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eliquid

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I'm getting more heavily into Facebook ads lately. Do you have any insight into the following...

1. When you're choosing the ad type to run - are there any objectives you believe perform better than others in general? Obviously it depends what your goals are and the ads themselves, but are there some that generally work better or that you prefer to use?

2. Under 'consideration' -. 'engagement' - for post engagement and likes - are these worth paying for? I've been running some like campaigns and awareness campaigns for posts and for my FB page. I'm getting low cost 'post engagements' but not seeing any other side effects on the FB page or post itself.

3. Should I be running like campaigns for a FB page (within FB) and spending dollars on likes? If I build up relevant likes from targeted people - will these still help my organic reach with posts in the future?

4. If you had to build up a new Facebook page or group from scratch, what paid strategies would you use to do so quickly and efficiently?

5. How long do you wait to kill an ad set/group after running it?

6. Any helpful programs you use or recommend to create ads pretty quickly?

Thanks!

Sorry about the delay.

I pretty much always try to run Conversions. A conversion can pretty much be any event you want and since I'm driving traffic to a page for a reason, I want more and more of w/e event I am going after with my page.

I almost never run anything to get likes to a page. Most times those campaigns end up not getting me leads or sales. Leads and sales are all I am looking to get when I do paid ads on FB.

To build a page or group up, I wouldn't use paid ads for it. Not unless I had some viral giveaway attached to it. Only then would I ever do paid ads to a group or FB page.

For campaigns that seem to be getting good traction, I kill ads when they spend 2-3x more than their goal. So if I am trying to get leads or sales at $45 and the campaign started off getting sales at $60, I'd keep running and tweaking. Same is true up to about $130 or so. If the campaign started off badly though with no sales, I might let it get to about 5x with 0 sales before cutting it. The goal is to get conversions so you can tweak down. For some campaigns this will be hard to do though... so say your goal is $5 a lead/sale. That's going to be really tough on Facebook to only let it run for $15 or $20 and give up, so for something like this I might let it run for $100-$200, or even 100 clicks and see the stats on landing page views, etc.

For creating ads quickly.. if you are just wanting to change out images ( one of the most important things about the ad ) you can do that easily within FB itself with the duplicate button. This is where I focus a lot of my time with ad creation. The text around the ad is important too, but I try to nail the image down first, then work on text, then button ( shop now, etc ). Once I have some good images, I work on maybe 5-10 version of the text which isnt hard to get into FB manually.
 
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Sorry about the delay.

I pretty much always try to run Conversions. A conversion can pretty much be any event you want and since I'm driving traffic to a page for a reason, I want more and more of w/e event I am going after with my page.

I almost never run anything to get likes to a page. Most times those campaigns end up not getting me leads or sales. Leads and sales are all I am looking to get when I do paid ads on FB.

To build a page or group up, I wouldn't use paid ads for it. Not unless I had some viral giveaway attached to it. Only then would I ever do paid ads to a group or FB page.

For campaigns that seem to be getting good traction, I kill ads when they spend 2-3x more than their goal. So if I am trying to get leads or sales at $45 and the campaign started off getting sales at $60, I'd keep running and tweaking. Same is true up to about $130 or so. If the campaign started off badly though with no sales, I might let it get to about 5x with 0 sales before cutting it. The goal is to get conversions so you can tweak down. For some campaigns this will be hard to do though... so say your goal is $5 a lead/sale. That's going to be really tough on Facebook to only let it run for $15 or $20 and give up, so for something like this I might let it run for $100-$200, or even 100 clicks and see the stats on landing page views, etc.

For creating ads quickly.. if you are just wanting to change out images ( one of the most important things about the ad ) you can do that easily within FB itself with the duplicate button. This is where I focus a lot of my time with ad creation. The text around the ad is important too, but I try to nail the image down first, then work on text, then button ( shop now, etc ). Once I have some good images, I work on maybe 5-10 version of the text which isnt hard to get into FB manually.

Rep++, that's excellent.

For those who want to run conversions but feel like it's too expensive to run the 50 conversions/week to get FB to optimize properly, choose a higher point on the funnel to optimize for. This will probably get you worse results, but your budget is your budget.

