Meta Ads Creative Strategy in 2026: The Full System — Transcript
Full transcript
- 0:00In 2026 and 2027, creative is the lever
- 0:03that sits within Meta ads. Media buying
- 0:05fundamentally is not your advantage
- 0:07right now. You need to become incredibly
- 0:09good at creative strategy, at creative
- 0:11design, production, then moving that
- 0:13into the ad account, and analyzing the
- 0:14creative to create this flywheel effect.
- 0:16By the end of this video, you'll know
- 0:18everything you need to know about
- 0:20creative for 2026. We're going to be
- 0:22running through why creative is the
- 0:24growth lever, how Meta's algorithm
- 0:26actually works in 2026, concept
- 0:28architecture, hook strategies that
- 0:30actually scale, all the formats you can
- 0:32use and test, a testing framework to
- 0:34take that creative and actually put it
- 0:36into the account to get statistically
- 0:38relevant results. We're then going to
- 0:39move into creative volume, creative
- 0:41diversity, and a financial model that
- 0:43ties it all together. We're going to
- 0:44talk about fatigue, scaling winners,
- 0:46portfolio management, creative
- 0:48production, so what do the teams, the
- 0:50briefing, and the process look like? And
- 0:51then lastly, we'll tie all of it
- 0:53together and package it into the 2026
- 0:56playbook. So with that being said,
- 0:57diving into section number one, we have
- 1:00why creative is the growth lever. I've
- 1:02been media buying on Facebook since
- 1:032018. So I've been about eight coming up
- 1:06on nine years in the Meta Ads Manager.
- 1:09And I remember back in 2018, 2019, 2020,
- 1:11there was so much leverage in media
- 1:13buying. You actually didn't need to be
- 1:15very good at creative, and as long as
- 1:17you had a massive edge on media buying,
- 1:19you could beat a lot of people. And the
- 1:20reason for that is that there was a
- 1:22massive skill gap. In fact, I would
- 1:24argue that any arbitrage opportunity
- 1:26that exists within a market is a product
- 1:29of the skill gap that exists at that
- 1:30point in time. So, back then, the
- 1:33difference between someone that just
- 1:34goes and opens up the ad manager and
- 1:36someone that is a super advanced media
- 1:38buyer that spends 12 hours a day doing
- 1:40this and that's three years in, there
- 1:42was such an enormous difference that
- 1:44that difference allows for arbitrage and
- 1:46allowed for the opportunity. Now, over
- 1:49time, Meta has slowly compressed media
- 1:52buying. The targeting is now fully
- 1:54automated. I would recommend 99% of
- 1:56people are just running broad only, so
- 1:57there's no skill within interest
- 1:59targeting. Andromeda now optimizes for
- 2:01the distribution of the creative.
- 2:03Consolidation is always favored across
- 2:05all of these digital platforms now
- 2:07because conversion data consolidates,
- 2:08which allows for better machine learning
- 2:10modeling. And all of the media buying
- 2:11hacks that used to exist, like
- 2:13duplicating ad sets or using bidding
- 2:16models in a certain way, none of them
- 2:18really work that well anymore. None of
- 2:20them really give you a big arbitrage.
- 2:21And so because of that, this arbitrage
- 2:23opportunity has compressed. And instead,
- 2:26where the big arbitrage opportunity
- 2:28exists right now, is in creative. And it
- 2:30is because most people, fortunately for
- 2:33you, are terrible at creative. And so
- 2:36because of that, there is this huge
- 2:37opportunity that if you simply become
- 2:39good at creative strategy, at
- 2:41understanding what a good ad looks like,
- 2:44and then being able to build a system
- 2:45that can churn out a ton of high-quality
- 2:48ads, this is where you now make all the
- 2:50money on that. And by the end of this
- 2:51video, you should unlock
- 2:54this opportunity. So, the first thing I
- 2:55want you thinking through here is the
- 2:57portfolio model. So, let's say that you
- 3:00have $1,000 a day in ad spend, and there
- 3:03is two different scenarios here.
- 3:05Scenario one is you have one single
- 3:07creative that's holding that entire
- 3:09$1,000 per day, and you're at a 4x ROAS.
- 3:13And then you have another
- 3:16pathway that you could choose. You've
- 3:18got three ads holding $1,000 a day
- 3:20together, and this is also at a 4x ROAS
- 3:23blended across these three creatives.
- 3:25Now, I would rather be in this situation
- 3:28every single day of the week. And the
- 3:30reason being is that this situation
- 3:32decreases risk enormously within the
- 3:35business, because any of these three
- 3:37creative can fatigue, and the other ones
- 3:40will pick up the slack, and you can
- 3:41continue operating at this efficiency,
- 3:43at this ad spend.
- 3:44>> [snorts]
- 3:44>> But over here, if this creative
- 3:46fatigues, you're done. And I say this
- 3:49out of PTSD, working with probably eight
- 3:52to 10 clients now over the course of the
- 3:54last six years who have come to us 40%
- 3:57down year-on-year in new customer
- 3:59acquisition. Their business is in a
- 4:00terrible spot and they're going, "Our
- 4:03business is declining. It's because we
- 4:05built this eight-figure business off
- 4:07three creatives that held a million
- 4:09dollars in ad spend and now these three
- 4:11creatives are all fatiguing and we're
- 4:13trying to spin up variants and it's kind
- 4:14of keeping us at some reasonable level,
- 4:16but we just can't get back to the level
- 4:18and we keep declining." And my response
- 4:20these days is, "It's too late. We're not
- 4:23taking on that account because you
- 4:24should have fixed that six to eight
- 4:26months ago." What people will do is they
- 4:28will get one or two winning ads that can
- 4:31hold a tremendous amount of ad spend.
- 4:33And then what they do is they just stop
- 4:34making more ads and they go, "Like, why
- 4:36would we spend money on creative
- 4:37production? That's useless. Let's just
- 4:39double down and put all our ad spend
- 4:40here and then focus on other areas of
- 4:42the business." Yeah, amazing until these
- 4:44creatives fatigue. And the only reality
- 4:46of creatives in Meta ads is that every
- 4:49single creative will fatigue. Every
- 4:50single creative has a maximum spend
- 4:52threshold that it will reach. And so you
- 4:55want to be constantly thinking through
- 4:56creative production ad account
- 4:58management and creative through the lens
- 5:00of this portfolio model, which is that
- 5:02we want to get as many ads as possible
- 5:04holding as much spend as possible. We do
- 5:06not want to over leverage into one or
- 5:08two ads because this is ultimately what
- 5:10ends up destroying a lot of businesses.
- 5:12Let me give you three common mistakes
- 5:13that most teams are making when it comes
- 5:15to creative. Number one is a lot of
- 5:17people confuse activity for strategy.
- 5:19I'll give you an example of this, which
- 5:20is recently in the last few months I've
- 5:22seen two ad accounts that are launching
- 5:242,000 plus new ads a month and they're
- 5:27barely able to crack quarter million
- 5:29dollars in ad spend per month. Now, for
- 5:30those that work on large ad accounts,
- 5:32you would know that that is insane. You
- 5:35do not need two to 3,000 new ads a month
- 5:38on a quarter million dollar budget.
- 5:40That's so much volume. And they weren't
- 5:42profitable. And so you're looking at the
- 5:43fact that they're launching so much
- 5:45volume, they're not profitable, They're
- 5:47doing so much activity, but there's
- 5:50clearly a gap in strategy.
- 5:52Because if you were putting 2,000 great
- 5:55creative into the account with a good
- 5:56offer, with a good persona, with a good
- 5:58angle, then you shouldn't need anywhere
- 6:00near 2,000 ads a month. And so yes, I
- 6:02think volume's good. I think you should
- 6:03be launching as many ads as humanly
- 6:05possible, but with a standard of quality
- 6:09and with a strategy behind the creative
- 6:11that's actually going into the account.
- 6:12So do not mistake activity for strategy.
- 6:15This is really common right now because
- 6:17people think they can just launch more
- 6:18ads and their brand will scale. In fact,
- 6:20I hear this all the time, which is
- 6:21people are like, "Okay, I need to double
- 6:23my business. Do I just launch 40 more
- 6:24ads a month?"
- 6:25I was like, "If it's that simple,
- 6:26everyone would do it. There's a little
- 6:28bit more to just increasing activity."
- 6:30The second one is misdiagnosing
- 6:32bottlenecks. So with in creative, there
- 6:35is a ton of different bottlenecks that
- 6:37exist that could be holding you back. It
- 6:39could be the quality of the creative. It
- 6:41could be the format diversification. It
- 6:43could be the quantity that's sitting at
- 6:45the different stages of awareness or the
- 6:47stages of the funnel. So you have
- 6:48nowhere near enough top of funnel assets
- 6:50to produce the scale that you actually
- 6:52want.
- 6:53This might be a bottleneck on not
- 6:55actually introducing partnership ads or
- 6:57employing different strategies into the
- 6:58ad account to unlock more spend. There's
- 7:00so many different bottlenecks that exist
- 7:02just within creative that holds a
- 7:04business back, and most people don't
- 7:06understand all the bottlenecks that
- 7:07exist. So they misdiagnose it. They
- 7:09don't realize what the actual bottleneck
- 7:10is, and so then they focus on activity
- 7:12that doesn't actually move the needle.
- 7:14For example, those two brands that I
- 7:15spoke about before, they were not only
- 7:18mistaking activity for strategy, but
- 7:20they were also misdiagnosing the
- 7:21bottleneck in the business, which is
- 7:23that they thought just increasing sheer
- 7:25volume would suddenly unlock growth, but
- 7:27it's not doing anything for them. And
- 7:28it's because they're trying to fix
- 7:29something that actually doesn't need to
- 7:31be fixed. And then the last one, which I
- 7:32hope people are getting over by now, but
- 7:34I still see it from time to time,
- 7:38which is that creative is seen as a cost
- 7:41center rather than a revenue driver.
- 7:44And this is fundamentally because of the
- 7:46shift away from media buying to
- 7:48creative, which is that back in the day
- 7:50when media buying had a lot of arbitrage
- 7:52behind it, you didn't need a lot of
- 7:53creative and a lot of volume of
- 7:54creative. And so because of that,
- 7:56business owners would often see the ad
- 7:58spend in the platform, the spend on
- 8:00Google, the spend on Meta, the spend on
- 8:01TikTok, Pinterest, Microsoft as revenue
- 8:04driving, but the actual creative that's
- 8:06used to fuel that spend as a cost
- 8:09center. We want to minimize that cost as
- 8:11much as possible because we just want
- 8:12the platforms to find us customers, but
- 8:14that's the complete wrong way around.
- 8:16The creative is actually what is driving
- 8:19the revenue and Meta and these other
- 8:20platforms are just driving the
- 8:22distribution. Now, the fact that you can
- 8:23actually just post this stuff on organic
- 8:25and get free distribution as well means
- 8:27that creative is also the revenue driver
- 8:29organically. And so if you're thinking
- 8:30that creative is a cost center, you've
- 8:32got the completely wrong approach. We're
- 8:34going to be diving into later in this
- 8:35video exactly how much spend you should
- 8:38have on creative production respective
- 8:41to your ad spend levels so you can know
- 8:43if you're currently under or over
- 8:44investing in creative. Before diving
- 8:46into creative strategy, you first need
- 8:48to understand how Meta's algorithm works
- 8:50because this is the distribution tool
- 8:52for the assets that you're putting in
- 8:53it. Now, everyone's probably heard the
- 8:55word Andromeda. It's a massive buzzword.
- 8:56I've talked about it in a lot of
- 8:57content. And to put it simply, it's just
- 8:59an algorithm change that Meta made
- 9:01because they had a lot of GPUs for
- 9:03training AI for their metaverse that
- 9:05kind of fell flat, and so they
- 9:07repurposed all of those training chips
- 9:09towards a better ad serving platform.
