But what are the far-reaching implications of an unsuccessful live stream, especially when promoting live events on social media? Hosting an unsuccessful live event leads to more than just immediate disappointment. The possible results can be:

• Loss of resources: Time, effort, and finances evaporating without the expected return on investment.
• Tarnish brand’s credibility: Painting your brand as disengaged or uninspiring at a time when capturing the festive spirit of Easter is crucial.
• Missed opportunity: Loss connections with your audience and create memorable experiences around the Easter celebration.

The emotional toll on marketers is profound, affecting not just the morale of the team but also casting a long shadow over future promotional strategies, breeding hesitation and doubt.

Understanding these challenges is critical, but they don’t have to define your Easter’s fate. With a clear goal to transform potential visibility hurdles into hopping stones, you’re on your way to building a more engaged, loyal, and enthusiastic community around your brand’s live-streaming efforts.

Resurrecting Your Easter Live Stream With These Organic and Paid Best Practices

As Easter week approaches, brands and marketers anticipate a surge of interest in chocolates, gifts, decorations, and other items related to the celebration. However, challenges and a lack of marketing push can cause livestream events that aim to create immersive online experiences to falter.

Strike Social can help you pivot from empty baskets to egg-citing opportunities for your brand with these best practices and solutions for organic and paid strategies. 

Cultivate an Engaged Community Through Organic Strategies

Focus on Your Content Marketing

• Begin your promotional journey weeks in advance. Crafting engaging blog posts like “Top Easter Basket Ideas” and weaving mentions of your upcoming live stream into the narrative can spark interest.
• Capture more eyes by sharing teasers and behind-the-scenes glimpses across social media platforms, stirring curiosity and anticipation. 
• Engage your audience with compelling questions and polls, transforming passive viewers into active participants.

Amplify Your Reach Using Social Media Ad Solutions

Multi-Stage Ad Campaigns

• Complement your organic efforts with targeted social media advertising campaigns tailored to your objectives.
  • Pre-event Ads: Utilize brand awareness and prospecting campaigns to reconnect with existing followers and reach similar audiences. Consider running these weeks before the target date as an “always-on” campaign.
  • Retargeting & Remarketing: Days leading up to the event, launch campaigns to retarget audiences who have interacted with your organic and paid content.
  • Live Stream Reminder: Run another retargeting campaign during the live stream to remind viewers about the ongoing event and encourage them to tune in.

Spring Into Action and Crack The Golden Opportunity on Your Easter Livestream

The path to promote a live streaming event is finding the right balance of organic and paid strategies. By leveraging content marketing, social media optimization, community building, targeted social media advertising, influencer marketing, and platform-specific ad formats, brands can effectively capture viewer attention, foster lasting connections, and deliver unforgettable live stream experiences that resonate with their audiences.

Whether you’re gearing up for the Easter season or planning a year-round livestream strategy, the key to success lies in understanding your target audience, crafting compelling content, and leveraging the right tools and platforms to amplify your reach and engagement. Take the first step towards promoting livestream success by consulting with our media buying experts. Our seasoned media buyers possess the knowledge and expertise to craft a tailored livestream promotion strategy that aligns with your campaign goals and resonates with your target audience.

How Does Your Organic Social Media Reach Compare to Paid Campaign Results?

Traditional advertising methods such as TV and print media, while still relevant, now take a back seat to digital marketing. Leveraging digital ads and targeted strategies can amplify brand awareness by up to 80%. Additionally, 58% of US consumers say they made purchases after encountering a brand’s ads on social media platforms. 

Hence, it’s essential for advertisers to possess the knowledge required to utilize both paid ads and organic content effectively. Recognizing the distinct advantages of each approach is crucial, as both contribute uniquely to brand promotion efforts. As marketers, understanding how these two marketing strategies complement each other is key to fully maximizing their potential in promoting your brand.

What’s the Difference Between Organic and Paid Marketing?

There’s no denying the substantial reach achieved through both paid advertisements and organic social media content. But can you differentiate between the two?

Let’s quickly run through the distinctions between organic and paid social media.

Organic and paid social media marketing strategies are no longer pitted against each other; rather, they work mutually to enhance brand visibility and engagement.

Organic social media efforts focus on fostering brand identity, engaging existing followers, and delivering value to current customers. Conversely, paid social media campaigns target new audiences, expand reach, and yield immediate results. By integrating both approaches, brands can adopt a comprehensive social media marketing strategy that capitalizes on the unique strengths of each.

Here are specific examples of how organic and paid social media marketing complement each other on different platforms:

Facebook

Example of organic social media marketing: Run a trivia contest with engaging questions related to your brand to generate organic reach and comments.

Example of paid social media strategy: Promote the contest using image ads and utilize Lookalike Audiences, increasing participation from similar user profiles.

Instagram

Example of nurturing your organic reach on Instagram: Share high-quality product photos and Reels using user-generated content (UGC), showcasing your brand in action to build brand loyalty.

Using paid social media campaign: Boost your Reels by featuring compelling visuals and influencer partnerships to drive traffic to your Instagram profile and product pages.

LinkedIn

Example of organic social media marketing efforts: Publish informative articles and participate in industry discussions to establish yourself as a thought leader in your niche.

How to boost your reach with paid social media ads: Create a sponsored post to promote your articles to targeted audiences, increasing brand awareness among chosen industry professionals.

YouTube

Example of how to grow organically on YouTube: Create engaging video tutorials and product demos to showcase your expertise and benefits.

Example of increasing engagement through paid advertising: Run targeted pre- or mid-roll ads on relevant videos to drive brand awareness and website clicks.

TikTok

Generate organic growth on TikTok: Participate in trending challenges and utilize relevant hashtags to reach a wider audience organically.

Accelerate reach and views through paid ads: Utilize Spark Ads featuring your trending video content to increase reach and brand awareness among your selected demographic.

Differentiating the Results of Organic and Paid Social Media Marketing Activities

To better understand how your marketing efforts perform organically versus through paid advertisements, you must be able to distinguish between the two. This becomes particularly important when considering strategies to enhance your organic reach on Instagram, for example, such as promoting your Reels.

But how can you determine when organic methods are more effective versus the benefits of paid advertising for specific campaigns, or vice versa?

Expand the dropdown for each platform below to see how it works:

Balancing Organic and Paid Social Media Marketing Efforts

It’s essential to recognize that one social media marketing strategy cannot thrive without the other. It’s not a question of organic versus paid but rather how to integrate them effectively. Now that you have insights into assessing the impact of paid social media on organic reach and the performance of organic posts without paid campaigns, you’re better equipped to optimize both avenues.

As you discern the distinct impacts of organic versus paid ads, remember the value of a trusted partner who can help you maximize your reach by merging these marketing efforts. Schedule a free demo with our team of experts and discover the Strike Social difference.

This post was updated in February 2025 to provide you with the latest information.

How TikTok Shop Transformed Buying Habits From Discovery to Purchase

Social media advertising platforms have now transformed beyond mere communication tools to bustling centers for e-commerce activities. TikTok Shop, introduced to the US market in September 2023, has rapidly gained traction, generating $363 million in consumer spending by November 2023 — just two months after its launch. It’s remarkable how the platform has evolved from a simple music and video-sharing app to a magnet for brands seeking advertising opportunities.

Keep on scrolling to discover the surge of TikTok shops and their significance for advertisers. Get amongst the lineup and seize the opportunity to maximize the capabilities of your TikTok shop ads.

The Rapid Ascent of TikTok Shops

TikTok’s share for video ad spend is currently at 7.0%, lagging behind YouTube and Meta at 8.2% and 30.4%, respectively. Now, TikTok Shop emerges as another avenue to increase the platform’s total ad spend.

Brands are flocking to TikTok Shops to tap into its engaged user base and create shoppable channels directly within the app. Integrated seamlessly into the platform, TikTok Shop ensures users are exposed to e-commerce opportunities, whether through showcased brands or live streams. With just a few clicks, users can browse and purchase products, all without leaving the app.