@eliquid FB has outlined pretty much everything a beginner needs in order to start running FB ads (start with your goal, install your pixel, get 50+ conversions/week to optimize properly, know your audience, test creatives and placements). With that + the information you've shared here, is there anything you feel like FB is misrepresenting?
 

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Sorry about the delay.

I pretty much always try to run Conversions. A conversion can pretty much be any event you want and since I'm driving traffic to a page for a reason, I want more and more of w/e event I am going after with my page.

I almost never run anything to get likes to a page. Most times those campaigns end up not getting me leads or sales. Leads and sales are all I am looking to get when I do paid ads on FB.

To build a page or group up, I wouldn't use paid ads for it. Not unless I had some viral giveaway attached to it. Only then would I ever do paid ads to a group or FB page.

For campaigns that seem to be getting good traction, I kill ads when they spend 2-3x more than their goal. So if I am trying to get leads or sales at $45 and the campaign started off getting sales at $60, I'd keep running and tweaking. Same is true up to about $130 or so. If the campaign started off badly though with no sales, I might let it get to about 5x with 0 sales before cutting it. The goal is to get conversions so you can tweak down. For some campaigns this will be hard to do though... so say your goal is $5 a lead/sale. That's going to be really tough on Facebook to only let it run for $15 or $20 and give up, so for something like this I might let it run for $100-$200, or even 100 clicks and see the stats on landing page views, etc.

For creating ads quickly.. if you are just wanting to change out images ( one of the most important things about the ad ) you can do that easily within FB itself with the duplicate button. This is where I focus a lot of my time with ad creation. The text around the ad is important too, but I try to nail the image down first, then work on text, then button ( shop now, etc ). Once I have some good images, I work on maybe 5-10 version of the text which isnt hard to get into FB manually.

Awesome info.

* Do you think this applies to any website using Facebook ads? Always run ads to your website or funnel and go for conversions?

From what you're saying, there's no point to waste money building up a Facebook audience in most cases.

* I've been trying out video ads and GIF ads and they seem to have much better engagement and significantly lower costs. Thoughts?

* Do you feel Adwords is still the better bet as far as conversions/cost for most campaigns?
 

eliquid

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Rep++, that's excellent.

For those who want to run conversions but feel like it's too expensive to run the 50 conversions/week to get FB to optimize properly, choose a higher point on the funnel to optimize for. This will probably get you worse results, but your budget is your budget.

@eliquid FB has outlined pretty much everything a beginner needs in order to start running FB ads (start with your goal, install your pixel, get 50+ conversions/week to optimize properly, know your audience, test creatives and placements). With that + the information you've shared here, is there anything you feel like FB is misrepresenting?

I think having a lot of options seems like a killer feature set when it comes to people new to the system. "Wow look at all the advanced cool stuff I can do, this is the greatest thing ever". Then those new people get in and waste a lot of money and time thinking they know their goal and in reality they just get lost in the sea of options and spend a lot of money and get paralysis by analysis type of mental roadblocks.

I'm sure some people really want Likes and "engagements". Personally, I can't stand that sheet. If I'm paying money, I want a bottom line result, but then again I am a direct marketer and not a brand wizard. At the end of the day I gotta eat and go on that cruise to the Greek isles, you know?

I think something that is very odd though is in reporting ( and even in the options ), you can get clicks at say 20.. but your landing page views are 9. WTF? If someone clicks on my ad, I want them to go to my landing page.

Are these bots that click, but vanish before the LP loads? Are these clicks on my "like button"? Are these clicks over to my FB page instead?

I know what the answer is, but for the new person this is very confusing. I also think it stupid to label it this way and offer such a option because it just creates more questions.

Having less options is more. I wish FB would understand that. I take that back, they do understand it and that's why they make so much money with people trying every single option and throwing money at it hoping it works for them. Who wins in the end, Facebook.

.
 
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eliquid

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Awesome info.

* Do you think this applies to any website using Facebook ads? Always run ads to your website or funnel and go for conversions?

From what you're saying, there's no point to waste money building up a Facebook audience in most cases.

* I've been trying out video ads and GIF ads and they seem to have much better engagement and significantly lower costs. Thoughts?

* Do you feel Adwords is still the better bet as far as conversions/cost for most campaigns?