- 9:12With that, the mechanical shift that you
- 9:15need to be across is that before
- 9:17Andromeda, and to be honest, we weren't
- 9:19even doing this pre-Andromeda, but it's
- 9:21an easy way to simplify the concept and
- 9:23then I'll go a little bit more nuanced,
- 9:24which is that pre-Andromeda, you would
- 9:25choose the audience. So you would say,
- 9:27"Hey,
- 9:28here is our interest.
- 9:30Please target this interest." And you
- 9:32would then go and load all the creatives
- 9:34in.
- 9:35And so you'd put creative one, creative
- 9:37two, maybe you're putting three
- 9:38creatives under this ad set. And you're
- 9:40saying, "Here's the interest, here's the
- 9:41ads, go and match them." Now,
- 9:43post-Andromeda, what happened is you
- 9:45actually do the opposite. So, you put
- 9:48the ads into the account, and you don't
- 9:50select any targeting.
- 9:52And then Meta goes and looks at the
- 9:54creatives, and it goes, "Okay, I think
- 9:56that these are going to resonate with
- 9:57these people based on the transcript,
- 9:59based on the words in the ads, based on
- 10:00the copy, based on my understanding of
- 10:02historical conversion data."
- 10:04And then it will go
- 10:07and find the people to target.
- 10:09Now, this is fundamentally a way better
- 10:10system because interest targeting has a
- 10:12lot of downside. Okay, when you're doing
- 10:14interest targeting, you're effectively
- 10:16labeling people with an interest, let's
- 10:18say pets, and then just arbitrarily
- 10:20serving all your creative to people that
- 10:21are interested in pets. But the reality
- 10:23is is that it's not just people
- 10:25interested in pets that want your
- 10:26product. It's probably people that are
- 10:28interested in pets within a specific age
- 10:29range that also have other variables or
- 10:32psychographic data points that are
- 10:34similar between them. And so, there's so
- 10:36much additional nuance that needs to be
- 10:38captured. And this
- 10:40serving mechanism ends up capturing that
- 10:42nuance better than the old one. Now, the
- 10:44reality is is that Meta was kind of
- 10:46already doing this pre-Andromeda. We
- 10:48haven't used interest targeting in most
- 10:50accounts for like two years. But what
- 10:51Andromeda really did is popularize this
- 10:54new approach to structuring an ad
- 10:56account. And so, there were still so
- 10:58many agencies and so many people running
- 10:59interest targeting, it was crazy, even
- 11:01though we have a video that was put out
- 11:03two years ago about this exact topic on
- 11:05the Meta algorithm. And this was before
- 11:07Andromeda. So, I was explaining this
- 11:08concept before this whole update even
- 11:11rolled out, and why we don't use
- 11:12interest targeting. It's called How
- 11:14Machine Learning Works in 2025 on Meta
- 11:18Ads. But this has popularized this
- 11:19approach, and now this is really how you
- 11:21want to be thinking through the asset.
- 11:23Now, why this becomes important is
- 11:24because the creative that you loads in
- 11:26that you load in is the targeting. So,
- 11:28if you load a bunch of creative that's
- 11:29all the the you end up just targeting
- 11:31the same person. You don't reach new
- 11:33people. If you end up loading in a bunch
- 11:34of creative that isn't clearly
- 11:37resonating with a specific target
- 11:38demographic, then it's going to get
- 11:40confused. For example, if you're calling
- 11:42out everyone in your ads, if you're
- 11:43like, "Hey, everyone, look at this
- 11:45product." Meta is going to be very
- 11:46confused cuz it's going to go, "What
- 11:47should we target the entire population?
- 11:49Is there a subset? Who should we
- 11:50actually go after?" You also need to
- 11:52think through this targeting mechanism
- 11:54at an ad set level in terms of
- 11:55structuring because if you just put a
- 11:57bunch of ads together that are all
- 11:58targeting different people under the one
- 12:00ad set, the ad set will also get
- 12:01confused. Who are we targeting? So,
- 12:03there's a lot of of additional nuance
- 12:04that we'll break down here when we get
- 12:06into the structure and testing section
- 12:07of this video. But, this is
- 12:08fundamentally the key concept that you
- 12:10need to understand here. There's also
- 12:11the creative similarity score that
- 12:13rolled out of Meta recently. Now, most
- 12:15people still can't access this in their
- 12:16ad accounts, but if you reach out to
- 12:17your dedicated Meta reps, they can get
- 12:19you this score. So, you can have an idea
- 12:22of what your similarity score is in the
- 12:24business. And as it currently works, the
- 12:26higher the number, the worse it is
- 12:29because the more similar your creatives.
- 12:31Now, why this matters so much is because
- 12:33of Andromeda bundling.
- 12:35And so, if you have, as I said before,
- 12:37multiple different creatives here, let's
- 12:39say one, two, three, but they're all
- 12:41slight variants. Let's say they're the
- 12:43same campaign shoot, but the model's
- 12:45just standing in a slightly different
- 12:46position. Or let's say it's UGC, but
- 12:49maybe there's a slight variation in the
- 12:52script halfway through the video. Or
- 12:53let's say these are actually very
- 12:54different videos in terms of formatting,
- 12:57but they're all speaking to the exact
- 12:58same audience. Well, what ends up
- 13:00happening is Andromeda will bundle them
- 13:03together and serve them all to the same
- 13:06pool of audience. Now, because of this,
- 13:07because they're similar creatives going
- 13:09to the same audience, what happens in
- 13:10the ad account is frequency goes up. So,
- 13:13frequency is how many times users are
- 13:15seeing your ads.
- 13:16Obviously, these ads are just going to
- 13:17serve to the same people over and over
- 13:18again, so frequency goes up. Your reach
- 13:21will go down, so you'll stop reaching
- 13:22that new users.
- 13:24And as a function of this over time,
- 13:27your return on ad spend will go down.
- 13:29And so you will start seeing diminishing
- 13:31returns in the platform.
- 13:32So instead, the position that you
- 13:34actually want to be in here is launching
- 13:35three creatives into the account, but
- 13:37these three creatives talk to different
- 13:39people,
- 13:40and therefore
- 13:42reach their own audiences.
- 13:45And with that, frequency declines
- 13:47because you're reaching different people
- 13:48with these ads, it allows you to unlock
- 13:50more spend because as they scale, you
- 13:51can almost think about this circle
- 13:53expanding as it goes to cold on cold
- 13:54audiences.
- 13:56But because these are talking to
- 13:57different people, you can see there's
- 13:58not much audience overlap.
- 14:00And as a function of that, you're going
- 14:02to be able to scale to new audiences
- 14:04effectively without just increasing
- 14:05frequency and saying efficiency decline.
- 14:08Another incredibly important concept
- 14:10here about how the platform algorithm
- 14:12actually works is in sequencing of
- 14:14creative and the reliability of return
- 14:16on ad spend as you decline through the
- 14:18account structure. So when it comes to
- 14:20sequencing creative, the reality is, and
- 14:23I think everyone watching this will
- 14:24agree with this, which is that if you
- 14:25just serve one ad to a user once, will
- 14:28they buy? And the answer 99.99%
- 14:31of the time is no.
- 14:33Generally speaking, you need to see an
- 14:35ad more than once to be confident in
- 14:37purchasing. Now, yes, there are some
- 14:39people out there that are getting one
- 14:41hit by ads and suddenly buy, right? That
- 14:42does happen. In fact, it's probably
- 14:44happened to me at one point in my life,
- 14:46but it's very, very rare and you
- 14:47definitely cannot build an efficient
- 14:49business off of those people. And so
- 14:51because of that, you need to serve them
- 14:53generally more than one ad. Now, you
- 14:55could serve them this ad again, a second
- 14:57time. However,
- 14:59Meta put out a article ages ago, it was
- 15:01like four or five years ago, which said
- 15:03that after two impressions of an
- 15:05identical creative, probability of
- 15:07purchase declines precipitously. And so
- 15:10if you look at the probability of
- 15:13someone buying, let's say this is a
- 15:14percentage, and then you look at the
- 15:16amount of ads that they are seeing. So
- 15:18this is frequency of an identical ad. So
- 15:21we're talking about the same ad here.
- 15:22You're not showing them different ads,
- 15:23just the same ad.
- 15:24When you show them the ad once, there
- 15:26might be a certain percentage uh chance
- 15:29of them buying. Then, when you show them
- 15:30the ad twice, it might be the same. It
- 15:32actually might even be slightly higher.
- 15:34Because on second viewing, now they're
- 15:36warmer and they're more likely to buy.
- 15:38But then on third viewing, it declines
- 15:40massively.
- 15:42And then on fourth, massively. And then
- 15:43it pretty much declines to zero. And so,
- 15:46there is very little purpose at all in
- 15:48showing a user the same identical ad
- 15:51more than twice. And the way to actually
- 15:53stress test this idea that I'm telling
- 15:55you right now in your own ad account is
- 15:56you can pull your ad account up, you can
- 15:58go down to the ad level, look at the
- 16:00last 30 days, 60 days, and look at
- 16:02frequency at an ad level on cold
- 16:04campaigns. And what you will see is that
- 16:06cold ads almost never have a frequency
- 16:09above a two. And if they do, you have a
- 16:12creative fatigue issue. You do not have
- 16:14enough diversification and volume in
- 16:15your account, and that is a red flag.
- 16:17Any good account that we're running,
- 16:19which is all of them, um no one has a
- 16:21frequency above a two on a cold ad. Just
- 16:23doesn't happen. Because if we see this,
- 16:25immediate red flag. We need to fix it.
- 16:27We need more diversity. We need more
- 16:28volume. Now, the big kicker here is that
- 16:32what Meta are published in that
- 16:34statement, and if I can go and find that
- 16:36article, I'll put it in the description
- 16:37below, is that if you then go and
- 16:39introduce a novel creative, the
- 16:42probability of purchase stays high. And
- 16:45so, after seeing the same ad once and
- 16:47then twice, if we go and serve a
- 16:48different ad in as the third impression,
- 16:52probability stays up here.
- 16:54And then if we go and serve a different
- 16:56ad as the fourth impression,
- 16:57probability stays up here.
- 17:00And so, we can actually keep probability
- 17:01of purchase up by rotating in new novel
- 17:04creative. Now, the question becomes, how
- 17:07does the algorithm do this and how does
- 17:08it decide the sequencing of creatives to
- 17:11these users to try to get them to
- 17:12convert? And this is where sequencing
- 17:14comes into the ad account structure.
- 17:16When Meta is optimizing across serving
- 17:18users ads, they're optimizing across
- 17:22understanding what sequence of creative
- 17:24actually gets the purchase. So, is
- 17:26showing users ad one, then ad two, then
- 17:29ad three going to get the click and
- 17:30purchase? Or is it showing users ad
- 17:32three as the opening creative, then ad
- 17:35two, then ad one going to get the
- 17:37purchase? Or is it some other kind of
- 17:38combination? Are we coming in here and
- 17:39then going back here? There's all of
- 17:41these different combinations of serving
- 17:43these ads in a particular order that
- 17:45might yield a click and might yield a
- 17:46conversion. Now, the kicker here is that
- 17:50Meta only attributes based on last click
- 17:52attribution. So, if we assume that the
- 17:55first sequencing example is what is
- 17:57actually occurring. They're going 1 2 3.
- 18:00If the click occurs here, all of the
- 18:03return on ad spend, all of the revenue
- 18:05gets attributed to this ad and it looks
- 18:07really good. Let's say it's at a 6X
- 18:08ROAS.
- 18:10Ad two, maybe some people buy at this
- 18:11stage in the sequence, but not a lot.
- 18:13And two at a 2X. And then on this top
- 18:16ad, we're down at like a 1.4X. When you
- 18:18look at this and you look at spend
- 18:20distribution, let's say spend is equal
- 18:22across all three creative. Naturally,
- 18:24you go in here and you go, "Oh, this is
- 18:27obvious. Turn ad one, turn ad two off."
- 18:29Cuz ad three's getting all the
- 18:30performance. But that would be a bad
- 18:32idea. And this is the concept in a lot
- 18:34of our content about do not turn a
- 18:35creative off when you are hitting KPI.