TikTok’s UX Simplifies Shopping Without Leaving the Platform

TikTok Shop’s integration into the main tabs of the app underscores its significance as a core feature, with users able to effortlessly transition between content viewing and shopping within the platform. While the concept of shop integration has faced challenges on other platforms, TikTok Shop demonstrates its resilience by providing easy access to customers.

As an example, when we looked up NYX Cosmetics on TikTok, the top results appeared on the first page. Additionally, we can browse through shops offering NYX products, videos, hashtags, and users. By selecting the users tab, we found our way to the NYX Cosmetics main TikTok channel and viewed their content. Furthermore, since their TikTok Shop is linked, we got to browse through their products without needing to return to the search results. Overall, TikTok excels in user experience with this integration.

Is Gen Z Redefining Consumer Behavior?

TikTok Shop and TikTok Live stand out as crucial features of the TikTok app where Gen Z’s preferences shape purchasing habits and brand perceptions. Here are key highlights of Gen Z’s dominance:

• Research suggests that Gen Z is more inclined to make purchases influenced by TikTok than any other channel. Moreover, 95% said that their last #TikTokMadeMeBuyIt purchase was worth the hype.
• Gen Z places high trust in TikTok influencers, surpassing other channels by nearly 40%.
• Evidence shows that products going viral on TikTok experience substantial growth, with one brand noting an 85% month-on-month increase in sales on Amazon.
• TikTok’s impact extends to eCommerce giants like Amazon, where dedicated features like Amazon Finds highlight products that have gained traction on TikTok, underscoring its influence throughout the customer journey.

TikTok Shop’s Growing Appeal to Buyers and Advertisers

As TikTok Shops gain momentum, the number of buyers continues to climb steadily. With an anticipated 35.8 million US social buyers in 2024, TikTok has quickly caught up to Facebook, with both platforms boasting a 37% user base making purchases. 

Here’s why the trend toward TikTok Shop purchases is expected to persist, and why brands should take note:

Valuable Insights from Actual Customers

• TikTok Shops offer valuable insights by showcasing how many people have purchased a product. This provides social proof to consumers and enables brands to evaluate market trends and competitors’ success.
• Integrated shop features allow customers to leave reviews after their purchase, providing prospective buyers with firsthand information about the product’s quality and suitability.

Affiliate & Influencer Marketing Opportunities

• Consumers tend to trust personalities they admire, which is why major brands often enlist top celebrities like Jennifer Aniston for their advertisements. Today, influencers have become equally influential choices for brands.
  • Affiliate marketing: Influencers can feature products in their video content and provide direct purchase links through their TikTok Shop basket, simplifying the buying process for their viewers and followers.
  • Influencer marketing: Brands can collaborate with influencers for video ads or live streams, effectively showcasing products and driving engagement. Another prevalent strategy is sending PR boxes to influencers, allowing them to feature products on their TikTok channels and reach a broader audience.

Drive More Views and Sales to Your TikTok Shop with These Strategies

Utilize Video Shopping Ads

TikTok offers a range of advertising options designed to enhance your TikTok Shop and drive sales. Here’s how you can maximize these innovative ad formats:

Spark Ads

Take your existing videos to the next level with TikTok Spark Ads. By boosting your content, you can expand your reach beyond your current followers and tap into a broader audience.

Product Catalog

Get started on building your TikTok Shop by adding your products manually or using the provided templates.

TikTok Video Shopping Ads

These ads allow viewers to shop directly from captivating video ads featured on the For You page. Combining the best features of Collection Ads and Dynamic Showcase Ads, TikTok Video Shopping Ads offer an engaging and efficient shopping experience for users.

Is Your Brand Ready to Move to TikTok Shop?

Are you prepared to make the leap to TikTok Shop for your brand? Now that you’ve learned about the unique features and advantages of TikTok Shop, it’s time to consider integrating them into your marketing strategy. 

While transitioning to a primarily video-based platform like TikTok may seem daunting for e-commerce brands, adaptation is key. Remember, your consumers are your audience, and increased visibility builds trust in your brand. Ultimately, embracing new opportunities like TikTok Shop can enhance your brand’s reach and credibility, leading to greater success in the long run.

As the NFL frenzy sweeps across advertising platforms, brands are eagerly jumping into the mix of Super Bowl social media campaigns to capitalize on the excitement. With TikTok amassing 25.7 billion views and Instagram buzzing with 8.6 million posts (and counting), the Super Bowl fever is in full swing. 

What’s your game plan to join the action? Discover what top brands are up to and learn how to secure a victory with the winning Super Bowl marketing ideas.

Conquer the Big Game with Winning Super Bowl Social Media Campaigns

The showdown between the Kansas City Chiefs and the San Francisco 49ers is approaching fast, and the Super Bowl ad space competition is only heating up. With CBS charging up to $7 million for a 30-second spot, major brands are pulling out all the stops, enlisting A-list celebrities like Ben Affleck, Jennifer Lopez, Steve Martin, and John Travolta to leave a lasting impression.

The surge in Super Bowl social media campaigns is highly evident, with TikTok ad spend skyrocketing by 400% YoY from January 1 to Super Bowl Sunday in 2023. As we anticipate the 2024 Super Bowl, the question arises: what new heights will this year’s social media campaigns reach?

Look at the latest Super Bowl advertising trends and explore how you can leverage these to build hype and engagement for your brand on social media.

A Showdown of Innovative Super Bowl Marketing Ideas

In the upcoming Super Bowl 2024, all eyes are on the Chiefs vs. the 49ers. However, another competition brewing among advertisers and media buyers is the battle of Super Bowl advertising.

Celebrity vs. Influencer Marketing

For years, celebrity endorsements have been a staple in Super Bowl commercials, capturing audience attention with star power. Some examples include Snickers’ iconic “You’re not you when you’re hungry” ad featuring Betty White in 2010 and Wendy’s legendary “Where’s the beef?” spot from 1984.

Another standout Super Bowl commercial is the one from Coinbase’s 2022 ad, which took a social media-inspired approach by flashing a QR code across the screen. This innovative tactic propelled their app from 186th place on the app store to No. 2. Subsequently, in the 2023 Super Bowl commercials, Limit Break and Servant also leveraged QR codes in their advertising, following Coinbase’s successful lead.

In a sneak peek of this year’s Uber Eats Super Bowl commercial, Friends stars Jennifer Aniston, David Schwimmer, and David & Victoria Beckham (amongst others) take the spotlight.

@addisonre Guess who I’m coaching…?! 🪩🕺🕺🎶🍬  tune in to find out!! @Nerds Candy 2.11 #ad ♬ original sound – Addison Rae

Meanwhile, e.l.f cosmetics have “summoned” TikTok creator Benito Skinner, aka “Benny Drama”, and Meghan Trainor, a prominent TikTok personality and pop singer, alongside the cast of the legal drama series Suits, for their Super Bowl ad teaser. This move highlights e.l.f’s strategy of blending celebrity and influencer marketing to broaden their appeal and capture diverse audiences.

Traditional vs. Social Media Advertising

The AFC Championship Game between the Kansas City Chiefs and Baltimore Ravens made TV history, attracting the largest audience ever for an AFC Championship Game and becoming the most-watched non-Super Bowl program on CBS in three decades. With a record-breaking viewership of over 55 million viewers, the game marked a milestone for TV ratings.

This massive viewership undoubtedly includes Swifties, eagerly tuning in to see Taylor Swift supporting her boyfriend, Travis Kelce. With 20.2 million female viewers, comprising 40% of the TV audience, it’s undeniable how Swift’s impact encompasses stadiums both for concerts and tournaments alike.

Super Bowl LVIII TV Ad Spaces in High Demand

As leading brands secure prime spots for Super Bowl viewing, audiences can anticipate a barrage of commercials from companies that have already secured their slots for the big game. 

CBS has reported that its Super Bowl advertising slots were nearly sold out as early as November 2023. To accommodate new advertisers, the NFL has expanded its ad inventory, partly due to the popularity of “Thursday Night Football.”