As a direct marketer, I feel anytime I spend money on ads ( or do anything ), I need to see a positive bottom line result.. directly. So I'd say yes on running conversions as that will more than likely be the fastest way for me to get there. Then again, I am use to running campaigns where I would meet the requirements that FB wants. If you can only eek out 2 conversions a month, it might not be worth it for you though. Also, a conversion is many things to me, not just a thank you page after a checkout.

I think you can spend money on building up a FB audience/page/group. I just woudn't do it with paid ads within FB. You could spend money buy giving away a product within an established group or buying an email list from another site in the same industry you want get likes from.

The video ads are good for getting people to stop scrolling and view your video, which can then help you build an audience. I like videos for this reason.

I think it depends for Adwords. In some circles trying to run certain products/service are very hard on Adwords because the competition is so high or there are restrictions for that category in Adwords. For situations like this, I think Facebook can help out with lead volume overall even though it might be a higher cost/conv than Adwords.

In other situations, Adwords done properly can kill it on cost/conv because Adwords is search intent. People came to Adwords looking for it. Even on the display network, people are reading on that topic ( they came looking for it ). Add in remarketing and its still people that once were looking for it.

Facebook is more disruption marketing. The only time this is different is if you place the FB code on your site and don't run normal FB ads, but instead but an audience off the pixel and traffic that came to your site ( hopefully from Adwords ) and now you advertise on FB to those people. Otherwise, you are having to disrupt them and make them interested in your product or service.

Facebook can provide very good cost/conv too, but you really have to be good at demo targeting and getting people emotional over your product/service.

.
 

The-J

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I think having a lot of options seems like a killer feature set when it comes to people new to the system. "Wow look at all the advanced cool stuff I can do, this is the greatest thing ever". Then those new people get in and waste a lot of money and time thinking they know their goal and in reality they just get lost in the sea of options and spend a lot of money and get paralysis by analysis type of mental roadblocks.

I'm sure some people really want Likes and "engagements". Personally, I can't stand that sheet. If I'm paying money, I want a bottom line result, but then again I am a direct marketer and not a brand wizard. At the end of the day I gotta eat and go on that cruise to the Greek isles, you know?

I think something that is very odd though is in reporting ( and even in the options ), you can get clicks at say 20.. but your landing page views are 9. WTF? If someone clicks on my ad, I want them to go to my landing page.

Are these bots that click, but vanish before the LP loads? Are these clicks on my "like button"? Are these clicks over to my FB page instead?

I know what the answer is, but for the new person this is very confusing. I also think it stupid to label it this way and offer such a option because it just creates more questions.

Having less options is more. I wish FB would understand that. I take that back, they do understand it and that's why they make so much money with people trying every single option and throwing money at it hoping it works for them. Who wins in the end, Facebook.

.

I don't do CTW anymore. Conversions from the getgo. I'm convinced that it's the only way to get direct results from FB. (Or whatever your goal is: messenger destination if that's your goal, PPE if that's your goal)

I had to tell a client that, before I came on, they wasted $6000 on garbage CTW traffic by looking at the analytics (avg time in site from FB was less than a second). That hurt. Their CPC was $.25, too.

I've seen PPE outperform WC, but it doesn't happen often.

Rep+
 

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I think having a lot of options seems like a killer feature set when it comes to people new to the system. "Wow look at all the advanced cool stuff I can do, this is the greatest thing ever". Then those new people get in and waste a lot of money and time thinking they know their goal and in reality they just get lost in the sea of options and spend a lot of money and get paralysis by analysis type of mental roadblocks.

I'm sure some people really want Likes and "engagements". Personally, I can't stand that sheet. If I'm paying money, I want a bottom line result, but then again I am a direct marketer and not a brand wizard. At the end of the day I gotta eat and go on that cruise to the Greek isles, you know?

I think something that is very odd though is in reporting ( and even in the options ), you can get clicks at say 20.. but your landing page views are 9. WTF? If someone clicks on my ad, I want them to go to my landing page.

Are these bots that click, but vanish before the LP loads? Are these clicks on my "like button"? Are these clicks over to my FB page instead?

I know what the answer is, but for the new person this is very confusing. I also think it stupid to label it this way and offer such a option because it just creates more questions.

