Let Results Be Your Guide

If you've been following my stuff long enough, you've surely heard me use this phrase. And probably a whole bunch of times: Let results be your guide.

Let's talk about what that means and how it can help with your advertising approach.

I've found that new advertisers, or really, any advertisers who lack confidence or conviction in what they're doing, desire structure and certainty. They want a repeatable approach that they can apply to all of their advertising. And that can become a problem.

Let me give you a few examples of the questions I get to help this make a little bit more sense.

How often should I update creative?

This is a common question. They're looking for a regular cadence so that they can add it to their routine. Update the creative every three weeks, four weeks, two months, whatever. If they know they need to create new ads every three weeks, it adds purpose and direction.

But the reality, of course, is much messier.

The need to update creative will differ based on a whole lot of factors. Things like:

• Potential audience size. Are you targeting internationally? By country? Which countries? Or is it local? Because that changes everything.

• Your budget. A higher budget may require more frequent updates.

• The number of creative options you're running at once. If you put everything into one ad, you may need to update creative more often. If you’ve got six ads running, that balances things out.

The need to update creative is largely driven by creative fatigue. And what we want to avoid is creative fatigue.

In theory, once someone has seen your ad a certain number of times, the likelihood of converting eventually drops. At that point, any new impression they get is mostly a waste of money.

But that threshold is going to be wildly different depending on the situation. In some cases, lots of frequency is necessary, especially for bigger commitments or higher price points. In others, you may only need to reach people a handful of times, like for a free offer.

Regardless, there is no universal number of impressions that will trigger the need for new creative. And there certainly isn’t a cadence or amount of time that should pass.

That said, Meta should notify you when creative fatigue has become an issue. And really, this is far easier than you think.

Let results be your guide.

Let’s assume you were initially getting great results for several weeks or even months, but you've noticed that performance has trended downward over time. Your ads are no longer effective.

So how often should you update creative? Let results be your guide.

Results can fluctuate from day to day or even week to week. But if you've seen a consistent trend and you're no longer getting the results you once were, it's time to try something else.

Let’s move on to another common question:

Should I restrict by age or gender?

This comes up a lot. I understand the inclination to define your ideal customer by age and gender. Maybe you predominantly serve women aged 25 to 44, so you define your audience that way.

But is it necessary?

First, these inputs are only used as suggestions when Advantage+ Audience is on. So if it actually is necessary, you may need to turn Advantage+ Audience off first.

Now, in theory, this shouldn’t be necessary when using the performance goal to maximize conversions, when your conversion event is a purchase. Meta is focused on getting you more purchases and will make adjustments in your audience to help make that happen.

I’ve seen examples where the business served women entrepreneurs. They kept gender open, and the vast majority of their budget was still spent on women. They even received a purchase from someone whose gender was unknown to Meta, and this person wouldn’t have been reached if the audience were restricted.

You also don’t want to completely eliminate a potential customer who may have otherwise bought from you. For example, you may sell men’s clothing, but that doesn’t mean only men will buy. A partner, spouse, or parent might buy your product as a gift.

There are times when restricting by age or gender may be necessary.

I’ve seen this in some cases when optimizing for leads. I was getting lots of cheap leads, but most were coming from people over the age of 65. They were also low-quality leads. I had to turn Advantage+ Audience off to restrict the age limit in this case.

That doesn’t mean this is always necessary when optimizing for leads. I’ve looked at plenty of accounts where budget was distributed naturally between age groups even while using Advantage+ Audience. So don’t assume it.

So should you restrict by age or gender? You know the answer: Let results be your guide.

It’s not just your cost per conversion. It’s the quality of your results too.

In my leads example, I was getting lots of cheap leads, but they were low-quality. Run a breakdown of your results by age or gender to see how your budget is distributed and where the results are coming from.

If you primarily sell to women and 90% of your budget is spent on women, there’s likely no need to make a change. You want to limit restrictions when possible. But if 80% of your budget is spent on men and they aren’t buying from you, that’s a sign something needs to change.

So here’s the bottom of the glass.

This is what I want you to walk away with today.

There are so many other examples of this:

• Should you use lookalike audiences or go completely broad?

• Should you use single image ads or catalog ads?

• Should you use Advantage+ placements or remove some placements?

You know what you should say: Let results be your guide.

Don’t rely on what others are doing. Don’t look for universal truths about what works or doesn’t work for everyone. Find what works for you. Make changes based on results, not based on theories or your gut or anything else.

Now, there is a bit of a caveat here. It’s related to making changes based on meaningful results.

We’ll cover that in the next episode.