- 18:38If this is hitting your performance goal
- 18:40overall as an ad set, don't touch
- 18:42anything. Because Meta is sequencing
- 18:44between these creatives on purpose and
- 18:46it is creating an outcome. Meta's
- 18:48optimization is not based on last click.
- 18:51Really important concept to understand.
- 18:53Meta's optimization is actually based on
- 18:56multi-click and view. And so, Meta sees
- 18:58that people are viewing this ad, viewing
- 19:00this ad, then clicking on this ad and
- 19:01buying, and therefore it distributes
- 19:03spend here, knowing that it played a
- 19:05role in the purchasing journey. But you
- 19:07don't see that. Unfortunately, we don't
- 19:09get any visibility into this at all
- 19:11within the ads manager, which is
- 19:12actually really annoying. And so, as a
- 19:13product of that, we just need to trust
- 19:15the system. We also need to think about
- 19:18the creatives that we're putting into
- 19:19the account. How are they working
- 19:21through this purchasing journey?
- 19:22Normally, if you're good at creative, if
- 19:24you're good at creative strategy, you
- 19:26can look at these three creatives, and
- 19:27you can go, "Oh, it's pretty obvious to
- 19:29me that this is actually the opening ad.
- 19:31This is then probably the second ad, and
- 19:32then this is the converting ad." Because
- 19:34this is a super unaware top of funnel
- 19:36creative. This is then a product aware
- 19:39creative, and then this is a bottom of
- 19:41funnel very aware creative. And so, it's
- 19:43super obvious to me just looking at the
- 19:45three ads that that's what the sequence
- 19:46looks like. But, if you don't understand
- 19:48creative strategy, you're going to look
- 19:50at this and go, "I don't understand
- 19:52what's going on. Why are the ROAS like
- 19:53this? Turn off, turn off, turn off,
- 19:55destroy performance." We're going to go
- 19:56into this in a lot more detail later on
- 19:58once we start going through the testing
- 20:00structure and actually KPI'ing and
- 20:01understand what is a good ad, what is a
- 20:03bad ad, but this is a really important
- 20:05concept to be across.
- 20:06Second concept to be across is that the
- 20:09reliability of ROAS declines as you go
- 20:12down in the account structure. So,
- 20:14everyone who's opened up a Meta ad
- 20:16account knows the basic structure, which
- 20:18is you have campaigns, you have ad sets,
- 20:20then you have ads. Right? The campaign,
- 20:23you set up the budget typically, and you
- 20:24set up the overall uh optimization of
- 20:26it. So, is it optimizing for sales,
- 20:28reach, etc.
- 20:29Ad set, this is where all the targeting
- 20:32occurs. Now, people forget that these
- 20:33days because people go, "Oh, targeting
- 20:35is just broad, so I don't even really
- 20:37know what's happening at the ad set
- 20:38level." But, it's really important to
- 20:40reinforce targeting is occurring at the
- 20:42ad set level. And then down here, the
- 20:43ads, this is obviously the creative that
- 20:45gets served to the end user. Now, when
- 20:47we look down at the ad level, and we
- 20:49start assessing creative, the issue here
- 20:51is everything I just went through. We
- 20:53can look at the ROAS numbers,
- 20:56but they're kind of meaningless because
- 20:57they're last click attribution, and
- 21:00there's a multi-click or multi-view
- 21:01through journey occurring here. And so,
- 21:03I can go in and say, "Yeah, this has a
- 21:056x ROAS, is Let's like try to scale it
- 21:07or make more ads like that. But it's
- 21:09often a bad decision. So instead, when
- 21:11we move up to the ad set level right
- 21:14here, now we can look at all of these
- 21:16returns as a group. And we can go, let's
- 21:18not go into the individual ads because
- 21:20the reliability of uh the attribution
- 21:23here is terrible because there's so much
- 21:24happening across these different
- 21:25sequences. So let's just go up to the ad
- 21:27set and look, okay, at the ad set level,
- 21:29what's our ROAS here? And maybe overall
- 21:31it's at a 3x.
- 21:32Now this is a lot more reliable. It is
- 21:34worth noting that cross-serving of ads
- 21:37still occurs at the ad set level. So you
- 21:39can have uh multiple different ad sets.
- 21:42So if I just throw another ad set in up
- 21:44the top here,
- 21:45we'll call this ad set two. And let's
- 21:47just put a couple creatives under here.
- 21:51A sequence that can occur is that people
- 21:53see this ad in ad set one.
- 21:55They then see this ad.
- 21:57And then they get served another ad set.
- 21:58Now it's not prioritized by the
- 22:00algorithm. The algorithm will always
- 22:02prioritize serving adjacent ads under an
- 22:04ad set due to the way that targeting is
- 22:06siloed, but there is cross-ad set
- 22:09targeting. And so because of that, we
- 22:11might have a 3x here. We might have a 4x
- 22:14up here. This ad set seems to be doing
- 22:16better, but it's actually just because
- 22:19this ad set is picking up some
- 22:20bottom-of-funnel conversions being
- 22:22generated from this ad set. That can be
- 22:23completely avoided as long as your
- 22:25structure is good and you're
- 22:26diversifying concepts across the ad set
- 22:28level, you shouldn't have much cross
- 22:29targeting. And you can measure all this
- 22:31and we'll go into it later on, but the
- 22:32whole idea is ad set is better.
- 22:35We can trust this number. We can trust
- 22:36it more than the ad level. Then once you
- 22:38go all the way up to the campaign level,
- 22:41the campaign ROAS number, as long as
- 22:43it's on 7-day click attribution, is
- 22:46super reliable. This is generally very
- 22:48congruent with the actual P&L as long as
- 22:51it's on 7-day click and as long as
- 22:53existing customers are excluded. And so
- 22:55because of that, when we're making
- 22:56decisions within Meta, when we're
- 22:57thinking about structure, when we're
- 22:59thinking about introducing creative, we
- 23:01want to be thinking about measuring at
- 23:03the ad set or the campaign level, not
- 23:05the ad level, and we want to be thinking
- 23:06through this idea of sequencing. So, the
- 23:08practical implications of Andromeda and
- 23:10the way that the algorithm and ad
- 23:12platform currently works is fourfold.
- 23:14Number one, you need concept diversity.
- 23:17We're obviously going to go into what a
- 23:19concept is, how to break it down, how to
- 23:21come up with concepts, what diversity
- 23:22looks like later on, but number one is
- 23:24you need diversity within the creative
- 23:26going into the account. You also
- 23:28obviously need that introduced into the
- 23:29structure so that you're having a
- 23:31concept per ad set so you don't have any
- 23:33of this cross targeting going on.
- 23:35Number two is you need format variety.
- 23:37Okay, you can't unfortunately just have
- 23:39the same format of all of your creative.
- 23:42And the reason being is that Meta will
- 23:44prioritize formats that people resonate
- 23:46with. I'll give you an example, which is
- 23:48that I never ever, and I could scroll my
- 23:50Instagram feed for the next 3 hours and
- 23:52show you, I will never get a piece of
- 23:54UGC under my profile. Just doesn't
- 23:56happen. And it's because I never click
- 23:58on them, I never resonate with them, and
- 24:00so Meta inherently knows that low-fi UGC
- 24:03content should not be served to me. And
- 24:05so, if your ad account is just low-fi
- 24:07UGC, I'll never see it. Now, same thing
- 24:11actually for DPA ads. Now, DPA are very
- 24:14bottom of funnel. This isn't really
- 24:15cold, so I'd have to be already very,
- 24:17very product aware and on the website,
- 24:19but I don't think I have ever been
- 24:22served a DPA almost in the history of
- 24:25the ads that I get served on my personal
- 24:26profile. Now, that is likely a product
- 24:29of the fact that DPAs are not a creative
- 24:32type that I resonate with. I never click
- 24:34on them. And so, if you just had UGC and
- 24:36DPAs, it's very unlikely you'd ever
- 24:38reach me. So, you need to be making sure
- 24:40you have as much diversity in format
- 24:41type, and I'm going to be giving you all
- 24:42the formats and how you should be mixing
- 24:44and matching them later on so that you
- 24:45can reach as many people as possible. We
- 24:47then have hook quality. So, this is
- 24:49going to be a big section of this video,
- 24:51but with Andromeda, any kind of persona
- 24:54call out that occurs within the actual
- 24:56creative is going to go and prioritize
- 24:58that persona. So, if I make an ad and at
- 25:00the start I say, "If you're a business
- 25:02owner doing over $5 million a year,"
- 25:04Andromeda is going to read the
- 25:05transcript, it auto transcribes every
- 25:07single ad, and it's going to go, "Okay,
- 25:08let's try to find a similar audience to
- 25:10what he just said." What if my ad or my
- 25:12content has nothing to do with that
- 25:13audience? Well, then we've just pushed
- 25:14the creative to an audience that's not
- 25:16actually relevant. And people do this a
- 25:17lot. People's hook actually isn't as
- 25:20good as they think it is. People call
- 25:22out a persona without problem agitating.
- 25:24There's the so many different issues
- 25:25that actually lie in hooks, which is why
- 25:27we're spending so much time on it, cuz I
- 25:29think people are terrible at hooks. Most
- 25:30ads I see, they're just not good. And
- 25:32then lastly, is that with Andromeda,
- 25:34volume is absolutely critical. The spend
- 25:37capacity of most ads isn't very high.
- 25:40Most ads that you went to the into the
- 25:41account, if we look at mean ad spend per
- 25:44ad unit, sits at about $700 to $1.5
- 25:47thousand depending on the ad account.
- 25:49And so, generally, you can't get much
- 25:51spend through most ads. So, you need
- 25:52volume to compensate, but you also need
- 25:54strategy at the same time. Because if
- 25:56you're just putting sheer volume into
- 25:58the account, which I've seen so many
- 26:00people do, with no actual strategy
- 26:02behind the volume, it doesn't actually
- 26:03work. So, let's run through concept
- 26:05architecture. This is how you need to be
- 26:07thinking through the segmentation of
- 26:08different creative. This is how your
- 26:10naming convention should be set up on
- 26:11Meta as well. This is how you should be
- 26:13ideating in a Google Sheet or whatever
- 26:15format you want to think through this.
- 26:16And we'll also talk about the AI
- 26:17implications into this ideation process.
- 26:20So, what actually is a concept? A
- 26:22concept is a persona, angle, and offer.
- 26:25And so, to have diversity within the
- 26:26creative that's going into the account,
- 26:28you need one of these three variables to
- 26:30change. If the offer changes, it will
- 26:32resonate with a different audience, with
- 26:34a different pool of people, because it's
- 26:36either a different product, or if it's
- 26:38it's a different value proposition or
- 26:39packaging of the product. If the angle
- 26:40changes, obviously, it's going to
- 26:42resonate with with someone different,
- 26:43because you're problem agitating on
- 26:44something else. And so, if you sold skin
- 26:46care, you might start by problem
- 26:48agitating on wrinkles, but then you
- 26:50might have another ad that problem
- 26:51agitates on that. They're going to reach
- 26:53two very different audiences even though
- 26:54it's the same product because the angle
- 26:56changed. And then lastly we have a
- 26:58persona change. Now the easiest way to
- 27:00think through a persona change is
- 27:02obviously who are we talking to, but
- 27:03also who is actually in the ad. And so
- 27:05if there's a 60-year-old woman in the
- 27:07ad, it's obviously going to resonate
- 27:09with a very different target demographic
- 27:10than if there is a 20-year-old woman in
- 27:12the ad. And so because of that we can
- 27:14adjust the persona and that will
- 27:16inherently adjust who resonates with the
- 27:18creative and who it will target on the
- 27:19platform. And so one of the easiest ways
- 27:21to ideate here and come up with almost
- 27:23infinite creative concepts is to start
- 27:26ideating on who are all the different
- 27:27personas that we want to reach. What are
- 27:29the core personas in the business? And
- 27:30you can go through and you can probably
- 27:32come up with two or three or four. And
- 27:34then if you really drill deeper, you can
- 27:36come up with tons more. So yeah, we
- 27:38could go like females age between 40 to
- 27:4045, etc. But then we can start digging
- 27:43into like what are the actual pain
- 27:44points. And so females age 20 to 20 five
- 27:47dealing with acne. Females age between
- 27:4930 to 35 dealing with acne which is a
- 27:51slightly different problem because acne
- 27:52shouldn't be occurring at that age so
- 27:53maybe it's hormonal acne. And then we
- 27:55can go women age between 40 to 45 with
- 27:59acne as well. That's also a completely
- 28:00different problem that should be fixed
- 28:02by now and so what are the different
- 28:04underlying causes that we can then
- 28:05resonate within that persona. And so you
- 28:07can build personas out in ridiculous
- 28:10detail based on all of the problems that
- 28:12the product solves. By the way, this is
- 28:14the case in every industry as well as
- 28:17fashion. So in fashion people really
- 28:19struggle to get their head around
- 28:20concept architecture, but with personas,
- 28:23it's the same thing. Most large retail
- 28:25fashion brands will break their target
- 28:27demographic down into like four core
- 28:28personas and they'll give them names.