Having less options is more. I wish FB would understand that. I take that back, they do understand it and that's why they make so much money with people trying every single option and throwing money at it hoping it works for them. Who wins in the end, Facebook.

.

I think this is basically what I was getting at with my original question on FB ads. With so many different nuances between the types of ads you can run on Facebook, how is anyone supposed to know which campaign type is going to yield the best results/return without testing each one and then testing various ads within each one. You end up spending money testing all the various campaign types and individual ad campaigns just to see if it's resulting in the actions you want users to take. Hundreds of dollars gone easily.
 
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The-J

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I think this is basically what I was getting at with my original question on FB ads. With so many different nuances between the types of ads you can run on Facebook, how is anyone supposed to know which campaign type is going to yield the best results/return without testing each one and then testing various ads within each one. You end up spending money testing all the various campaign types and individual ad campaigns just to see if it's resulting in the actions you want users to take. Hundreds of dollars gone easily.

That's how FB makes bank: from noobs who don't have the experience to know what will actually work for them.

By starting with a clear business objective, you will save thousands of dollars right off the bat. Make FB's optimization work in line with your business objective and it will do its best based on the ridiculous amount of data it has.

Other than that... it's all trial and error. But it's not a waste.
 

AdamMaxum

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That's how FB makes bank: from noobs who don't have the experience to know what will actually work for them.

By starting with a clear business objective, you will save thousands of dollars right off the bat. Make FB's optimization work in line with your business objective and it will do its best based on the ridiculous amount of data it has.

Other than that... it's all trial and error. But it's not a waste.

Yeah, true. I guess that's why there are all those FB courses you can take. I will stick to clear objectives and run traffic direct to my sites. Sounds like best course of action in most cases.

Some things you don't really know though unless you research and read other people's experiences with FB ads. Like, how is someone to supposed to know that if you run like campaigns and increase your likes/exposure by 100 people that those 100 people won't equate to any sales or activity within your business model? What about the effects of someone seeing your FB page and saying okay they have some likes and activity, maybe I do trust them a little more. Maybe I will visit them or buy from them now based on the social activity/comments/likes. Or when you have X likes on a page or FB group and post a link in them are people clicking over to the site/link?
 

eliquid

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Yeah, true. I guess that's why there are all those FB courses you can take. I will stick to clear objectives and run traffic direct to my sites. Sounds like best course of action in most cases.

The thing about courses that I hate is, a lot of times you have no clue when they were made. Also, 95% of the time they just cover the basics like how to make your ad ( directly in the system, not the psychology behind it ), where to grab your pixel, etc. You know, the stuff FB already shows you for free.

When you combine both of those together, 95% of the time you end up with a course you paid for that you would have learned the same thing for free from FB. On top of that, the course was made 3-5 years ago and most of those basic screenshots no longer even apply.

Finding an up-to-date/new course that teaches you more than FB already does is the trick.

Some things you don't really know though unless you research and read other people's experiences with FB ads. Like, how is someone to supposed to know that if you run like campaigns and increase your likes/exposure by 100 people that those 100 people won't equate to any sales or activity within your business model?

What you speak about here is a very very very common problem in marketing. It's called attribution. Some of the brightest minds in the world have tried to tackle it. Most of their solutions work "somewhat ok". Your direct example above is sorta like the old question that use to be, "how do I know how many of my web viewers saw my ad on Adwords, clicked, researched and didn't buy, but physically came into my store last week and purchased offline?"

What about the effects of someone seeing your FB page and saying okay they have some likes and activity, maybe I do trust them a little more. Maybe I will visit them or buy from them now based on the social activity/comments/likes.

See above.

Or when you have X likes on a page or FB group and post a link in them are people clicking over to the site/link?

Well, I think I know what you are asking here. For this you would easily add a variable on the end of your URL and track how many times that variable came up in your analytics.
 
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eliquid

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Wanna chat a bit 1x1 with me personally about paid advertising?

I'll be speaking at the 2018 FLF event in Scottsdale.

Specifically, I'll be talking about SaaS at the event, but I'll be around to talk to people about other stuff like paid advertising.

If you want to meetup during the event ( or slightly before/after ), this is your notice to attend the event and make contact with me.

Meetup - 2018 Fastlane Summit - Confirmed Speaker List

.
 