Viewers tuning in to the Super Bowl can expect new advertising campaigns from prominent brands such as Kia, Osmow’s, Coca-Cola, Molson, M&M’s, and others as they vie for consumer attention during this highly anticipated broadcast.

Browsing the Super Bowl Social Media Campaign Stream

The NFL’s TikTok account is among many who capitalized on the Chiefs’ victory by sharing Travis and Taylor’s post-game interaction, garnering 12.7 million views as of the time of writing this article. Brands are also seizing the opportunity presented by the Swift-Kelce romance, integrating music and football themes into their Super Bowl social media campaigns.

With Super Bowl watch parties approaching, it’s no question that consumer spending on CPG food & beverage ads hit up to $2.3 billion during the Super Bowl week. As the weekend draws near, food chains are maximizing their Super Bowl ads to their way to get up to users’ feeds:

Comparing YouTube Shorts, TikTok, and Instagram Reels for Super Bowl Social Media Advertising Strategies

Explore the effectiveness of short-form advertising for your Super Bowl marketing ideas. Discover how brands utilize these platforms to maximize their Super Bowl social media campaigns.

YouTube intelligently houses Super Bowl 2024 ads on AdBlitz, providing a powerful showcase and expanding brand reach. Hyundai, for example, generated over 247 million impressions through YouTube during last year’s Super Bowl advertising period leading up to the big game.

Early Super Bowl Victors: Brands Triumphing Ahead of the 2024 Tournament

As the countdown to Super Bowl 2024 commences, some brands have emerged victorious with their pre-game campaigns. Here’s a glimpse at the frontrunners in Super Bowl advertising:

Dove and Kylie Kelce

Partnering with Dove, Kylie Kelce champions body positivity among female athletes through TikTok ad campaigns. As a field hockey coach, Kelce’s collaboration with Dove aligns with their message of empowerment.

NYX Cosmetics

NYX ranks second in the top 10 ads category and is the fifth-most mentioned brand on X (formerly Twitter). Their TikTok strategy demonstrates how beauty brands can resonate with their demographic, which likely intersects significantly with the Swift fandom. Apart from NFL references, NYX also encourages user-generated content, as seen on their official TikTok account.

Play on the Offensive With These Super Bowl Social Media Advertising Trends and Tips

Now that we’ve provided insights on how to create a winning Super Bowl social media campaign, here are five actionable tips you can implement based on the trends discussed:

Fuel Your Competitive Spirit with These Super Bowl Marketing Ideas

Embracing trends isn’t just a bandwagon approach — it’s a strategic move that can catapult your ads to your audiences’ home screens during this football season. 

Staying attuned to what’s trending is essential for brands to remain relevant and informed about what’s new, what’s hot (and what’s not).  The Super Bowl social media campaign strategies we’ve outlined are proven techniques already generating traffic, conversions, and headlines. As the Super Bowl weekend looms, now is the opportunity to capitalize on these insights to ensure your brand stands out amidst the advertising frenzy.

Expand your expertise. Browse Strike Social’s latest blogs here:

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  Father’s Day Advertising with Meta Advantage+: Tips for Smart Audience Targeting
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  Smarter Paid Search with Google’s AI Max for Search Campaigns
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  Google Marketing Live 2025 Recap: Key YouTube and Google Ads Updates for Advertisers
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  Marketing to Gen Z: Social Media Strategies for Performance-Driven Brands
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  TikTok News and Updates Q1 2025: What Advertisers Need to Know
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  YouTube Shorts Views Are Changing: How You Can Adapt Your Paid Ads Strategy

53% of marketers recognize the potency of short-form videos, especially for promoting podcasts on Instagram and video content overall. It’s not a misconception; short-form videos have proven highly effective. As a leading platform for short video ads, Instagram Reels has already captured the preference of most advertisers. 

But what about long-form video content like podcasts? Discover the strategies for Instagram marketing for podcasts in this blog.

Using Instagram Reels to Promote Podcast Channels

In the wake of the short-form video trend in 2020, Instagram swiftly introduced Instagram Reels. Fast forward to 2024, and content on Instagram Reels boasts a 22% higher engagement rate than regular Instagram videos. It has undoubtedly become a noteworthy platform for brands, promoters, and influencers. 

Growing a podcast audience demands dedicated efforts, from nurturing your podcast content to cross-platform posting and engaging with listeners. As part of an effective podcast marketing strategy, Instagram Reels can be a helpful tool to promote podcasts to American Instagram users, exceeding 158 million users. This blog provides insights and strategies for leveraging short-form video advertising to promote your podcast on Instagram Reels.

Instagram Marketing for Podcasts: Why Paid Advertising is the Way to Go

Although limited to 90-second videos, Instagram Reels may seem an unlikely choice for promoting podcasts, especially when episodes typically span 20-40 minutes. Trimming content to fit this brief format is just one hurdle; the bigger challenge arises when brands and influencers neglect to promote podcasts on Instagram Reels.

To gain a deeper insight into why paid advertising is necessary for podcast growth on Instagram, consider the following limitations:

YouTube Shorts vs Instagram Reels vs TikTok for Podcast Promotion

Cross-promotion is a common practice to maximize each platform’s diverse social media audiences. Each caters to a distinct demographic and reach, making it essential to extend your reach to increase your podcast listeners. To determine the most effective platform for your goals, let’s evaluate these short-form video advertising platforms:

How Can Instagram Reels Be Used to Increase Podcast Listeners?

Opting for paid Instagram podcast marketing can significantly enhance your visibility on Meta platforms (Facebook and Instagram). The opportunities provided by Meta open doors for effective podcast promotion on Instagram Reels ads. Here’s how you can make the most of it:

Other Tips and Strategies To Get More Views on Podcast Reels

Together with your podcast engagement strategies through Instagram Reels advertising, consider incorporating the following approaches:

Gain More Listeners by Promoting Podcast on Instagram Reels

Growing a podcast audience may pose challenges if you’re uncertain where and how to promote it. Having gone through this guide, we trust you can effectively implement these podcast engagement strategies and commence promoting your podcast on Instagram Reels.

The best practices for podcast Reels marketing have been revealed. Your next move now is to create engaging podcast snippets for Instagram Reels. The creative aspect of your ads is under your control. We’ve laid the groundwork; it’s now up to you to take action. Start promoting your podcast in Instagram Reels and witness a rapid increase in your podcast listenership. 

Expand your expertise. Browse Strike Social’s latest blogs here:

• 
  Father’s Day Advertising with Meta Advantage+: Tips for Smart Audience Targeting
• 
  Smarter Paid Search with Google’s AI Max for Search Campaigns
• 
  Google Marketing Live 2025 Recap: Key YouTube and Google Ads Updates for Advertisers
• 
  Marketing to Gen Z: Social Media Strategies for Performance-Driven Brands
• 
  TikTok News and Updates Q1 2025: What Advertisers Need to Know
• 
  YouTube Shorts Views Are Changing: How You Can Adapt Your Paid Ads Strategy

Valentine’s Day 2024, the month of love and affection, is not just about roses and chocolates anymore. For media buyers and advertisers, it’s a season of ‘Roi and Roses,’ a time to blend romantic campaigns with solid returns on advertising investment. This Valentine’s week, an estimated 52% of adults are expected to celebrate, potentially pouring a little close to $26 billion into the economy, as per the latest projections.

TLDR? Jump straight to our comprehensive guide at the end.

2024’s Valentine’s Day Advertising Trends on Social Media

Valentine’s Day celebrations have evolved outside of mostly romantic and exclusive for couples. With the evolution of celebration, Valentine’s Day has gone from cherishing moments with family, friends, and even pets. Brands are taking the opportunity to connect through heartfelt paid social campaigns.

Expressing love can sometimes mean giving gifts or creating experiences during this season. And where does anyone look for Valentine’s gift ideas? Nothing short, almost everything is on social media platforms. Let us observe last year’s trend in ad spend and audience engagement to better prepare for the upcoming celebration.  