- 28:30But the reality is you can go way deeper
- 28:31than this because a persona could be a
- 28:34particular problem that a particular
- 28:37person is facing. And so there's this
- 28:39particular person who's a mom age
- 28:41between 30 to 35 with young kids and the
- 28:44problem that they face is they need an
- 28:46affordable dress that can go from a work
- 28:49dress into a night dress on a Friday
- 28:50afternoon. That is a persona. That's a
- 28:51persona that you could make infinite
- 28:53creative for for that exact particular
- 28:55pain point and circumstance. And you
- 28:57could probably think of 400 examples of
- 28:59that. When we move into angle, it's the
- 29:01presentation of how we're actually going
- 29:03after the problem. So, what is the
- 29:05angle? What is the value proposition?
- 29:07Why would you purchase the product? And
- 29:09then the offer is obviously really
- 29:10straightforward, which is what are we
- 29:12actually offering? The key here is
- 29:13personas
- 29:14>> and demographics. They're archetypes
- 29:17that are defined by problems, desires,
- 29:19and buying triggers. So, we want to be
- 29:20thinking about who are our avatars. And
- 29:23you want to think hard on that. Spend 20
- 29:25minutes on it. Then, what problems do we
- 29:27actually solve for these people?
- 29:30Then, what are the differences in pain
- 29:33points, language as to how we talk to
- 29:36this person, and the proof that is
- 29:37required for this person? And once we
- 29:40understand these three, we should be
- 29:42able to build out a whole lot of
- 29:43personas, which you can then, once that
- 29:46is done manually, go to an LLM like
- 29:49Claude or ChatGPT or Gemini,
- 29:51give it the entire persona list, and
- 29:53tell it come up with 20 to 30 more, and
- 29:55give it as much context as possible,
- 29:57which you should already have loaded in
- 29:58there in some capacity about the
- 29:59business, about the target demographic,
- 30:01etc. Claude, OpenAI LLMs, they're only
- 30:04going to give you averages. And so, if
- 30:07you just give it three or four personas,
- 30:09and you give it your website, and you
- 30:09say, "Hey, come up with some more
- 30:10personas," you're going to get an
- 30:11average outcome. And everyone's going to
- 30:13be doing it, and you're going to get the
- 30:14same as them, and you're going to revert
- 30:15to the mean. So, what you want to do is
- 30:16if you are going to do this, you need to
- 30:17put all the manual effort into actually
- 30:19building out proper 30 to 40 personas
- 30:22that are actually good, and then you
- 30:23need to give it an unbelievably wide
- 30:25amount of context as to the business and
- 30:26the target demographic and everything
- 30:27you can, so that it can actually ideate
- 30:29properly on another 20. And of the 20
- 30:31that it produces, you shouldn't just be
- 30:33putting that in there. You should be
- 30:34refining down, probably cut down to four
- 30:36to five, give that back in, say these
- 30:38four to five are good, ideate on another
- 30:4010 to 20. And then that way you can beef
- 30:42this out from 20 to 30 personas or
- 30:44whatever you get to and double the
- 30:46number. One really important note here
- 30:48is that people die in persona work by
- 30:51keeping the personas too broad. Broad
- 30:53personas end up producing forgettable
- 30:56creative that is nowhere near specific
- 30:59enough for the target demographic that
- 31:01you want to resonate with. And so if you
- 31:02come away with a persona while you're
- 31:04building this out, which is let's say
- 31:06women age between 25 to 45, this is a
- 31:11terrible persona. The creative that
- 31:13you're going to make for this audience
- 31:14is nowhere near specific enough that
- 31:16it's going to resonate with enough
- 31:18people to be able to hold a good amount
- 31:19of spend. As an example, instead of
- 31:21going for the persona busy professional,
- 31:23which I actually see so much when when I
- 31:25tell people to do this concept build
- 31:26out, and instead you would want to
- 31:28delineate this into a consultant who
- 31:31flies twice a week and needs a carry-on
- 31:33wardrobe that works for boardrooms and
- 31:35bars. Way more specific. And now with
- 31:36that persona call out, you're already
- 31:38thinking about how to talk to this
- 31:39person. You can almost visualize who
- 31:40this is, what their problem is, what we
- 31:42need to solve, what the creative should
- 31:44look like. It gives so much more
- 31:45specificity into the actual briefing and
- 31:47production process. And then guess what,
- 31:49we actually reach this audience
- 31:50properly. But when we say busy
- 31:52professional, what is a busy
- 31:54professional? That is so wide, there are
- 31:55so like the age is all over the place,
- 31:57their gender is all over the place. What
- 31:59do they actually do? What do they get up
- 32:01to? Why do they even need this product?
- 32:02This is so broad that you will you will
- 32:05end up with mediocre creative. You are
- 32:07better off making five ads for this
- 32:09target demographic than five for this.
- 32:11Now five for this will scale harder. If
- 32:13you can actually do a proper unaware ad
- 32:15that is going to resonate with this
- 32:17entire pool of people, yes it's a bigger
- 32:18total addressable market, so yes you'll
- 32:20be able to hold more spend. But the
- 32:21reality of you making a good ad for an
- 32:23audience this broad is actually very
- 32:25unlikely. And so you are way better off
- 32:27making more ads for very specific
- 32:29personas, and then as you start to
- 32:31become a eight mid-eight figure brand,
- 32:34you can start to play around in trying
- 32:36to get ads to work for very broad
- 32:38audiences, but the skill level required
- 32:40here is so high and it is just not
- 32:42required for most ad accounts. Most ad
- 32:45accounts you can just go hyper specific
- 32:46and get way better results than needing
- 32:48to go and try to target the entire of a
- 32:50population. Another example here is
- 32:51instead of doing, let's say, health
- 32:53conscious parent, you could target a mom
- 32:56who's tried six different supplements
- 32:58because her toddler won't eat
- 33:00vegetables. Once again, way more
- 33:02specific. Now, you could go away and you
- 33:03could write a script for that. You know
- 33:04exactly what that ad looks like. You
- 33:05know who who should be in it. You know
- 33:06who you're talking to. You know what the
- 33:08proof needs to be for that particular
- 33:10target demographic. You know what the
- 33:11language needs to be and you know the
- 33:12pain points of that particular persona.
- 33:14Now, an angle is the specific argument
- 33:17or perspective that you take when you're
- 33:19speaking to a persona. This is where a
- 33:21lot of creative strategy actually ends
- 33:23up failing because brands default to
- 33:25product features rather than crafting
- 33:28genuine angles that resonate with the
- 33:30persona. So, I'm going to give you a lot
- 33:31of tactical application here. Number one
- 33:33is you want to problem agitate in some
- 33:35capacity. You don't need to do this in
- 33:37all of your creatives. In fact,
- 33:39especially if people aren't even problem
- 33:40aware, then you can't even problem
- 33:41agitate, right? But you want to be
- 33:42leading with pain as much as possible
- 33:44and you want to make the viewer feel the
- 33:46pain, feel like they have been heard
- 33:48before you go and introduce the
- 33:50solution. Another great angle here is
- 33:52approaching with a contrarian truth. So,
- 33:54you want to challenge a common belief
- 33:56that people have which allows them to
- 33:57reframe. An example of this,
- 33:59particularly just as a hook, is
- 34:01everything you've been told about X is
- 34:03wrong. Everything you've been told about
- 34:05the protein industry is wrong. And then
- 34:07you go into obviously an educational
- 34:09piece that then might problem agitate
- 34:10that then obviously loops into a
- 34:12solution. You want to typically always
- 34:13have social proofing in the angle. You
- 34:15want to build some kind of authority or
- 34:17expertise in
- 34:19the domain. So, this is more
- 34:20specifically domain expertise. So, you
- 34:22don't need, for example, a doctor in a
- 34:24lab coat showing up in every single ad
- 34:26for every industry. Right? If you're
- 34:27selling a running product, you want a
- 34:29marathon runner showing up. You want
- 34:30someone with authority in the domain
- 34:32that you're trying to sell it. Curiosity
- 34:34is great and is commonly in most angles
- 34:36that do well, and this is specifically
- 34:38creating what's called a curiosity gap.
- 34:40And so, when you open up a video asset,
- 34:42and you can actually do this in image
- 34:43assets, too, but when you open up the
- 34:45video, you open up and create a
- 34:47curiosity gap or an information gap. As
- 34:49an example, you'd say, "Here's what the
- 34:52top 1% of millionaires know about saving
- 34:55money that they don't want you to know
- 34:57about." And then you don't answer it
- 34:58straight away. And you go into a story,
- 35:00and you go into something else. You go
- 35:01into any of these other aspects. You
- 35:02problem agitate. You have a contrarian
- 35:04truth. You go into some degree of social
- 35:06proofing, although that's probably
- 35:07stacked towards the back of the ad. And
- 35:09then eventually, the ad goes on and on
- 35:10and on. You pull people through this
- 35:12journey. You educate them on everything.
- 35:13And then you end up actually answering
- 35:15the curiosity gap. And so, you didn't
- 35:18have any information. You want to get to
- 35:19the information, and eventually the
- 35:20information's provided to you. And so,
- 35:22that's how you hold people through an
- 35:24ad. All good angles also have some
- 35:26degree of comparison or objection
- 35:28handling. And so, often people who are
- 35:31watching your ad have tried to solve
- 35:33their problem through other solutions.
- 35:35And so, you want to tell them why your
- 35:37solution will work versus all of the
- 35:38competitors. You've probably tried this.
- 35:40You've probably tried this. You've
- 35:41probably tried this. If it's a piece of
- 35:42user-generated content, you'll commonly
- 35:44see the actual person in the script
- 35:45going, "I tried this, just like you
- 35:47would have, and it didn't work for me. I
- 35:48then tried this. I thought it was
- 35:49overhyped. It didn't work. And then
- 35:51finally, I was like, okay, I'm going to
- 35:52give one more thing a shot, and it
- 35:53actually worked." And then this one is
- 35:55the least compliant, but it is the best
- 35:57performing component to add into an
- 36:00angle, so I'm going to throw it in,
- 36:01which is a transformation, aka a before
- 36:05versus after. Uh before versus after's
- 36:08Meta does not like them. You have to
- 36:09sneak these into creatives in a way that
- 36:12the algorithm doesn't flag it. But these
- 36:14are some of the best performing
- 36:15creatives ever, because people want to
- 36:16see visually a before and after. I think
- 36:18this is basic human psychology. Before
- 36:20and after's will always crush for as
- 36:22long as they exist. And because of that,
- 36:24Meta doesn't like you uh running them.