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Something I want to point out with using video & image ads on FB.

With video ads, when people click the video (not the button), FB sends them to your site but with the video at the top of the page. The user will have to scroll down to see the actual site.

For me, this isnt 45fg2good because it leads to high bounce rates with people clicking off in a couple seconds. I'm assuming this is happening because people are sent back to the video they just clicked with my site below it. And, they aren't scrolling down past the video but yet I still get charged for someone clicking to my site.

With image ads, when people click the image (not the button), FB sends them to the full site with nothing at the top. I have much lower bounce rates & people actually stay on my site for much longer.

This is something that I've noticed for awhile & wanted to share with those that may not have noticed when using FB ads.
 
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Google doesn't mess around.

This is an awesome thread. Thank you for all the info and value provided. I took detailed notes so I could validate an e-comm idea.

Built the site, listed the product, built two rudimentary ads for Adwords and two for Facebook.

Both were driving minimal traffic in the first 24 hours. I expected this and just wanted to play around with things.

Well, 24 hours into Adwords, my account is suspended. "Your account is suspended, we've detected suspicious payments in your account" I fill out an appeal and they reply back within an hour saying I'm in violation of their terms. No further info is provided.

The only violation I can think off is my copy was a bit off so maybe that caused the flag. Technically it could fall under a "misrepresentation" which they appear to take very serious.

I'm writing to share so others that rip through here don't repeat my hasty mistake. Go fast, but double check and read the TOS so you dont make rookie mistakes.

Spanked but not down and out!
 
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eliquid

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Google doesn't mess around.

This is an awesome thread. Thank you for all the info and value provided. I took detailed notes so I could validate an e-comm idea.

Built the site, listed the product, built two rudimentary ads for Adwords and two for Facebook.

Both were driving minimal traffic in the first 24 hours. I expected this and just wanted to play around with things.

Well, 24 hours into Adwords, my account is suspended. "Your account is suspended, we've detected suspicious payments in your account" I fill out an appeal and they reply back within an hour saying I'm in violation of their terms. No further info is provided.

The only violation I can think off is my copy was a bit off so maybe that caused the flag. Technically it could fall under a "misrepresentation" which they appear to take very serious.

I'm writing to share so others that rip through here don't repeat my hasty mistake. Go fast, but double check and read the TOS so you dont make rookie mistakes.

Spanked but not down and out!

Yeah, I've noticed Facebook doing this a lot recently too.

A client that I was helping recently got their new FB account banned. So I set up a second one for him, also banned.

We set up a third and got it running and just bill him under my card now.

He wasn't doing anything wrong or shady. All of his ads were good. His card for payments was good.

Facebook wouldnt give us any clue why. We filled out the form to provide ID too for him.

Sometimes it these platforms get nervous and tripped up on some filter.
 

eliquid

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Wanted to drop this nugget for anyone looking to get a bit more out of their campaigns. I touched on this a little before, but I wanted to bring it back up.

People tend to buy from companies they know, trust, and have heard about.

Purchasing ads on Google, having customers hit your landing page, and then running ads on Facebook to them later can be a wonderful way to help build your brand and influence purchasing decisions.

Here's how it would work:
  • Set up Adwords remarketing pixel/conversion pixel and FB pixel on your landing page.
  • Ran Adwords ads to your site
  • Those people that do not buy/convert and bounce get pixeled by FB ( as well as Adwords )
  • You run FB ads to those people who didn't convert ( it's a custom audience )

These people have already heard of you and some interaction with you.

Will this cause them to directly buy? No, but it will help influence them if you do your FB ads right, like addresses their fears/concerns/reasons for not buying from you to begin with.

The same is true the other way around too:
  • Purchase ads on FB running to your demo
  • They hit your landing page and get pixeled by Adwords. Some purchase, several others do not
  • You run campaigns on Adwords remarketing to those that didn't purchase ( display or RLSA )
You're always hitting these people up and addressing the issues why they didn't sign up.

Back this up with email on other networks like AdRoll.

Will you always know their reason from not buying from you? Not directly most of the times.

Maybe you have a list of people that hit the page, added their item to cart, and then never purchased. Maybe price was a concern for them. Maybe it was the shipping times ( long wait ). Maybe it was because you didn't offer free shipping.