YouTube’s Valentine’s Cost and Engagement Dynamics Trend

Strike Social data recorded an early spike during early February, suggesting early ad placement is critical in setting up love campaigns. Interestingly, the Click-Through Rate (CTR) steadily climbed as Valentine’s Day approached, peaking on the actual day. This trend shows more consumers are engaging with ads as the day of love draws near.

Facebook’s Valentine’s Cost and Engagement Dynamics Trend

Facebook showed a consistently high CTR through the first half of February. Notable peaks of CTR appeared during the weekends. Together with the streak of CTR, a midweek spike in CPC has been recorded. This pattern suggests that advertisers actively engage audiences throughout the days before the big Vday. 

TikTok’s Valentine’s Cost and Engagement Dynamics Trend

TikTok experienced significant spikes in CPC, particularly on the weekday before Valentine’s Day, reflecting a competitive environment as advertisers vied for attention. Despite a relatively lower CTR than Facebook, TikTok’s dynamic platform remains a fertile ground for trend-driven and creative campaigns for the younger demographic and even the much older ones.

Marketers’ Love Language: Mastering Keywords

The art of using words in marketing transcends greeting cards and sweet nothings. For media buyers, it’s a key to unlocking the hearts of social media users. When used strategically, keywords attract and engage the right audience and help avoid unwanted content, ensuring brand safety and suitability.

This section will discuss keyword strategies to enhance your campaigns’ ROI and turn them into a blooming success.

YouTube Ads: Balancing Targeting and Brand Safety with Keywords

Selecting the right keywords for Valentine’s Day is more than just finding relevant search terms. It involves thoughtful thinking on keywords to use to reach and create a positive impact on audience perception. Specific keywords like “Valentine’s Day gift for her” target niche audiences, increasing ad visibility. Conversely, adding terms like “Cheap Valentine’s Day gift” to your Keyword Exclusion list prevents negative brand associations. Mastering this balance between visibility and relevance is crucial.

TikTok Ads: Diverse Keyword Usage for Creative Insights

TikTok’s dynamic platform offers a unique advertisers’ playground for keyword experimentation. The TikTok Creative Center inspires advertisers to craft compelling ads with diverse keyword applications. Using the inspiration tool, the Strike team searched for keywords related to Valentines that could influence the TikTok community to engage with ad creatives.

Based on the team’s observation, TikTok segments keyword usage into three types: ad text, overlay text, and voice-over. The top short-form video platform challenges traditional contextual targeting, primarily focusing on captions or hashtags.

The recent TikTok Creative Center data shows that the keyword “Valentine’s Day” positively impacted viewers, but results varied. Voice-over resulted in a median CTR of 5.06%, with 5 out of 10 ad creatives applications. Meanwhile, ad text delivered 4.61% engagement with 4 out of 10 ad creatives. Interestingly, a single ad creative using text overlay drove an impressive 8.53% CTR.

Facebook: Navigating Interest Targeting with Precision

While Facebook Ads Manager relies on interest targeting rather than traditional keywords, the principles are similar. With Meta’s extensive user base,3.05 billion users engaged on its platform, precise interest targeting on Facebook reaches specific audiences effectively.

Putting this into action, our analysis of various Valentine’s-centric interests revealed insightful cost metrics. For campaigns running from February 1st to 15th across North Carolina, Virginia, Tennessee, Georgia, and Minnesota, targeting ages 25-65+ of all genders, we found that CPM for awareness campaigns ranged from $6.56 to $12.50. CPCs varied from $0.54 to $1.6 for action-centric campaigns with link-click objectives. This data highlights the importance of selecting the right interests to optimize ad spend and maximize campaign reach.

From YouTube’s strategic balance of targeting and brand safety to TikTok’s innovative use of diverse keyword applications, each platform offers unique opportunities for engagement and brand alignment. Facebook’s precision in interest targeting further underscores the importance of understanding and leveraging user interests to maximize campaign effectiveness.

Our analysis across these platforms reveals vital insights into optimizing ad spend and enhancing campaign ROI. For an overview of these strategies and to access the data, download our guide and bring out the full potential of your Valentine’s Day advertising efforts.

Valentine’s Day 2024: Evolving Synergy of Storytelling and Data Precision

For media buyers and advertisers, this season is a dynamic fusion of ‘Roi and Roses,’ where the art of crafting heartfelt campaigns intersects with the science of achieving returns on advertising investments. This year, with an estimated 52% of adults participating and nearly $26 billion at stake, the occasion is not just a celebration of romance but a great window of opportunity for savvy marketers.

Platforms like YouTube, Facebook, and TikTok each present unique opportunities and challenges, necessitating tailored strategies. YouTube’s fluctuating CPC and steadily increasing CTR highlight the need for timely, targeted campaigns. Facebook’s consistently high CTR underscores the effectiveness of interest targeting, while TikTok’s dynamic keyword trends call for creative, trend-aligned content strategies.

For advertisers and media buyers, mastering this blend of creativity and data analytics will be critical to unlocking the full potential of this opportunity, turning the month of love into a period of meaningful returns.

For adept media buyers, mastering X ad specs remains a distinct advantage as X (formerly known as Twitter) stands out as an essential hub for breaking news. Despite notable brand pullouts, X has transformed into a ‘better value’ proposition, enticing brands with more affordable CPMs.

X now emerges as a promising opportunity for marketers who possess the expertise to navigate the platform strategically and take advantage of its potential for extensive reach.

Are Your Ads Aligned with the X Ad Specs?

The platform’s commitment to innovation is evident as it seeks to enhance its ad offerings with new X ad formats designed to integrate seamlessly into a user’s feed. As X opens up diverse placements within the app, advertisers can strategically take advantage of this opportunity to broaden their reach significantly.

The significance of understanding X ad specs becomes more pronounced than ever. Being knowledgeable about Twitter X ads specifications is essential to stay ahead as X continues to evolve and adapt alongside other giants in social media advertising.

• Keeping Up-to-Date: The Latest in X Advertising Guidelines
• The Insider’s Guide to X Ad Specs for the Latest Ad Formats
• X Advertising Today: Why You Should Stay Up-to-date With X Ad Specs
• Influencing Effectiveness By Adhering to the Latest X Ad Specs

Keeping Up-to-Date: The Latest in X Advertising Guidelines

The latest updates to X advertising guidelines significantly enhance advertisers’ control over their campaigns on X.

The recent updates on the X advertising guidelines provide media buyers with refined control over their advertising strategies on X. Prioritize brand safety and relevance in every campaign by staying informed and adapting your approach to capitalize on these powerful features.

The Insider’s Guide to X Ad Specs for the Latest Ad Formats

Your roadmap to effective X advertising begins with ensuring your creative endeavors resonate flawlessly with the dynamic X ad specifications. Look at the array of Twitter X ad placements and how you can align your campaigns with the X ad size requirements.

Promoted Ads

Promoted Ads, like regular Posts, seamlessly integrate into users’ feeds, allowing reposting, replies, likes, and more.

Twitter X Amplify Ad

Twitter Amplify, a product suite tailored for Pre-roll Views campaigns, offers diverse avenues to showcase your brand: Amplify Pre-roll, and Amplify Sponsorship.

X Takeover Ads

Position your brand at the forefront with X Takeover Ads, securing prime placement at the top of users’ timelines. Explore Trend Takeover and Brand Takeover formats, aligning your brand with the hottest trends of the day.

X Live

Twitter Live allows brands to maximize engagement by placing Live ads on recommended stream specifications, and ensuring top-notch video quality during live events.

Dynamic Product Ads (DPA)

Dynamic Product Ads (DPA) allow advertisers to deliver precisely what customers need, precisely when they need it, by using the latest Web Conversions products on X.

Explore two distinct strategies under DPA:

• DPA Retargeting: Engage targeted consumers by showcasing products they’ve interacted with on your website, such as items added to their shopping cart. 
• DPA Prospecting: Expand your customer base by reaching out to individuals who haven’t visited your website.

Follower Ads

Grow your follower base with Follower Ads, as they seamlessly blend into users’ timelines and “Who to Follow” boxes, enhancing visibility and attracting new followers.