- 36:25So, when we're thinking about the angle,
- 36:28we're starting at the persona and then
- 36:30we're thinking about what angle and
- 36:31approach do we need to be able to
- 36:33resonate with this target persona. And
- 36:34what you will notice is I've given you a
- 36:36lot of tactical application that can be
- 36:39included or built together into a script
- 36:42that creates the angle. So, the real key
- 36:44with the angle is actually you can
- 36:46simplify it into a one sentence, which
- 36:47is if our persona is women with kids age
- 36:5035 to 40 that are having energy issues,
- 36:53we're going to then sell them creatine
- 36:56powder and the angle is going to be that
- 36:59it solves energy issues based on
- 37:01particular studies and then we can
- 37:03continue training it out. The thing is
- 37:05the angle realistically, if you're going
- 37:06to write this out properly, we're just
- 37:07talking about the script, okay? And so,
- 37:10you just want to write the whole script.
- 37:11If it's a static, this is obviously
- 37:12going to be a bit tighter and you could
- 37:13probably encapsulate this in a few
- 37:15sentences, but the idea is we want to
- 37:17figure out what angle are we approaching
- 37:19selling this person on with a myriad of
- 37:22different strategies that's going to
- 37:24resonate with them. And so, if we take
- 37:25for example that, uh, woman age 40 to
- 37:2745, uh, with creatine and energy issues,
- 37:30well, we're going to want social
- 37:32proofing, but we want to we're going to
- 37:33want social proofing for that particular
- 37:35persona. So, we're going to want either
- 37:36case studies around persons people like
- 37:38that or the clinical studies that we're
- 37:40going to reference, which is going to
- 37:41give us expertise and authority, needs
- 37:44to reference their particular age and
- 37:45gender. We want to think about problem
- 37:47agitation on that particular persona.
- 37:49So, how are we going to agitate to that
- 37:51problem? Are we going to pull in some
- 37:52kind of contrarian truth or curiosity
- 37:55gap that's going to hold them into the
- 37:56asset? Can we do any kind of comparisons
- 37:59to stuff that they've tried in the past?
- 38:01Has this persona tried things or is this
- 38:02very new to them? And then, can we pull
- 38:04in any kind of transformation at the end
- 38:07as a piece of social proof to back into
- 38:09the creative? And so, we choose the
- 38:11elements that we want, we think about
- 38:12how we're going to slice and dice these
- 38:14into a script and that becomes the
- 38:15angle. And we're going to build out some
- 38:17actual examples of this in a moment, but
- 38:19before we do, I want to talk about the
- 38:21testing priority order. Which of these
- 38:24three components has the largest impact?
- 38:27What should you be thinking about
- 38:28testing the most of or the least of?
- 38:30Number one at the top is angles. So,
- 38:32this is exactly what we're just
- 38:33discussing. This is the message or the
- 38:35argument. The reason why this is such a
- 38:37high priority is because we can sell to
- 38:39any persona that is relevant to the
- 38:40product. You should be able to
- 38:41effectively look at who has bought from
- 38:43you in the past. What persona do they
- 38:44sit in? Why did they buy from you? And
- 38:47then, we just need to craft an angle to
- 38:48that particular persona. If that persona
- 38:50isn't purchasing from us, we know that
- 38:52it's actually really an angle or an
- 38:54offer issue. It's not an issue with the
- 38:55persona cuz we've already proven that
- 38:57these people buy from us, okay? And so,
- 38:59when something's not working, we
- 39:00typically don't want to look at the
- 39:01persona as long as you did it well.
- 39:03Like, let's not do broad 25 to
- 39:0645-year-old females. Let's get hyper
- 39:08specific into a very specific person
- 39:10that has purchased from us before, and
- 39:12let's target them. But then ultimately,
- 39:14it's going to come down to an angle or
- 39:15offer issue, which is why angle is the
- 39:17first thing you should test if things
- 39:18aren't working. You need to rotate that
- 39:20and improve the angle. And then the
- 39:21second is the offer. Now, fundamentally,
- 39:24the offer actually might be the number
- 39:25one most important thing out of all of
- 39:27this, but the issue is is that you
- 39:29actually don't have much flexibility in
- 39:30changing the offer. What do I mean by
- 39:32that? The offer is two things. The offer
- 39:34is the product, and then the offer is
- 39:36the value proposition or the way that
- 39:38we're framing value. Now, when it comes
- 39:40to the product, if you have a single
- 39:42product and ads aren't working, well, I
- 39:44can't really tell you to change the
- 39:45product, right? Now, you could. You
- 39:46could change the whole business, but the
- 39:48reality is is that the product is the
- 39:50product. We need to change the angle or
- 39:52the persona, right? So, even though this
- 39:54is the most important thing, the product
- 39:55ultimately is king out of anything, we
- 39:57don't have much flexibility here. Now,
- 39:58if you have a very large skew count, and
- 40:00maybe this is a new product that's being
- 40:02launched into an existing 20-product
- 40:04portfolio, then sure. Then we can go and
- 40:06say, "Is this an offer issue? Is this an
- 40:08issue with the product?" And we can
- 40:09start to troubleshoot accordingly. But
- 40:10for most people, you're pretty stuck on
- 40:12the product. Then when it comes to the
- 40:14value proposition, the value proposition
- 40:16we've got a couple options, right? We
- 40:17can go and try testing bundles, we can
- 40:20go and try testing like a gift with
- 40:22purchase, we can go and try all of these
- 40:24different repackaging of the offer,
- 40:27right? We can do like tid as well, so
- 40:29you get percentage off when you buy two
- 40:30or three. We can go and throw in like a
- 40:31subscription offer. So, there's a lot of
- 40:33testing that we can do here. And we do
- 40:34this with a lot of clients is we'll come
- 40:36up with a bunch of different offers and
- 40:38how we should reframe value to try and
- 40:39get the funnel working more effectively.
- 40:41But ultimately, you are limited here.
- 40:43There's only so many offers you can
- 40:45test. And we run into this issue, which
- 40:46is like, "Ah, we've tested like seven
- 40:48variations of how we can spin these two
- 40:50to three products. And now we're
- 40:51relatively stuck. And the only way that
- 40:53we can increase the value perception on
- 40:55the offer is to just do harsh deep
- 40:57discount. And we don't want to do that.
- 40:59We don't want to go and just eat 40%
- 41:01into margin and build a brand off a
- 41:03heavy discount reliance." And so,
- 41:04although the offer is unbelievably
- 41:06important, this is a huge variable that
- 41:08we do a lot of testing on. And we do a
- 41:09lot of offer testing for clients. It's
- 41:12something that eventually you're going
- 41:13to hit a wall on. There's only so much
- 41:15offer testing you can actually do. And
- 41:16once you've found the best performing
- 41:18offer, you're stuck on it. And so, that
- 41:19is where then we want to be doing a lot
- 41:21of switch ups in personas. And personas
- 41:24is ultimately what's actually going to
- 41:25give us breadth and volume in the
- 41:26account. And then I have number four in
- 41:28here. There is actually a fourth
- 41:29component of concept design. Now, this
- 41:32didn't really used to exist
- 41:34pre-Andromeda, but it's an additional
- 41:36component that we've added in recently.
- 41:38And it's because of the way it then
- 41:40Andromeda will take different formats
- 41:42and serve it to different people. So, as
- 41:43I said before, I don't get UGC content.
- 41:45I don't get dynamic product ads. And so,
- 41:47you could do all the mix and matching
- 41:49that you want of personas, of angles, of
- 41:51offers to try to hit me, but if the only
- 41:53ads in the account is UGC and DPAs. And
- 41:56so, there is a fourth component to be
- 41:58able to reach more people, which is the
- 41:59format. You can have the same persona,
- 42:01same angle, same offer, and you can
- 42:02change the format and you will reach a
- 42:04different audience. However, this is
- 42:06nowhere near as effective as these other
- 42:09components. If you do this and then you
- 42:10change the format, the reality is you're
- 42:12probably going to hit a lot of the same
- 42:14people cuz you are talking to the same
- 42:15people, you are going with the same
- 42:16angle, and you are offering them them
- 42:18the same thing. You'll get a bit of
- 42:19novel reach, you'll obviously reach
- 42:20people that don't resonate with the
- 42:21current format, but this isn't like a
- 42:23huge unlock great variable in the
- 42:25account. And that's why it is down at
- 42:27number four in the testing priority.
- 42:29Now, the big issue here and the reason
- 42:30why I spent so much time going through
- 42:31the testing priority order is everyone
- 42:33gets this completely the wrong way
- 42:34round. People spend all of their time
- 42:37testing formats. They go, "Oh, let's
- 42:39test some UGC cuz UGC will work." UGC as
- 42:42a concept doesn't work. It is the
- 42:44script, it is the persona, it is the
- 42:46angle, it is the offer that is contained
- 42:48within this type of content that is what
- 42:50works. Just like a professional photo
- 42:53shoot doesn't work. The format isn't
- 42:55what works, it's what's contained within
- 42:57the format. Then people move up to the
- 42:58persona and they go, "We need to reach
- 43:00different people." Okay, we understand
- 43:01that in Andromeda we need to talk to
- 43:03different people, so let's talk to
- 43:04different people. This is the second
- 43:05priority. It is not because if your ads
- 43:08aren't working, fundamentally, you have
- 43:10bad messaging and you have bad arguments
- 43:12for why they should buy. The creative is
- 43:14just bad. And creative being bad is
- 43:16normally a function of the angle and the
- 43:17scripting. And so this is what you
- 43:18should be fixing. Changing up the
- 43:20persona is just you trying to target
- 43:22different people with terrible ads. Then
- 43:23they go to the offer and they say,
- 43:24"Well, all the big influencers, Hormozi,
- 43:26says offer is king. That's the thing
- 43:28that matters the most, so we need to go
- 43:29to the offer." Sure, but you're going to
- 43:31once again fatigue offer testing pretty
- 43:33quickly. There's only so much you can do
- 43:34with your one or two product. And then
- 43:36they end up at the angle, which is their
- 43:37lowest priority, but it should be the
- 43:38highest. So this is how you need to be
- 43:40thinking through testing priority. Now,
- 43:41the practical application of thinking
- 43:43through this format type actually
- 43:45translates directly into the account
- 43:47structure,
- 43:48>> [snorts]
- 43:48>> which is that when you have a campaign,
- 43:50you want your ad sets to be segmented
- 43:53out based on concept. And the reason
- 43:55being is that the targeting exists at
- 43:57the ad set level. And so if you go and
- 44:00put in, as I said before, a bunch of
- 44:02different ads that are a bunch of
- 44:03different concepts resonating with
- 44:05different people, well then the ad set
- 44:07that's trying to figure out who to
- 44:09target is going to get confused. It's
- 44:11going to go, "Wait a second, this is
- 44:12resonating with men, old men, this is
- 44:14resonating with young women. Like, why
- 44:15are there all these different angles in
- 44:17here? Who do we actually target?" Now,
- 44:18yes, there is some siloing of target
- 44:21demographic targeting at an individual
- 44:22ad level, but a lot of it still sits at
- 44:24the ad set level. And so, you're going
- 44:25to get worse performance when you go and
- 44:27bundle all different concepts together.
- 44:28Not only that, because you can't trust
- 44:30the reliability of ROAS at an ad level
- 44:33very well, when you go and put all these
- 44:34together and you don't hit KPI, you do
- 44:36hit KPI, let's say you maybe you got a
- 44:383x ROAS here, well, then you're going to
- 44:40look at these ads
- 44:42and not actually understand what concept
- 44:44worked because there's three concepts
- 44:46here. So, what is the learning from this
- 44:47ad set? Well, if it was all under one
- 44:49concept, one persona, one angle, one
- 44:50offer, we could go, "This concept works
- 44:53really well. Let's go and make more like
- 44:54this. Let's double down in this
- 44:56direction. Let's not over leverage.
- 44:57Let's think about portfolio management,
- 44:59but we should definitely put a little
- 45:00bit more resourcing here cuz there's a
- 45:02squeeze available." If instead you have
- 45:04three different concepts in here and
- 45:05it's hitting KPI, what what's the
- 45:06conclusion? Is Is all the concepts
- 45:08working, but this one doesn't have a
- 45:09good ROAS? So, we know that ROAS at the
- 45:11ad level isn't reliable. So, like, what
- 45:12is it How do we draw conclusions out of
- 45:14a campaign structure with mixed-up
- 45:16concepts at the ad set level? You can't.