Your remarketing ads should address those to that audience.

For other people, you won't really know. But you can start writing down what COULD BE the reason and act smart about it.

How?

Ok, some people will just be tire kickers, time wasters, bots, and bad traffic. You can weed those people out by simply not having your pixels ( from Adwords and Facebook ) not fire when the page loads, but 10 seconds after the page loads.

You'll need some Javascript mastery to pull that off, but by not firing until 10 seconds you prevent all these bots and bad traffic from ever getting into your lists.

Everyone else that has stayed on more then 10 seconds, you know you have someone that is interested and reading, or engaging.

From that point you need to determine if most of the people are scrolling down, clicking other pages, looking at other items, etc. This can be determined with Analytics tools and heatmaps. This info can help you come up with what COULD BE the reasons other people are not buying and you can start working those into your campaigns at FB and Adwords ( and maybe email too ).

.
 

eliquid

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Anyone got any questions out there yet?

I'm wanting to prep for my presentation at the event in Feb. Your questions here could help me prep out there
 
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Anyone got any questions out there yet?

I'm wanting to prep for my presentation at the event in Feb. Your questions here could help me prep out there
Could low budgets on FB (ex. $10/day) be the reason holding people back from generating sales?
 

eliquid

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Could low budgets on FB (ex. $10/day) be the reason holding people back from generating sales?

It depends honestly.

If it's a new campaign with no history/metrics, yes. Especially if you are using Google or FB to optimize to a conversion. They have nothing to work with, and thus, need to spend money and get data before they can work their magic on your pixel.

They are going to have to spend money and get a history first. At $10 a day, that might take a long time until statistical relevance.

.
 

Greg R

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Anyone got any questions out there yet?

Oh boy where do I start...

First of all huge BUMP and thank you for this thread.

My question isn't relating to SAAS but Facebook Ads.

You said earlier in this thread that FB has too many targeting options. Is there a maximum number of options that you test in one given campaign?

Right now, I am just trying to get reservations on my landing page as a soft proof before I move to production. And there seems one billion ways to slice the audience.

Do you typically start by casting a wide net and narrow the audience as results come in or start with you ideal customer and work backwards?

Thanks in advance.
 
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Azure

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I have a few questions.

What sort of automated rules do you utilize the most? Any scripts?

What are your thoughts on DKI? If you use them, do you have any tips for effective use?
 

eliquid

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You said earlier in this thread that FB has too many targeting options. Is there a maximum number of options that you test in one given campaign?

I try to test only 1, max 2 things per campaign. So if I am testing age in one campaign, I might only test interest in another and that will be it.

Do you typically start by casting a wide net and narrow the audience as results come in or start with you ideal customer and work backwards?

Thanks in advance.

I do both, but only bc I can spend the money.

One campaign will be a wide net using FB's algo to narrow down by conversion.

I'll build the same campaign, but focus in on my desired/expected customer and use FB conversion algo to narrow down even further.

After a week, I can tell which is going to work out the best conversion wise and I will leave one on, and the other I will turn off.

If you can only spend enough money for 1, do the wider net if you can wait it out.

.
 

eliquid

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What sort of automated rules do you utilize the most? Any scripts?

So 2 answers:

1. For those rules/scripts I use on almost every account.. it would have to be a budgeting script ( some clients are REALLY anal about not spending over X per month, not even a dollar ) so I use a script to ensure accounts go into pause if they reach 20% of the final budget just to be on the safe side. Sometimes I do this daily too instead of monthly now that Google will and can go over your budget.

For rules, I love to use 3 rules that help ensure kws are in positions that provide the most ROI for the client. Let's just say they help me stay on top of the page and not bottom or 2nd page.

2. I do use other scripts and rules, but it depends on client and need. I have a few I can't talk about bc its my advantage moat. Scripts that do some heavy analysis like split testing ads for me and refining negatives, etc.


What are your thoughts on DKI? If you use them, do you have any tips for effective use?

I don't really like DKI. Mostly because I use excel to build out a lot of the campaigns quickly. I might use 1 DKI ad in the build, but that's very rare. Typically I try to have 3 ads per adgroup and DKI is almost never present for me because I'm my groups are so tight I can pretty much use a H1 or H2 that contains the term and the term will have little variation since the groups are so tight.