Branded Features

Add a creative touch to your brand presence on X with Branded Hashtags and Branded Notifications, enhancing your brand’s visibility and engagement.

X Advertising Today: Why You Should Stay Up-to-date With X Ad Specs

As we explore why Twitter X ads are thriving, let’s examine the core factors contributing to its enduring allure.

Advertisers’ Power Play During Q5

As the holiday fervor engulfs us, the temptation to ease up on advertising endeavors might seem compelling. However, Q5 trends for Twitter X ads tell a different story. Brimming with tent-pole moments spanning holidays, sports, entertainment, and more, this period becomes a strategic arena for advertisers. Far from slowing down, this is the opportune time to dominate.

Short-Form Video Ads on X

Recognizing the surge in short-form video popularity—embraced by up to 90% of global marketers—X (Twitter) steps into the arena. Currently, in beta testing, a distinct opportunity unfolds for select US advertisers. This beta phase allows bids on pre-screened, brand-safe Vertical Video feed inventory, establishing a partnership with Integral Ad Science (IAS). 

The collaboration, integral to the GARM brand safety and suitability framework, ensures content alignment before the ad integration. Notably, this pre-bid product is tailored exclusively to the Vertical Video format, distinguishing it from the broader X Timeline.

Influencing Effectiveness By Adhering to the Latest X Ad Specs

As digital ads brim with noise from various platforms, the resilience of X Ads shines through. The commitment to innovation echoes loudly as X introduces new ad formats, seamlessly integrating into users’ feeds and opening up diverse placements within the app. It’s clear that X isn’t just holding its ground; it’s flourishing as a promising opportunity for marketers who possess the expertise to exploit its potential for extensive reach.

Staying informed about the evolving advertising trends in X ad specs allows marketers to keep pace alongside giants in the field. The platform’s real-time marketing capabilities and extensive user community make it an appealing choice for businesses seeking to engage with their audience and showcase their products.

To learn more about the ad specs for other social media platforms, click on the menu below.

The concept of advertising is nearly as old as commerce itself. Wherever businesses compete, there’s a need to get your brand noticed. But advertisement as an industry is one of continual change. With the advent of the digital age, there’s been a greater focus on quantifying ad effectiveness, and attention-based metrics are an up-and-coming way to do just that.

The economist Herbert Simon predicted attention’s role when he coined the term “attention economy” in 1971 – decades before the emergence of the digital age.

Nowadays, modern technology enables us to measure consumer attention in ways we couldn’t before. In this context, “attention” means the extent to which a customer views or listens to an ad when they’re exposed to it.

But what is attention in digital marketing, and how can attention metrics be used to boost your campaigns? Let’s find out in this guide.

The Problem With Other Digital Advertising Measurements

Attention-based metrics are not the only tool a marketer can use to determine the effectiveness of a campaign or broader strategy. Below are some other popular metrics, alongside why they might not give you the full picture of your performance.

Impressions and Viewability

Simply put, impressions are the number of times your ad has been loaded. So, each impression is an opportunity for your web domain ad to be seen by potential customers.

On the other hand, viewability is a metric that quantifies the likelihood of your ad being seen. For an impression to be considered viewable, it must be seen for at least one second, and at least 50% of its pixels must be visible on screen.

Using tools like Meta Business Suite, you can track the number of impressions and levels of viewability.  For example, you can see how many impressions your ad has received in a specific amount of time. If your Facebook following is only in the hundreds, you might deem this a successful advertising campaign based on this metric alone. It also gives you a measurement to gauge future ads against.

But while these metrics are straightforward and give a clear idea of how many people see your ads, they’re not very useful for telling how many people actually engage with them.

That’s because it’s easy for attention-based metrics to provide a skewed picture. People might see the same uninteresting ad repeatedly, throwing off impressions. Or they might step away from their device with the browser still open on a webpage. This would cause apparent viewability to skyrocket, despite the complete lack of user attention.

Click-Through-Rates (CTR)

Let’s say you’ve recently set up a new service. You’ve managed to build your website and start growing traffic, but are seeing few of these visits convert into actual purchases. What can you do?

Since viewable impressions don’t account for engagement, you might turn to click-through-rates as an alternative. These are exactly what they sound like: the number of people actually clicking on your ads to follow their links.

CTR can be a useful measure of ad effectiveness, but it’s still a flawed methodology compared to proper attention-based metrics.

For one thing, CTR fails to show how much attention people actually pay. It can only tell you whether they clicked the ad, regardless of context. On top of that, it’s easy to click something by accident, especially on touch-screen mobile devices.

So, if you limit yourself to using this metric, you might not get to the crux of your issue and find out why your domain sales aren’t as high as you’d expect them to be. 

Cost-Per-Thousand (CPM)

CPM is a bit of a confusing acronym for the uninitiated. It stands for cost-per-mille, as mille is verbal shorthand for a thousand. CPM is the level of financial cost to your business for every 1000 ad impressions. 

Understanding CPM can be useful when creating advertising budgets. However, it can’t measure the overall performance and effectiveness of your ad – that is, how many people saw the ad in its entirety, absorbed the message, and took action.

That’s where CPM and other common advertising measurements fall short. They often measure metrics on the website or from a business’ point of view. However, they fail to recognize the actions and behaviors of consumers.

What Are Attention Metrics?

Unlike other measures of ad effectiveness, attention-based metrics are focused on the human side. As a result, they offer a more accurate view of how engaging your ad content actually is to your various audiences. 

Measuring attention, however, requires a more involved process, since you’re gathering human behavioral data. This might involve, for example, an algorithm analyzing subjects via webcam and/or microphone. Although, since attention metrics are still an emerging concept, there isn’t a unified standard for how to measure it, and companies are also taking a variety of approaches to gather that information.

Attention-based metrics can be useful for developing lead generation strategies for e-commerce businesses. And that’s because you gain an in-depth understanding of your ad’s audience. Studying consumer attention can be a much more effective way of gauging their browsing and purchasing habits than simple web traffic data. And you can use this information to target new demographics.

You might notice that ads featuring certain kinds of products are better for growing your website traffic. For instance, a customized baking business might notice their ad about wedding cakes performs the best. With this data, the company can gauge consumer demand for such bakes. They can then conduct more digital ads along similar lines to compare metrics, and then choose to focus more on the wedding market for the future.

In this way, tracking these metrics can benefit your ad campaign development in the long-term. It gives you a clear path for investing in future online advertising campaigns, helping you narrow down your audience, market, and messaging. It can even guide business decisions such as branching out into a new market or focusing on a niche product or service altogether.

How to Gain and Measure Attention in Digital Advertising

There are already several established factors that drive human attention. If you want to put your best foot forward, it’s important to bear these in mind:

• Pixel space: The larger the ad, the more compelled we are to pay attention.
• Motion: Video content tends to be more engaging than a static image.
• Time: Short-form content is punchier, but long-form content has more detail.
• Placement: Some parts of a webpage are more likely to catch the eye.
• Interaction: Interaction with an ad boosts the likelihood of recall.

Tailor Ads to the Platform

Each platform has its own specifications, and you must be knowledgable and

With the right extension, it’s easy to annotate web pages with Google Chrome with notes and ideas, and this will enable you to create fresh and relevant content for each platform. You can add notes to tweak your YouTube video ads to use them in TikTok, for example.

Consider Active Time and Interactions

There are some simple metrics for attention to ads. They tend to suffer from some of the same issues we described in our first section, but the upside is you can study them “in the wild,” so to speak. For instance, the amount of time an ad is open in your active browser tab could be an attention-based metric.

There are also the interactions they have beyond simple click-throughs. So if a company like Only Domains ran a video ad to promote a new domain type, they might track the number of users fullscreening it. Similarly, they could run customer surveys through their ads and track the rates of response.

Conduct Lab-Based Studies

At its simplest, these methods involve studying eye movement with screen data to show whether people are looking. Facial coding even allows AI to study expressions to show how people feel while viewing your ads. That way, you’ll know whether they’re excited, bored, or just plain confused.