- 45:17It's very difficult to do. You just got
- 45:19to hope your ads are good and that you
- 45:20get a good return. But, if you want to
- 45:21actually have any kind of learning
- 45:23feedback loop, you want to be
- 45:24structuring
- 45:26the account based on concepts. All
- 45:28right, so here's a full buildout that
- 45:30I've just put together of a persona,
- 45:31angle, and offer that I think would
- 45:33actually crush. The formats we can add
- 45:36as we go along here. So, and you're
- 45:38going to have to excuse my writing.
- 45:41Persona: casual runner training for a
- 45:43sub 4-hour marathon. It's a male.
- 45:46They're a gym-goer. So, they're not just
- 45:47a runner, but they've gone to the gym.
- 45:49They follow XYZ influencers. So, there's
- 45:52particular influencers that we've called
- 45:53out and we know that they're probably
- 45:55following them in some capacity. And
- 45:56they make about 70k a year per annum.
- 45:59This is important in terms of framing
- 46:01value around what we're actually going
- 46:03to try to sell to them. So, where do
- 46:04they actually sit in terms of income
- 46:06level? In terms of the angle, we're
- 46:08going to come in with science backing
- 46:10because we know that this person
- 46:11probably follows someone like Andrew
- 46:13Huberman, so we can come in with at
- 46:15least an angle around him. We're going
- 46:16to go through how creatine improves
- 46:18recovery, but it doesn't improve
- 46:20recovery in general cuz we want to talk
- 46:22to this persona. So, it improves
- 46:24recovery for the long run. Now, people
- 46:26are only going to be doing a long run if
- 46:28they're training for a marathon. That
- 46:29enables a 5-minute improvement on the
- 46:32marathon time. So, we're directly
- 46:34connecting the entire angle to the
- 46:36persona, and we're giving them an
- 46:37expected outcome. Then, the offer is
- 46:39relatively straightforward. Creatine
- 46:41gummies, buy two, get one free. Now,
- 46:43this offer was selected by myself just
- 46:45due to the income level here. So, we
- 46:47probably won't increased perceived value
- 46:49cuz creatine gummies are generally quite
- 46:50expensive, and it's going to be hard to
- 46:52push it onto someone and to reframe them
- 46:55against creatine for running. The actual
- 46:57format here, this is where we can chop
- 46:58and change this, and we can have like 10
- 47:00different ads, right? We could go into a
- 47:01VSL format. Probably not going to work
- 47:03as well on this age demographic, but it
- 47:07is a potential option. We could go into
- 47:08UGC, which I think is going to be great.
- 47:10We could go into founder talking head.
- 47:13We could go into a more educational
- 47:14high-fi style piece.
- 47:17You could also actually translate this
- 47:18into a carousel. Formats go on and on,
- 47:20but they're probably the starting ones
- 47:22that I'd go for. VSL, I might just leave
- 47:24out for now because the age is too low
- 47:26for a VSL to work on. And so, that is
- 47:28one concept. We're now we can come into
- 47:30here, and we can start changing one of
- 47:32these variables to be able to mix and
- 47:34match it to different target
- 47:35demographics. And so, the reality is is
- 47:37that this angle will also work for women
- 47:42that are training for a marathon. So, we
- 47:43can change over that persona, and we
- 47:44have now a whole different concept that
- 47:47we can start making an ads for. Now, we
- 47:48can tweak the angle a little bit, and
- 47:50rather than making it for long days, we
- 47:52could make it for people that are trying
- 47:54to get up to a 5K run. And if you're
- 47:56just started running and you're trying
- 47:58to get to a 5K run, creatine is a great
- 48:00way to build up initial improvements in
- 48:01recovery, and therefore we can now
- 48:03resonate with a different persona. So,
- 48:04you can start to mix and match this
- 48:06accordingly to reach way more people.
- 48:08Now, on hook strategy, everyone thinks
- 48:10that the hook of an ad is a trick to try
- 48:12to get someone to watch the video. But,
- 48:14the hook of an ad is a play towards
- 48:16relevancy. What you are doing is
- 48:18promising the user that what they're
- 48:19about to watch is relevant and
- 48:21contextual to them. And that distinction
- 48:23matters enormously because a lot of
- 48:26people think that they should just be
- 48:27baiting people into watching. They
- 48:28should be trying to hook them through
- 48:30some kind of meme at the start. And yes,
- 48:32that'll give you really high hook rates
- 48:33if that's what you want to optimize for,
- 48:35but it's not actually going to give you
- 48:36conversions. Now, there's actually three
- 48:38different layers to the hook. You have
- 48:40the visual. This is what's actually on
- 48:42the screen.
- 48:43You then have audio.
- 48:45This is obviously the underlying audio.
- 48:46And then you actually have the copy that
- 48:49overlays the visual. This could also be
- 48:51the primary text that sits above the ad.
- 48:53Now, the reason why I'm even putting
- 48:54this as a section in the video is
- 48:56because the hook is so important in
- 48:59video assets because 80% of people never
- 49:02watch past the hook. And so, if you're
- 49:03going and serving ads into the
- 49:05marketplace and 80% of people never even
- 49:08watch your ad cuz they don't like the
- 49:09hook, so they just skip straight past
- 49:11it, well, it's pretty critical then for
- 49:13us to try to optimize the hook, okay? If
- 49:14most people are never going to see past
- 49:16this point in the video, then let's make
- 49:18sure this video is relevant, providing
- 49:19value in some capacity. You're trying to
- 49:21pull people through the video that are
- 49:22relevant and need to watch. An example
- 49:24of this in terms of resource allocation
- 49:26is that you can spend an hour going and
- 49:28making two hooks and then five different
- 49:31bodies for this ad, or you can go and
- 49:33spend the same amount of time, but just
- 49:35make two bodies and then 15 hooks, and
- 49:39you will probably always get better
- 49:40performance here given that the actual
- 49:42scripting is good on the bodies. And the
- 49:44reason being is that the delta available
- 49:46in performance increase is normally
- 49:48higher in the hook than it is in the
- 49:49body. Once again, assuming scripting's
- 49:51good. If you're not good at scripting,
- 49:53well then like one of these bodies might
- 49:54actually be a good script and then it
- 49:56will hit and you'll get a
- 49:56misrepresentation of the actual impact
- 49:58here of the different components of the
- 50:00ad. Now, in terms of rating whether a
- 50:02hook is good, cuz I do this a lot. I do
- 50:04a lot of reaction videos on Instagram
- 50:05saying this is a bad hook, this is a
- 50:07good hook. And I'm rating how well
- 50:09people have done in putting a hook
- 50:11together. Well, there is actually a
- 50:13grading system that you can think
- 50:14through as to how good your hook
- 50:16actually is. Number one is clarity. Can
- 50:19a stranger understand what you are
- 50:21actually talking about within the first
- 50:233 seconds or are you just trying to
- 50:25confuse them as a way to hook them in?
- 50:26Number two is relevance. Now, people
- 50:28mistake this for a persona call out.
- 50:30They mistake this for me taking the
- 50:32persona that I was talking about before
- 50:34and just calling them out at the start.
- 50:36Hey, if you're a mom that has kids and
- 50:38you're age 30 to 35 and you have this
- 50:40problem, well listen up. Persona call
- 50:41outs are super overrated and it's
- 50:43because no one wants to hear themselves
- 50:45called out. People want to hear the
- 50:47problem that they're actually dealing
- 50:49with and so you'll always see much
- 50:50better performance agitating on a
- 50:52problem than you will on any kind of
- 50:55persona call out. And I have this from
- 50:56personal experience. Anytime I get an ad
- 50:58saying agency owners who need XYZ,
- 51:01listen up. I never watch the ad. I move
- 51:03on. But if they agitate on a specific
- 51:05problem, it feels much more genuine. I
- 51:07actually wants to I actually want to
- 51:08watch through and find out what the
- 51:09solution is to the problem that I am
- 51:11actually currently facing. So, you want
- 51:13it to be relevant but persona call outs
- 51:15are nowhere near as effective as just
- 51:18making the problem agitation relevant to
- 51:19the person. We then have novelty. This
- 51:21isn't a requirement but this is a really
- 51:23good way to create white space within
- 51:26the ad that you're making. And so this
- 51:28concept of white space is also this
- 51:30concept of purple ocean theory, which is
- 51:32that you have a blue ocean over here.
- 51:35You then have a red ocean over here.
- 51:37Now, this is actually one of my favorite
- 51:38books that I've ever read. I actually
- 51:39reference it in a lot of content, blue
- 51:41ocean theory. This is that you want to
- 51:42reposition your product into a market
- 51:45that differentiates you from everyone
- 51:46else so that you're not competing on
- 51:48pricing, you're not even getting
- 51:49compared, and you're seen as a
- 51:50completely novel product or service
- 51:52within the market. Red ocean means that
- 51:53you're selling the same stuff as
- 51:55everyone else, and then you're just
- 51:56getting priced down to zero. These are
- 51:57terrible businesses. These are
- 51:58incredible businesses. The issue with
- 52:00blue oceans is they don't really exist
- 52:03because if you're going truly blue,
- 52:04you're selling something that's never
- 52:05been sold before, and that's kind of
- 52:08risky cuz there's no actual market
- 52:10knowledge. You need to do tons of
- 52:11education, and there's no proven product
- 52:13market fit, either. So, yeah, you could
- 52:15reposition into something that you think
- 52:16people might want, but they might not
- 52:17even want it. And so, you realistically
- 52:19want to sit like somewhere in the middle
- 52:21here where you're repositioning into
- 52:22something novel, but it still has proven
- 52:25product market fit. It's still proven
- 52:26that it is going to work. It's just not
- 52:28what everyone else is doing. It's
- 52:29slightly adjacent. And so, we do this a
- 52:31lot in our own content in terms of
- 52:33format testing. So, we'll rotate in
- 52:34different formats cuz we want to test
- 52:36new things. We'll take ideas from other
- 52:37industries, from other people. We'll
- 52:39come up with our own ideas to try to cut
- 52:41through and have novelty that people
- 52:43haven't seen before. I would say this
- 52:44YouTube video is actually an example of
- 52:46that, which is that there isn't many
- 52:47creative courses on YouTube for meta ads
- 52:50that are 2 plus hours long. So, you want
- 52:51to be thinking through that concept,
- 52:53too, in the hook. Now, once again, it's
- 52:54not a requirement, but it will help in
- 52:57standing out without having some kind of
- 52:59gimmicky tactic to hold people through
- 53:01the ad that's not actually unique. The
- 53:03question I would be asking yourself here
- 53:05is has this hook been done a million
- 53:08times? And if the hook's been done a
- 53:09million times, probably don't do it. The
- 53:11next is specificity. So, is there a way,
- 53:13and you're not going to be able to do
- 53:14this in a lot of hooks, but in our
- 53:15specific hook, is there a way we can use
- 53:18numbers, maybe quantify names, or maybe
- 53:21even quantify outcomes right out of the
- 53:23gates
- 53:24that's going to build authority into the
- 53:27hook. Anytime you can start a hook by
- 53:29name-dropping someone that's super
- 53:31famous that's relevant to the product in
- 53:32some capacity, it always does better. If
- 53:34you can name-drop some kind of number,
- 53:3667% of people got this result, then once
- 53:39again, it's going to build authority. If
- 53:41you can speak straight to a specific
- 53:42outcomes, it's going to build authority
- 53:44and it's going to be more specific to
- 53:45your target demographic that you want to
- 53:46resonate with. And then lastly, we have
- 53:48credibility, which is fairly obvious.