.
 
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Last edited:

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So 2 answers:

1. For those rules/scripts I use on almost every account.. it would have to be a budgeting script ( some clients are REALLY anal about not spending over X per month, not even a dollar ) so I use a script to ensure accounts go into pause if they reach 20% of the budget just to be on the safe side.

For rules, I love to use 3 rules that help ensure kws are in positions that provide the most ROI for the client.

2. I do use other scripts and rules, but it depends on client and need. I have a few I can't talk about bc its my advantage moat. Scripts that do some heavy analysis like split testing ads for me and refining negatives, etc.




I don't really like DKI. Mostly because I use excel to build out a lot of the campaigns quickly. I might use 1 DKI ad in the build, but that's very rare. Typically I try to have 3 ads per adgroup and DKI is almost never present for me because I'm my groups are so tight I can pretty much use a H1 or H2 that contains the term and the term will have little variation since the groups are so tight.

.
Yep. I don't use DKI at all. I see it as a sign you can create your ads properly...

(Except for that trademark workaround which I don't use anymore.)
 

eliquid

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Did you know Google is going to take your ads, rewrite them on their own, and then set their versions of your ads live in your account automatically?

Yeah, this could be good.. or horrible. Depends on if your clients expect approval of their copy before set live ( like many of mine ).

Wanna know more?
About ad suggestions (beta) - AdWords Help

.
 

Azure

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For those of you who manage Grant accounts, some big changes are coming that will likely disqualify many charities from participating at their current set up. On the other hand this will make professional account managers who can direct these accounts to meet the new metrics to be even more in demand.

1) No single keywords, no kw of competitors/other organizations at all, no location names, nothing with a QS of 2 or less.Mission-based campaigns - Ad Grants Help

2) Geotargeting requirement, ads/kw/sitelink extension requirements, 5% CTR requirement, thinly-veiled threat to cancel your account if you don't answer their surveys.Account management policy - Ad Grants Help

3) Oddly random and limited number of single-word kw that are exempt from the new rules.Ad Grants single keyword policy exceptions - Ad Grants Help
 
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I have recently run into a major challenge with paid search and I'm curious to hear how you deal with this.

My account seems to be in good shape right now, but I'm having a terrible time tracking changes and the impacts of each change that I make. And I do keep notes in a separate spreadsheet.

To be more specific, I'm not talking about big changes like an A/B test or creating a new campaign. I'm talking about smaller things like adjusting the bids for keywords and loging them in a way that is meaningful and easy enough for me to reference between I make any changes again to that keyword.

There has been some mention throughout this thread of keeping track of optimizations outside of the Change Log. I know that both you and Andy keep notes about changes.

I'd love it if you or someone else here would explain how you keep track of day to day optimizations in a way that's easy to reference your previous changes for a keyword so you don't undo what you already set in motion... or overwhelm yourself.

Here's what I'm doing:

Awhile back I developed my own little system in an excel sheet. I include things like date of the change, description, and a code.

The code looks like this: Change - Dec 12/17.

Then I turn the code into a label and I apply it to the keyword.

Creating a coded label is handy because it tells me if I made a change to the keywords and when. Before I adjust the bid for a keyword, I always check to see if I have a change label applied to the keyword. If I do, then I go back to the spreadsheet and update the sheet, then I remove the old change label and add a new one for the keyword.

It seems to be working ok, but I feel like I over-complicated everything. And if I start making a number of changes to one keyword then things get pretty messy in excel.

Any advice for how to track little optimizations like this? Are there tools out there that can help with this? I have yet to find one.
 

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I have recently run into a major challenge with paid search and I'm curious to hear how you deal with this.

My account seems to be in good shape right now, but I'm having a terrible time tracking changes and the impacts of each change that I make. And I do keep notes in a separate spreadsheet.

To be more specific, I'm not talking about big changes like an A/B test or creating a new campaign. I'm talking about smaller things like adjusting the bids for keywords and loging them in a way that is meaningful and easy enough for me to reference between I make any changes again to that keyword.

There has been some mention throughout this thread of keeping track of optimizations outside of the Change Log. I know that both you and Andy keep notes about changes.