This can be particularly useful when it comes to A/B testing. For example, maybe you’re testing out some domain name hacks and different language ads to try and better appeal to international audiences. You can use a lab-based study to monitor which site not only attracts more visitors but also which is more engaging to each audience. 

Attention-Based Metrics Are Still growing

Attention-based metrics can be incredibly useful for ensuring ad campaign effectiveness. But don’t forget that this is still an emerging form of analysis, and we don’t have a unified standard metric for consumer attention. 

There is an upside, though: attention metrics have so much untapped potential left to discover. As more businesses embrace attention tracking for their ad campaigns, we’re bound to see some exciting innovations.

So, it’s clear that attention and engagement metrics, when used in tandem, will change the way we advertise. The only question is, how significant will that change be?

This article is written by Francis King, Head of Demand Generation at OnlyDomains, a domain management solution that offers global services and support that can be accessed from anywhere in the world. Francis has been a part of the team since 2009. He is our go-to guy for everything online advertising. Originally from Melbourne, Francis cannot go a day without lifting weights; he is considering taking on Jiu-Jitsu next. Here is his blog.

Have some great content up your sleeve? We invite you to reach out to us. We are excited to collaborate with talented writers and feature high-quality content on our blogs.

Q5 Advertising Strategies’ are becoming indispensable for brands that leverage the post-holiday season. This period, often underestimated, offers a unique opportunity to engage with consumers who are still active and ready to spend. Traditional marketing approaches need to catch up in this digitally dominated environment. The emergence of Q5 advertising marks a strategic shift, focusing on capturing consumer attention when most brands are winding down their marketing efforts.

Recent data from Hubspot highlights this opportunity, revealing that 47% of consumers are inclined to make additional purchases after the holiday frenzy. This period is not just about handling returns; it’s a time when savvy consumers search for post-holiday deals and are open to brand loyalty reinforcement.

Therefore, integrating Q5 social media advertising is not merely an alternative but a critical strategy for businesses seeking to conclude their fiscal year on a high note. This approach taps into the unique consumer behaviors of this period, turning potential returns into opportunities for repurchases and brand engagement.

What is Q5, and why is it important for advertisers? 

Before we dive into Q5 strategies and insights, let’s shed light on this mysterious “fifth quarter.” Distinct consumer behaviors following the traditional holiday shopping period from November to December typically characterize Q5, though there is no fixed start or end date.

Consumer activity during this time can be segmented into phases: early shoppers who complete their purchases around Thanksgiving and late shoppers active just before Christmas. Q5, however, commences post-Christmas and extends until the second week of January.

This period marks a shift in consumer focus – from gift-buying to self-purchasing and redeeming gift cards. According to Statista, nearly 30% of U.S. consumers engage in self-gifting, a noticeable increase from previous years. Additionally, 35% of gift card recipients will likely spend their cards within the first 45 days post-Christmas.

For advertisers, Q5 represents a fertile ground for digital marketing opportunities. It’s a time when consumer engagement remains high, yet many brands must improve their marketing efforts, leading to less competition and more potential for impact. By capitalizing on this period, advertisers can boost sales, strengthen brand loyalty, and set a positive trajectory for the new year.

Capitalizing on Post-Holiday Opportunities: The Q5 Advantage

While traditional pre-holiday advertising blitz gets all the attention, savvy marketers know the magic happens after the last Christmas gift has been unwrapped, often called Q5 or “Hidden Quarter.” Pouring all efforts during the high-stakes season of Cyber Five weekend and Super Saturday does not guarantee holiday campaign success.

Several key factors contribute to the disparity in outcomes:

By acknowledging these trends, brands can effectively extend their holiday advertising strategies into Q5. This period, often dubbed the ‘Hidden Quarter,’ presents a golden opportunity to engage with consumers still in a spending mindset.

Q5 in Action: Data-Driven Insight to Fuel Post-Holiday Campaign

Let’s put the Q5 data into action. Strike’s Facebook, YouTube, and TikTok ads data will reveal insightful trends covering the whole holiday shopping period from November 1, 2022, until Jan 15, 2023. Last year’s US campaign data will equip us to build high-performing Q5 strategies that cut through the noise from the onset of the holiday shopping season to the last holiday shopping cart checkout.

Q5 YouTube Instream Skippable Ads: Data and Insights

Q5 Facebook Impression Ad Campaigns: Data and Insights

Q5 Facebook Link Clicks Ad Campaigns: Data and Insights

Q5 TikTok Ad Impression Campaigns: Data and Insights

Crafting Effective Social Media Strategies for Q5 Success

As the data reveals, Q5 presents a significant, yet often overlooked, opportunity for advertisers to extend their reach and drive conversions beyond the traditional holiday season. Now that the potential has been revealed let us translate these insights into actionable paid social media strategies.

Don’t Hibernate, Activate Q5 Marketing Strategies

Q5 represents more than just a marketing strategy; it’s a shift in mindset. By understanding and adapting to the unique dynamics of this period, marketers can tap into significant potential for sales growth and elevate brand presence. It’s time to move beyond the traditional December 31st marketing slowdown and capitalize on the Q5 surge.

While campaign data guides your direction, remember that creativity is the key to engaging your audience. Use these insights and strategies as a foundation to develop Q5 campaigns that truly resonate and drive sales.

If you are ready to master Q5 social media advertising, book a meeting with us to explore specific strategies tailored to your brand and audience, ensuring your success in the post-holiday market.

Expand your expertise. Browse Strike Social’s 2023 insights here:

The landscape of social media marketing continues to transform the online presence of any business with dynamic and innovative trends. Nowadays, businesses are generating more leads from social media marketing than content marketing and other marketing techniques. So, it’s really important to understand the social media marketing trends.

In this blog, we will explore the top 10 social media marketing trends that will dominate over other marketing trends in 2024. These trends range from the integration of cutting-edge artificial intelligence to talking about the importance of micro-communities. These trends highlight the industry’s move towards more personalized and immersive approaches.

Top 10 Social Media Marketing Trends

Understanding and leveraging below social media marketing trends will be pivotal for marketers looking to stay ahead in the highly competitive and ever-evolving world of social media. We have also discussed how each trend can be used effectively for business growth.

Using AI for enhanced user experiences

In 2024, artificial intelligence (AI) is revolutionizing social media marketing by offering invaluable personalization. AI algorithms analyze user data to deliver content that aligns perfectly with individual preferences and behaviors. With the rise of multimodal AI analyzing text, images, and videos together, platforms can tailor content in more dynamic ways. This level of customization not only enhances user engagement but also boosts the effectiveness of marketing campaigns.

According to a 2023 survey conducted by HubSpot, the findings reveal that marketers predominantly employ AI for the following purposes:

• 33% for generating ideas and finding inspiration,
• 28% utilize AI in the writing process for creating compelling copy,
• 26% leverage AI for crafting marketing images,
• 25% rely on AI to condense texts into essential key points, and
• 23% make use of AI for translating marketing content into various languages

Brands utilizing AI can expect to see significant increase in user interaction as their content becomes more relevant and appealing to each unique audience member. Facebook, TikTok, and Instagram are the best examples of using AI to personalize the user experience by showing relevant content according to the user’s past history and interests.

Video content dominance

Short-form videos stand out as the most captivating content on social media, according to 66% of consumers. Furthermore, these videos are 48% more likely to be viewed compared to content on other platforms. In addition, 62% of businesses incorporate videos as a key element of their marketing approach. These engaging videos are perfect for capturing the attention of an audience and offering more information in a short time.

Use different types of content to engage your audience in a variety of ways. With that in mind, do not only focus on captions; incorporate diverse formats such as videos using advanced video editor software, transcribe audio to text for accessibility, and AI avatar to interact dynamically. Utilize reels, audio content, polls, quizzes, and other engaging elements to create a compelling video advertisement that can surely capture audiences.

Social commerce expansion

Social commerce is transforming social media into a vibrant marketplace. Social media platforms like Facebook are upgrading to integrate shopping features seamlessly, allowing users to make purchases without leaving the app. This trend is creating a more streamlined shopping experience, where discovery and purchase are part of a single journey.