- 53:49Now, with credibility, you're usually
- 53:51not going to be able to do this through
- 53:52the copy or through the audio. It's
- 53:54typically going to have to be done
- 53:56through the visual. And so you were
- 53:57going to need either like someone famous
- 53:59that pops up at the start, you're going
- 54:01to need someone that is uh contextually
- 54:03relevant. So if you're selling
- 54:05supplements, you have a doctor who pops
- 54:06up. If you're selling running
- 54:08supplements, it's obviously like a
- 54:10runner that pops up. You want to be
- 54:11thinking about how you can build
- 54:12credibility. Now, you don't need 10 out
- 54:13of 10 scores on all of these to be able
- 54:15to have a good hook. You really only
- 54:16need a couple of them done well. This is
- 54:18how you should be thinking through hook
- 54:19creation. Now, let me give you a bunch
- 54:21of hooks that you can go and start
- 54:23using. Number one is problem agitation.
- 54:25Do you want to lead with the pain that
- 54:27the viewer is already feeling and you
- 54:29want to make them feel seen. An example
- 54:31of this is "Are you struggling with back
- 54:33pain from desk work?" This will only
- 54:36resonate with problem aware audiences.
- 54:38So you can get really good performance,
- 54:39but it isn't going to be scalable above
- 54:41that stage of awareness. Number two is a
- 54:43contrarian truth. So you challenge a
- 54:44common assumption, you create cognitive
- 54:47friction that demands a resolution. An
- 54:49example here is everything you've been
- 54:50told about protein timing is wrong. And
- 54:52this works across all levels of
- 54:54awareness and it works strong in organic
- 54:56and paid. Number three is specific
- 54:57proof. So you want to lead with a
- 54:59measurable outcome, numbers, time
- 55:00frames, specificity. An example of this
- 55:03is "I lost 12 kilos in 90 days without
- 55:06giving up pasta." So you build
- 55:07credibility throughout the hook. The
- 55:09next one is a curiosity gap. We spoke
- 55:12about this before, which is that you
- 55:14create an information gap that can only
- 55:15be closed by watching. An example is
- 55:18"What the top 1% of brands know about
- 55:19meta ads that you don't." And a funny
- 55:21side note is that my average view time
- 55:23when I use that hook or some variation
- 55:25of that hook is over 45 seconds. And so
- 55:28that hook actually works incredibly well
- 55:29because it creates an information gap in
- 55:31my own organic content. Truth bomb,
- 55:33there's actually one specific client
- 55:34where this is just unbelievably well
- 55:36for. So that's why I threw it in here
- 55:38cuz I don't see many people doing it,
- 55:39which is that you lead with an
- 55:40uncomfortable truth about the product's
- 55:42price, ingredients, or industry. The
- 55:43honesty itself becomes the hook. And so,
- 55:46the hook in this instance is something
- 55:47along the lines of, "This product costs
- 55:49$120. Yeah, it's super expensive, but
- 55:53it's our best seller and everyone buys
- 55:54it. Here's why." It ends up working
- 55:56exceptionally well for premium or higher
- 55:58average order value products where the
- 56:00price ends up being the main objection
- 56:02that people have. So, you confront it
- 56:04way up front, and it actually works
- 56:06really well at cutting through on cold
- 56:07audiences. Cuz even if I've never seen
- 56:08the product before, if someone's opening
- 56:10with, "This thing is expensive." I'm
- 56:12like, "Okay, what is that thing? Teach
- 56:13me more." And then it can go into a very
- 56:15very educational piece. Obviously,
- 56:17that's only going to be relevant to very
- 56:19specific industries. The next is
- 56:22psychological confrontation. And so,
- 56:24this is being direct and pattern
- 56:25interrupting with a statement that feels
- 56:27like a friend calling you out. An
- 56:29example here would be, "You know that
- 56:31drawer full of products you never use?
- 56:33That's the problem." Or, "Stop buying
- 56:35things that make you feel guilty for not
- 56:36using them." It's not clickbait, but
- 56:38it's playing on an emotional pain point.
- 56:40And so, the viewer ends up feeling
- 56:42personally addressed, which ends up
- 56:43acting as a scroll stopper. Once again,
- 56:45all of these things also apply into
- 56:47organic, which is where I think getting
- 56:48good at organic content is actually a
- 56:50very critical skill for getting good at
- 56:52creative strategy because it just
- 56:53translates into paid. We'll keep going
- 56:55here, which is you can also do sensory
- 56:59I'm going to call this a texture hook as
- 57:00well. This does unbelievably well in
- 57:02fashion right now. This is just an ASMR
- 57:04hook. So, you don't need any words, 2 to
- 57:063 seconds, close-up of the fabric being
- 57:08handled, a product being squeezed,
- 57:10liquid being poured, package being
- 57:12opened, something ASMR related. These do
- 57:14incredibly well. Uh we have a lot of ads
- 57:16right now that are high performers on
- 57:18this hook. You've then got a founder's
- 57:20letter. You can go and apply all of
- 57:21these into most brands. So, you want to
- 57:23open with the founder and their origin
- 57:25story. So, we started this because {dot}
- 57:27{dot} {dot} Or, "Here is why I left my
- 57:29career to go and build this." The more
- 57:31risk you can build within the hook as
- 57:33well, the better. And so, you want to
- 57:34build tension. And this is once again a
- 57:36big organic strategy that you just want
- 57:38to translate into paid, which is that
- 57:40you want to have high stakes within the
- 57:42hook if you're going to have a founder's
- 57:43letter style hook, so that people have a
- 57:45reason to continue watching. I
- 57:47remortgaged my house and put $300,000
- 57:50down to be able to order my first order
- 57:53of this product. And here's what's
- 57:54happened since. Like that hook, I could
- 57:57almost guarantee it would do well. Now,
- 57:58obviously, that has to be a real
- 58:00circumstance, which is why that hook
- 58:01does well. Right? It's things that you
- 58:03can't fake. If you actually did put so
- 58:06much risk on the line, it's a great
- 58:08angle to be able to talk about that
- 58:09risk. The last one here is social proof.
- 58:13So, you want to lead with some kind of
- 58:14credibility marker. 90% of customers saw
- 58:16results in 30 days. Now, this is nine
- 58:18different hook types that you can go and
- 58:20take. You can probably apply at least
- 58:21seven of these into your particular
- 58:23brand right now. There are infinite hook
- 58:25strategies. Right? I could write hooks
- 58:26here all day long. I could fill the
- 58:28whole board with 50 different hook
- 58:29types. You can go to Claude or ChatGPT
- 58:31right now and say, "Give me all the
- 58:32different hook types that I can run."
- 58:33The idea is that you want to take hook
- 58:36strategies and you want to translate it
- 58:37into your brand, but the scripting is
- 58:39going to be critical. And where you're
- 58:40going to really see uh a standout from
- 58:43competitors is over here in this novelty
- 58:45piece on whitespace. So, you can become
- 58:47an eight-figure brand by using these
- 58:49hook strategies and having relatively
- 58:50good scores over here, but if you want
- 58:53an ad that's going to hold half a
- 58:54million dollars in spend, you do
- 58:55probably want to generate something
- 58:57novel at the beginning of the creative
- 58:59that's going to stand out from
- 59:00competitors. And then what's going to
- 59:01happen is all your competitors are just
- 59:02going to go and copy it. And so, you
- 59:04will set the trend. Now, I've spoken
- 59:05about the hook a lot, but an an
- 59:07important subcomponent of the hook is
- 59:09the bridge, which is where you move
- 59:11between specific components within the
- 59:12video. Now, the two big bridges that
- 59:14often occur is when you go from hook to
- 59:17body, and then when you go from body to
- 59:19CTA. These two bridges often don't end
- 59:22up being done well. And so, what ends up
- 59:24happening is if you think about product
- 59:26awareness on the Y axis and then you
- 59:28think about time going through the video
- 59:30asset on the X axis, what ends up
- 59:32happening is people hook you in and
- 59:34you'll become aware that it's an ad and
- 59:36then suddenly as you bridge to the body,
- 59:38some people will just instantly
- 59:39introduce the product. So they'll hook
- 59:41you with something like, are you trying
- 59:43to train for a marathon and you want
- 59:44better recovery? Well, creatine from
- 59:47Blue Zones Digital is your solution.
- 59:49That ad won't do well. Hook was good,
- 59:52bridge ruined the whole thing. The whole
- 59:54body could be good. Like the body
- 59:55scripting could be perfect, hook
- 59:56scripting could be perfect, call to
- 59:58action could be great, but the bridge
- 1:00:00ruins the whole asset. And so you don't
- 1:00:03want your asset to look like this where
- 1:00:05there's this massive step change in
- 1:00:07product awareness as a user goes through
- 1:00:09the creative. Instead, you want to blend
- 1:00:11these out so that people are slowly
- 1:00:13becoming aware that they're being sold
- 1:00:15to. And so instead, you're looking like
- 1:00:17this. And so I don't really even need to
- 1:00:19give you that much information on how to
- 1:00:20do this. To me, it's pretty intuitive
- 1:00:23which is just blend in the introduction
- 1:00:25of the product. Don't just suddenly
- 1:00:27introduce it or else people go quickly
- 1:00:29from oh, I was watching something that
- 1:00:30was educational or that was teaching me
- 1:00:32to oh, I'm actually being sold a
- 1:00:33product. And people don't intuitively
- 1:00:35like that feeling. This also, this jump
- 1:00:37in bridge will typically ruin the flow
- 1:00:40of scripting in most very good top of
- 1:00:42funnel unaware ads. And so when it comes
- 1:00:45to really good top of funnel unaware
- 1:00:47ads, what they do is they move people
- 1:00:49through the stages of awareness as you
- 1:00:51progress through the ad. This is
- 1:00:52actually something that VSLs, video
- 1:00:54sales letter ads do unbelievably well
- 1:00:57because they get the capacity to teach
- 1:00:59through the asset. And so you start with
- 1:01:01unaware. So you're hooking people in
- 1:01:03with something that they might be
- 1:01:04interested in, usually some kind of
- 1:01:06curiosity gap. Then you're making them
- 1:01:07problem aware. Okay, now I understand
- 1:01:09that there's a problem with drinking
- 1:01:11water. If I just drink water every day,
- 1:01:13not only does it not have electrolytes
- 1:01:15which apparently I need, I didn't even
- 1:01:17realize this was a problem, but also tap
- 1:01:19water's incredibly bad for me. Okay,
- 1:01:20that's interesting. What's the solution?
- 1:01:22Oh, the solution is is that I need this
- 1:01:23amount of salt in this kind of ratio and
- 1:01:25then I need to stop using tap water.
- 1:01:27Okay. Ah, there's actually a product
- 1:01:30that solves this problem. It's canned
- 1:01:32mineral water with electrolytes in it.
- 1:01:34Ah, okay. I was unaware of anything. I
- 1:01:36became problem aware. I became solution
- 1:01:38aware. I'm now product aware. Okay, this
- 1:01:40is going to fix all of these problems
- 1:01:41that I didn't realize I had and now I
- 1:01:43move down into the aware stage of
- 1:01:45awareness where maybe I convert on a
- 1:01:46retargeting ad. Now, this is generally
- 1:01:48how you want to be thinking through
- 1:01:49scripting on really good top of funnel
- 1:01:50ads, but what most people do is that
- 1:01:52they'll start really unaware. They'll
- 1:01:54then go problem aware and then like in
- 1:01:56here they'll just introduce the product.