I'd love it if you or someone else here would explain how you keep track of day to day optimizations in a way that's easy to reference your previous changes for a keyword so you don't undo what you already set in motion... or overwhelm yourself.

Here's what I'm doing:

Awhile back I developed my own little system in an excel sheet. I include things like date of the change, description, and a code.

The code looks like this: Change - Dec 12/17.

Then I turn the code into a label and I apply it to the keyword.

Creating a coded label is handy because it tells me if I made a change to the keywords and when. Before I adjust the bid for a keyword, I always check to see if I have a change label applied to the keyword. If I do, then I go back to the spreadsheet and update the sheet, then I remove the old change label and add a new one for the keyword.

It seems to be working ok, but I feel like I over-complicated everything. And if I start making a number of changes to one keyword then things get pretty messy in excel.

Any advice for how to track little optimizations like this? Are there tools out there that can help with this? I have yet to find one.

@Andy Black and others might feel differently, but I'd say not to track the small micro level changes like that. Unless your enough of a bid to go from say an average position below 4th, to an average of say 2nd... I wouldn't track it.

Why?

Because your account does not live in a vacuum.

Lets say you change a bid to 1 keyword on Dec 1st and its for .50 cents more. Maybe that raises you from 4.2 avg position to 3.7

Things start to get worse and your wasting money now.

How do you know it's just the bid alone that did this? Maybe a new competitor jumped in and is advertising from 11am to 3pm and it's causing an issue for that 1 keyword.

Maybe the person in position 2 ( above you ) changed their ad copy on Dec 2nd and it's a lot better because he hired @SinisterLex to make it more persuasive and now more people are clicking that ad instead of yours.

What if a seasonal change, like holiday shopping or Amazon buying up 50% of the ad inventory on Adwords, is causing the issue?

It's really nice to track these changes, but at some level you have to not drive yourself crazy in it.

What happens if you do the bid change on Dec 1st and then a landing page change on Dec 2nd? Replace the LP change with maybe an ad adjustment or device change near the same day? If another change is close in time, it could be the mix or the other change causing issues.

When you track that granular, you really have to watch out for other things more closely.

I might be crazy, but I don't get down that far unless it's a sweeping change where I go from bottom of the page ( with ads ) to the top of the page ( position 2.5 on average ).
 

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Thanks for the response. That actually makes complete sense.

I was starting to wonder if I was getting too granular with my tracking. I started reading a lot of different blog posts about this yesterday and I'm pretty sure that you just said it the best.

Thanks again!
 
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@Andy Black and others might feel differently, but I'd say not to track the small micro level changes like that. Unless your enough of a bid to go from say an average position below 4th, to an average of say 2nd... I wouldn't track it.

Why?

Because your account does not live in a vacuum.

Lets say you change a bid to 1 keyword on Dec 1st and its for .50 cents more. Maybe that raises you from 4.2 avg position to 3.7

Things start to get worse and your wasting money now.

How do you know it's just the bid alone that did this? Maybe a new competitor jumped in and is advertising from 11am to 3pm and it's causing an issue for that 1 keyword.

Maybe the person in position 2 ( above you ) changed their ad copy on Dec 2nd and it's a lot better because he hired @SinisterLex to make it more persuasive and now more people are clicking that ad instead of yours.

What if a seasonal change, like holiday shopping or Amazon buying up 50% of the ad inventory on Adwords, is causing the issue?

It's really nice to track these changes, but at some level you have to not drive yourself crazy in it.

What happens if you do the bid change on Dec 1st and then a landing page change on Dec 2nd? Replace the LP change with maybe an ad adjustment or device change near the same day? If another change is close in time, it could be the mix or the other change causing issues.

When you track that granular, you really have to watch out for other things more closely.

I might be crazy, but I don't get down that far unless it's a sweeping change where I go from bottom of the page ( with ads ) to the top of the page ( position 2.5 on average ).
I agree. We only log large changes, making sure to note WHAT was done and WHY.

We do this in a Weekly Trading sheet (I think I've dropped a screenshot in here somewhere, and certainly in the thread where I had a call with @Random_0).


EDIT: A "large" change could indeed be a bid adjustment to a keyword or few that drive the account, but we don't get hung up on logging every single bid adjustment.
 

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