47% of social media marketers report that their brands engage in direct selling through social media apps, highlighting the growing trend of social commerce. Looking ahead to 2024, social commerce will become a marketing trend for brands to meet the evolving shopping habits of their consumers.

User-Generated Content (UGC)

Brands are finding great value in content created by their own customers. This method is known as user-generated content (UGC). This approach involves encouraging customers to share their own experiences with a brand’s product or service. This kind of content is incredibly effective because it’s genuine and relatable as real people showcasing how they use and enjoy the products in their everyday lives. Interestingly, visitors engaging with UGC exhibit a conversion rate that surpasses the average by 102.4%.

When brands share their content on their social media channels, it not only adds authenticity to their marketing. When a customer shares their reviews, they feel valued and part of the brand’s story, leading to increased loyalty and trust.

Augmented Reality: Creating immersive experiences

Augmented Reality (AR) is revolutionizing social media marketing by offering engaging and interactive experiences. Brands are using this innovation for virtual try-on, interactive ads, and engaging content that captivates the imagination of the audience.

AR not only enhances user engagement, but also provides a unique way for brands to showcase their products and services. It will be a key tool for creating impactful marketing experiences that stand out in a competitive market.

Voice Search Optimization

Voice Search Optimization has become an important trend in digital marketing in 2024. It can be easily found and understood by voice assistants like Siri, Alexa, or Google Assistant. People use this feature for internet searches and optimizing content for voice searches.

This trend is about understanding how people speak when they use voice search. This is often different from typing. It uses natural language, long-tail keywords, and question-based phrases in content.

Strategic influencer partnerships

Influencer marketing continues to evolve, with a significant shift towards more strategic and meaningful collaborations. Brands are partnering with influencers whose values and audience align closely with their own products and services. This approach allows businesses to check the credibility of influencers and reach them. They also ensure that the content is authentic and attracts the target audience.

In 2024, successful influencer marketing is about finding the right fit and building relationships that add value to both the brand and the influencer’s audience.

Live streaming and interactive experiences

Live streaming is changing the way brands interact with their audience. It offers a real-time and interactive experience that traditional social media platforms are not offering.

Brands use live streams to show off new products, answer questions, or take their audience behind the scenes. This way, people feel part of a community and get to know the brand better. Live streaming is great for keeping audiences interested and building stronger connections because it’s exciting and feels more personal.

Prioritizing data privacy and security

In a world where data privacy is a major concern, it is necessary for brands to prioritize transparency and security in their social media marketing. Consumers are more concerned about their digital presence and expect brands to respect their privacy.

Brands must strike a balance between personalized marketing and data safety to gain the trust and loyalty of their users. Data security is a key factor in building and maintaining a positive brand reputation.

Micro and nano influencers

In 2024, more businesses will be partnering with micro and nano influencers on social media. These influencers are not celebrities but everyday people who have a smaller yet highly engaged group of followers. Micro-influencers usually have followers in the thousands, while nano-influencers have even fewer. According to HubSpot’s 2023 Social Media Marketing Report, 80% of marketers are collaborating with smaller creators and influencers boasting under 100k followers. In contrast, 16% are engaged in partnerships with celebrities who have follower counts exceeding 1 million.

What makes them special is that their followers really trust their opinions and recommendations, almost like advice from a friend. Businesses collaborate with these influencers because they can reach specific groups of people in a more personal and authentic way. This approach often leads to better results for brands, as these smaller influencers have a strong connection with their audience, making their endorsements more genuine and effective.

Conclusion

In this blog, we have discussed the top 10 social media marketing trends to follow in 2024. These trends are the key to growing your business faster. Generally, the use of AI is increasing with social media for the best user experience. Also, strategic partnerships with influencers are becoming important to promote products on social media.

Video content, live streaming, and augmented reality provide interactive and engaging experiences, while user-generated content and authentic influencer partnerships build trust and community. Furthermore, with the growing importance of voice search optimization, data privacy, and sustainability, businesses must adapt to stay relevant.  

This article is written by Jigar Agrawal, Digital Marketing Manager at eSparkBiz. He is passionate about anything related to Digital Marketing. He wants to unlock the world of technology and Social Media where every day there is a chance of new possibility as well as innovation.

Have some great content up your sleeve? We invite you to reach out to us. We are excited to collaborate with talented writers and feature high-quality content on our blogs.

Are you curious about how media planning using AI can revolutionize your advertising strategies, or do you find it adding complexity to your tasks? The idea of relying on generative AI for crafting your marketing ideas may seem ambitious. However, it promises to transform what once took a day into a mere hour of work. Is it too good to be true? Let’s find out.

Discover the Possibilities: Streamline Media Planning With AI

Forrester’s Q1 2023 survey reveals that 41% of US B2C marketing leaders have already explored AI for media plan optimization. Furthermore, an impressive 19% confirmed they already integrated ChatGPT into their marketing strategies. However, it’s essential to acknowledge that AI, even in its most advanced forms, is not perfect. It thrives when coupled with human input. Your expertise bridges the gap between AI’s potential and its impact.

Indeed, artificial intelligence thrives under your guidance. The pivotal element lies in crafting thoroughly designed ChatGPT media plan prompts. To truly maximize AI in media planning, you must assume the driver’s seat, rather than merely being a passenger.

• How Can ChatGPT Prompts be Customized for Specific Media Planning Needs
  • Audience Analysis
  • Media Channels
  • Budget Allocation
  • Content Strategy
  • Campaign Timing
• ChatGPT for Different Media Planning Scenarios
• Achieve Precision in Media Planning with ChatGPT

How Can ChatGPT Prompts be Customized for Specific Media Planning Needs?

Your media plan serves as the blueprint for your advertising endeavors, making sure your message reaches the right audience at the right time. Now, imagine having a powerful ally to assist you – that’s where ChatGPT steps in.

Unlike other AI-driven tech integrated into advertising platforms, ChatGPT isn’t just a passive addition. It’s a dynamic solution that adapts to your specific needs, streamlining the preparation of your ad campaigns. With ChatGPT, your campaigns can be effortlessly drafted and uploaded when the timing is right.

To truly understand how ChatGPT media plan prompts can help, let’s dissect the core components of a top-notch media plan:

Audience Analysis

Understanding your target audience is imperative. Who are they? What are their preferences? How do they behave online? These are the media research questions to which ChatGPT can provide assistance.

How AI can improve media research for audience insights:

Example of ChatGPT media plan prompts for audience analysis:

Before you get started, provide ChatGPT with context and insider information about your business, your unique selling proposition (USP), and your niche. This ensures that this media planning tool can effectively step into your shoes. In this manner, ChatGPT can act not just as your assistant, but as an extension of your expertise.

Social Media Channels

As a media buyer, you must also select the right paid advertising channels. Which platforms will be most effective? Will it be YouTube, TikTok, Facebook Reels, or a combination of these?

How can generative AI help with media planning:

Example of ChatGPT media plan prompts for determining social media channels:

Budget Allocation

Now that you’ve identified where to advertise, the next piece for media planning with AI is budget allocation. How will you distribute your budget across various media channels to maximize reach and ROI?

How AI in media planning can help:

Example prompts in ChatGPT for media plan optimization:

Content Strategy

Explore a range of content formats, including articles, infographics, and podcasts, and define your content strategy. Once you’ve mastered AI in media planning, you can set a consistent posting schedule that aligns with your target audience’s preferences and expectations.

How AI media planning tools can help:

Example of ChatGPT content prompts for media strategy:

Campaign Timing

Timing is the unsung hero of marketing. These are the critical questions you need to ask: When will you launch your campaigns? How long should they run?

How can ChatGPT help with your media planning calendar:

Example of ChatGPT media plan prompts to determine campaign timing:

ChatGPT for Different Media Planning Scenarios

The effectiveness of your media planning strategies isn’t a one-size-fits-all endeavor, and ChatGPT recognizes that. Let’s further explore media planning with AI and how it can accompany you through the entire media buying journey.

Market Research

When you’re introducing a new product to a market that lacks historical data, making informed decisions can be quite challenging. Utilize AI with media planning to build a comprehensive buyer persona based on available market feedback. Tailor it for your upcoming product launch by asking ChatGPT to provide insights into your potential customer’s demographics, preferences, and pain points.

See our sample prompt here for a pre-launch campaign.

Achieve Precision and Revolutionize Media Planning with AI

We started by questioning whether these ChatGPT media plan prompts can truly enhance ad strategies. The answer, as we’ve uncovered, lies in the synergy between AI and human expertise. The promise of utilizing AI in media planning lies in its ability to streamline your tasks as you complement it with your advertising knowledge.

As you continue to utilize generative AI on your daily undertakings, remember that ChatGPT is your trusted ally. ChatGPT is here to support and amplify your efforts, but it’s your insights and direction that drive the ship forward.

Expand your expertise. Browse Strike Social’s latest blogs here:

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How frustrating can it be when you want better ChatGPT responses, but it’s not quite hitting the mark? Despite repeated requests, it still falls short of delivering the response you’re looking for. It’s a familiar scenario: the gap between what we ask and what we receive from AI-driven conversations.

How do you get each prompt you type in to hit the mark almost most of the time? Well, it’s all about crafting effective ChatGPT prompts that can shape the course of conversations, trigger insightful responses, and foster interactions that genuinely resonate.

Mastering Your Prompts and Getting Better ChatGPT Responses

In just five days following its November 2022 launch, ChatGPT already had a million users. This remarkable feat marked the onset of a generative AI revolution, with tools like Google Bard, Jasper, Perplexity, and more swiftly joining the fray. Such lightning-paced adoption speaks volumes about the potential of this innovative AI tool. As you stand ready to explore ChatGPT, where exactly should you begin?

AI followers and enthusiasts emerge one year after its introduction as they scale the learning curve and easily wield the platform. With ChatGPT’s user base surpassing 100 million, the prospect of becoming a ChatGPT prompting expert is well within reach. This article will help you discover techniques to improve the prompt quality and get better ChatGPT responses that are consistently on point.

• What Are the Common Issues with ChatGPT Prompts
• How To Write Better ChatGPT Prompts
• Improving Prompts and Enhancing Responses: The Road to ChatGPT Expertise

What Are the Common Issues with ChatGPT Prompts

Many AI users face common challenges that sometimes call for a bit of ChatGPT prompt troubleshooting to snag those better responses. Tackling these issues head-on is your golden ticket to unlocking richer interactions with this AI platform.

It’s a common misconception that readily available ChatGPT prompts found online are an easy ticket to flawless content.

While pre-made prompts can be a helpful starting point, they also yield vague responses. The quality and precision of your inputs are the driving factors to receive better ChatGPT responses. For instance, consider the prompt: “Create a social media content plan for December for our [company or product] on [topic of choice].”

While this prompt has generated a reasonably good response, we can’t directly utilize the provided copy and ideas. We still need to align them with the existing content we have on hand.

Moreover, the mentioned captions are too short, making it challenging to convey comprehensive data-driven insights and strategies on social platforms as intended.

ChatGPT answers can occasionally veer toward the overly generic.

This means that if multiple accounts within your niche use similar ChatGPT prompts, they might share nearly identical content on the same day, all centered around the same topic.

For better ChatGPT responses, you must craft highly specific prompts tailored precisely to your industry, niche, and the unique content you plan to publish.

Even with meticulously crafted ChatGPT prompts, it’s essential to acknowledge the tool’s inherent limitations.

Keep in mind that ChatGPT’s training data is only up to 2021. The AI tool cannot access real-time information or stay updated with developments beyond this cut-off date.

ChatGPT includes a prominent disclaimer in some of its responses: “Please note that the results are hypothetical and for illustrative purposes.” A reminder for those seeking factual and up-to-date information: getting desired answers may remain elusive when relying solely on ChatGPT.

How To Write Better ChatGPT Prompts

To make the most of ChatGPT, mastering the skill of crafting effective prompts is essential. By enhancing ChatGPT accuracy, each interaction yields more precise and relevant responses and adds significant value to your conversation.

Let’s look into the art of prompt optimization. 

1. Talk to ChatGPT as if in conversation.

Think of ChatGPT as more than just a machine; engage in conversation as if talking to another person. It encourages ChatGPT to provide contextually relevant and coherent answers.

Generic prompt: Write a Facebook ad copy on [topic].

Specific prompt: Can you write a Facebook ad copy for [company] to promote [product]? Make sure to include this information in the ad copy: [pertinent information you would like to add such as current offers, product or service features]. Copy

2. Provide context within your ChatGPT prompts.

Explaining the background or situation helps ChatGPT understand the specific context of your query. To enhance ChatGPT results, you must go beyond merely posing a question. 

Generic prompt: Write 5 LinkedIn ad headlines for [website or company].

Specific prompt: Can you write 5 LinkedIn ad headlines for [website or company] promoting [product or service] to [target demographic]? Copy

3. Assign roles and identities to ChatGPT.

One way to improve ChatGPT interaction is to incorporate a persona into the conversation. This involves instructing ChatGPT to assume a particular profession or entity, aligning its responses with the chosen role.

Generic prompt: Write 5 Facebook ad copies to advertise [product or service].

Specific prompt: I want you to act as [company or entity]. You are [provide a brief background of the company or entity you want ChatGPT to embody]. Your task is to write 5 Facebook ad copies to advertise [product or service, including features and specific ad details you want to include]. Copy

Like assigning roles, you can prompt ChatGPT to take on your target audience’s persona. This means that ChatGPT can craft responses tailored to the identity and preferences of the specific audience you aim to engage.

Improved prompt: I want you to act as [company or entity]. You are [provide a brief background of the company or entity you want ChatGPT to embody]. Your task is to write 5 Facebook ad copies to advertise [product or service, including features and specific ad details you want to include]. This ad is targeted at [audience demographic]. Copy

4. Specify the response length you require.

Lengthy responses, often exceeding 500 words, can occasionally decrease quality and relevance. You’ll keep those answers sharp and on point by dropping in your preferred response length when crafting those ChatGPT prompts.

ChatGPT’s answers can occasionally be too brief or excessively long, potentially getting cut off. Therefore, guiding the response length is key to effectively receiving better ChatGPT responses.

Generic prompt: Write a Facebook ad copy on [topic].

Improved prompt: Can you write a Facebook ad copy for [company] to promote [product]. Make sure to include this information in the ad copy: [pertinent information you would like to add such as current offers, product or service features]. Keep the ad copy within [number of words]. Copy

5. Refine your ChatGPT prompts. And do it again.

If the responses you receive don’t precisely align with your intent, don’t hesitate to refine your prompts. Small prompt adjustments, like rephrasing questions or changing your approach, can guide you to getting the desired answers from ChatGPT.

For example, if you are not satisfied with the response from the prompt above:

Specify the modifications you need and let ChatGPT give you an answer closer to your desired response.

Improving Prompts and Enhancing Responses: The Road to ChatGPT Expertise

Effective ChatGPT prompts and precise responses are the foundation of a seamless and productive human-AI partnership. Remember that ChatGPT is not here to add complexity to your tasks but to streamline and enhance them.

We encourage you to experiment with different prompts and strategies to unveil ChatGPT’s capabilities. So, journey on and discover what more ChatGPT can do. As a nurturing expert in AI-driven communication, you hold the keys to shaping its future. Your creativity and innovation are the driving forces that will continue to launch this technology forward.

Expand your expertise. Browse Strike Social’s latest blogs here:

• 
  Father’s Day Advertising with Meta Advantage+: Tips for Smart Audience Targeting
• 
  Smarter Paid Search with Google’s AI Max for Search Campaigns
• 
  Google Marketing Live 2025 Recap: Key YouTube and Google Ads Updates for Advertisers
• 
  Marketing to Gen Z: Social Media Strategies for Performance-Driven Brands
•