- 1:01:58And you're like, "What are we doing? We
- 1:01:59haven't even moved them to the next
- 1:02:00stage of awareness. We can't introduce
- 1:02:02the product yet." And people do this cuz
- 1:02:04they think in retention curves. And so
- 1:02:06they go, "Well, if we look at the
- 1:02:07retention curve on an ad, which is how
- 1:02:09many people are still watching on
- 1:02:10average as we move through a creative,
- 1:02:12the retention curve will look like
- 1:02:13this." And so intuitively you go, "Well,
- 1:02:1680% of people are going to drop off by
- 1:02:19the 90-second mark. So we need to
- 1:02:20introduce our product before the
- 1:02:2290-second mark cuz we don't want most of
- 1:02:25the users to not know they're being sold
- 1:02:26our product. It's the wrong way to think
- 1:02:28through it. Okay, you actually want to
- 1:02:30introduce your product as late as
- 1:02:31possible in the creative because you
- 1:02:33want people to be problem aware and
- 1:02:34solution aware and really pre-framed and
- 1:02:37engaged, ready to buy once the product
- 1:02:39is actually introduced. You don't want
- 1:02:41to introduce the product too early
- 1:02:42before they're actually aware of what
- 1:02:44the problem and solution is. And so you
- 1:02:46often end up getting way better
- 1:02:47conversion rates out of an asset by
- 1:02:49moving the product introduction and call
- 1:02:51to action way later because these people
- 1:02:54are now way more qualified to actually
- 1:02:56buy and are way more higher intent. And
- 1:02:58so yes, you can introduce it sooner, but
- 1:03:00they're not high intent enough that you
- 1:03:02will actually have worse conversion
- 1:03:03rates and even though it's more total
- 1:03:05people, you will ultimately get worse
- 1:03:07total purchase volume out of the asset.
- 1:03:09And so that is something to be really
- 1:03:11careful of when you're thinking about
- 1:03:12bridging. Now, to wrap this section up,
- 1:03:14one final question that I get a lot is
- 1:03:17does hook testing still work post
- 1:03:19Andromeda? Because isn't the whole point
- 1:03:21in Andromeda that we need diversity? And
- 1:03:23if I have a 90-second Facebook ad, me
- 1:03:27just changing the first 3 seconds at the
- 1:03:29start, that's not diversity.
- 1:03:31Right? That's the same ad. We just
- 1:03:33changed the first 3 seconds.
- 1:03:35Meta will still recognize a different
- 1:03:37hook as a different creative. It will
- 1:03:39get its own creative ID. It will not get
- 1:03:42pulled together with this asset. It will
- 1:03:44go and reach a novel unique audience.
- 1:03:46Now, obviously, there is going to be
- 1:03:48some degree of overlap because 87
- 1:03:50seconds of this asset is going to be
- 1:03:52talking to the same person with the same
- 1:03:54problem with the same offer. So, if we
- 1:03:56actually look at the concept framework,
- 1:03:58it is the same concept. It's just the
- 1:04:00hook chain. So, the question becomes is
- 1:04:01hook changes worth it? Yes. Why is it
- 1:04:04worth it? Because it is so low effort.
- 1:04:06Rotating in new hooks is almost free.
- 1:04:09Okay, when you record the ad, you just
- 1:04:11record the hooks six times and it takes
- 1:04:13an extra few minutes and you've got six
- 1:04:15different hook variations. Or you can
- 1:04:17take existing high performers and you
- 1:04:18throw new hooks on them. We have had ads
- 1:04:20that have spent 50 100 thousand dollars
- 1:04:22fatigued, then we just rotate 50 new
- 1:04:25hooks on and we get another 100 thousand
- 1:04:27dollars to spend at the same efficiency.
- 1:04:29And those hooks took like 1 hour to
- 1:04:32shoot. And so, you can very much so keep
- 1:04:34winners alive through changing hooks.
- 1:04:36You can also take ads that didn't work
- 1:04:38and then suddenly make them work by
- 1:04:40fixing the hook that had a really bad
- 1:04:42hook rate. So, yes, absolutely hook
- 1:04:44testing still works post Andromeda. You
- 1:04:46should be doing it. It is still the
- 1:04:47highest leverage point in videos,
- 1:04:50organic, ads, YouTube, everything. All
- 1:04:52right. So, when it comes to formats,
- 1:04:54there's five questions that you need to
- 1:04:55be asking yourself when you're thinking
- 1:04:57on a format. Number one, what is the
- 1:04:58concept? We need to define the concept
- 1:05:00first before we even think about
- 1:05:01formats. You want to go out, build your
- 1:05:03persona angle offer, then come back to
- 1:05:05thinking about the format. You don't
- 1:05:07start with the format and work
- 1:05:08backwards. This is the last step.
- 1:05:10Secondly, does this concept require
- 1:05:12education? Now, if it requires
- 1:05:14education, you likely need to go into
- 1:05:15some longer form asset that's going to
- 1:05:18educate. Number three, can the value
- 1:05:20prop be communicated in a single frame?
- 1:05:22This is obviously going to lean yourself
- 1:05:24towards images, carousels, something
- 1:05:26that's easier to produce. Can obviously
- 1:05:28still be in a video, but you do have an
- 1:05:30advantage with images that they're very
- 1:05:32easy and cheap to produce and you can
- 1:05:33produce a lot of them. So, anytime you
- 1:05:35can produce statics over videos, you
- 1:05:38generally want to do it. Now, there's
- 1:05:39two different approaches to statics, if
- 1:05:41we just leave these out for the moment,
- 1:05:42which is number one, you can use statics
- 1:05:44to quickly test different angles and
- 1:05:46different concepts, get fast feedback,
- 1:05:48and then develop that into a video
- 1:05:50format where you can go a lot deeper and
- 1:05:52create a more scalable asset. And then
- 1:05:54number two is that images are very cheap
- 1:05:57to make and so they often end up
- 1:05:59outweighing videos in the cost of
- 1:06:01production. So, if you look at the
- 1:06:02average spend of an image versus a video
- 1:06:04in your account, it might actually make
- 1:06:05a lot of sense to just go way harder on
- 1:06:07images because the cost of production is
- 1:06:08super low and the average revenue
- 1:06:10generation is decent in proportion. And
- 1:06:12so, this is what is called cost of
- 1:06:14production against the average revenue
- 1:06:18per ad. This is something that we
- 1:06:19calculate for everyone during the audit
- 1:06:21process because we want to understand
- 1:06:23what is the average revenue per ad that
- 1:06:25you put into the account. For most
- 1:06:27people, it's about like $2,000-ish.
- 1:06:29And then what is your cost of production
- 1:06:31against this delineated down to
- 1:06:33contribution margin. And so, we minus
- 1:06:36off gross profit, we minus off the cost
- 1:06:38of serving the ad, we might find that
- 1:06:40average contribution margin per ad unit
- 1:06:42is, let's say, $350.
- 1:06:45How much is it costing us to make an ad?
- 1:06:46It might be costing us $400. Okay, this
- 1:06:49equation doesn't work. We're currently
- 1:06:50paying more to produce an ad than we're
- 1:06:52getting contribution margin out of each
- 1:06:54ad. We can then go and delineate this
- 1:06:56down to images specifically. We might
- 1:06:58find out images cost us about $50, but
- 1:07:01they're producing us $300.
- 1:07:04Videos are costing us 500 and we're only
- 1:07:07getting 400 here. And so we actually
- 1:07:09find out even though videos do perform
- 1:07:10better, the actual cost of production
- 1:07:13versus expected contribution margin is
- 1:07:14worse than image assets and therefore we
- 1:07:16should actually just double down on
- 1:07:18images. And I know people doing
- 1:07:20$200,000 a day in revenue on just AI
- 1:07:23images. And so there's absolutely no
- 1:07:25reason as to why you can't do hundreds
- 1:07:26of thousands of dollars a day on images
- 1:07:29only. And if you can't, it just ends up
- 1:07:30being a skill issue. Number four is does
- 1:07:32the product need a demo? This is just
- 1:07:34going to be a general question that
- 1:07:35applies to the business as a whole,
- 1:07:37which is how much education do we need
- 1:07:39to force people through because
- 1:07:41obviously you're going to be relatively
- 1:07:42restricted with images then unless you
- 1:07:44get really fancy and you you have a good
- 1:07:46designer. And then lastly, which ties
- 1:07:47into both of these points, is what stage
- 1:07:49of awareness are we sitting in? Okay, if
- 1:07:51we're sitting in a very high stage of
- 1:07:53awareness, we need a creative that is
- 1:07:55going to be a longer format that can
- 1:07:56educate, typically a video. If we are
- 1:07:58sitting at a very low stage of
- 1:08:00awareness, like the product aware or
- 1:08:02aware stages, uh we can just go for DPAs
- 1:08:05and images and get away with very bottom
- 1:08:07of funnel ads. I want to reiterate that
- 1:08:08the belief that image ads are bottom of
- 1:08:11funnel and video ads are top of funnel
- 1:08:13is fundamentally a skill issue. Once
- 1:08:15again, I have seen multiple ad accounts,
- 1:08:17I've talked to multiple people that do
- 1:08:19hundreds of thousands of dollars per day
- 1:08:21in revenue off just that. And so if
- 1:08:24you're saying, "Oh, statics don't work,
- 1:08:25they're bottom of funnel assets." It's
- 1:08:27because yeah, the way that you design
- 1:08:28them and the way that you approach them
- 1:08:29and concept them out is bottom of
- 1:08:31funnel. But you can make top of funnel
- 1:08:32statics. We're now going to cut out two
- 1:08:35three ad breakdowns that I have done on
- 1:08:38static images. We're going to go through
- 1:08:39an organic tweet format, which is an
- 1:08:41IM-8 health ad. We're going to go
- 1:08:43through a creatine gummies ad. And then
- 1:08:45we're going to go through a GLP-1 hair
- 1:08:47loss ad and you will see three statics
- 1:08:49that are holding tons of spend on top of
- 1:08:51funnel. This is an incredible static ad.
- 1:08:534.7 thousand likes down here. It's by
- 1:08:56IM-8 and let's break down exactly why
- 1:08:58it's so good. Number one, it's a new
- 1:08:59format. They're actually using a tweet
- 1:09:01here and they're re-posting it, so it
- 1:09:03feels organic to the platform, but it's
- 1:09:06actually an ad. Now, further to this,
- 1:09:07they're reinforcing it by using not a
- 1:09:10partnership ad, so they're not
- 1:09:11collaborating with IMA and Dr. James,
- 1:09:14but it's just Dr. James. So, they're
- 1:09:16running it as effectively a whitelisting
- 1:09:18ad through this profile, so you don't
- 1:09:20know that this is an ad. In fact, you
- 1:09:22would look at this for a very long time,
- 1:09:23and it's only until you start getting
- 1:09:25through the copy that sits under the
- 1:09:27creative over here, that you actually
- 1:09:29realize that you're getting sold
- 1:09:30something. So, what's so good about the
- 1:09:31static over here, other than it being a
- 1:09:32common format and that you're not really
- 1:09:34knowing that it's an ad, so it feels
- 1:09:35organic? Well, symptoms of vitamin
- 1:09:37deficiencies. So, right away, we're
- 1:09:38problem agitating into okay, here's some
- 1:09:42education around how vitamin
- 1:09:43deficiencies could be impacting you.
- 1:09:45Then, this is an unbelievably wide set
- 1:09:49of symptoms. So, if you have dry eyes,
- 1:09:51if you have poor vision, if you have low
- 1:09:52energy, if you have bad skin, if you
- 1:09:54have cracks on your mouth, if you have
- 1:09:56fatigue, if you have bleeding gums, if
- 1:09:57you have painful muscles, if you have
- 1:09:59excessive bruising, all of these things,
- 1:10:02very, very wide total addressable
- 1:10:03market. Well, then, it's an issue with a
- 1:10:06vitamin deficiency, and it tells you
- 1:10:07exactly what the vitamin deficiency is.
- 1:10:09So, you get education around okay,
- 1:10:11here's my problem, here's the solution.
- 1:10:13Then, you start probably reading the
- 1:10:15copy, and you go, "The best multivitamin
- 1:10:17equals IMA, daily ultimate, 10% off.
- 1:10:20Here's the thing." Then, you get more
- 1:10:22educational pieces here about how the
- 1:10:24product actually works, and obviously,
- 1:10:25because this is an ad, a big call to
- 1:10:27action will appear at the bottom here
- 1:10:29that it will allow you to click straight
- 1:10:30off the site. So, it problem agitates to
- 1:10:32a very wide target demographic, it then
- 1:10:35educates about exactly what the solution
- 1:10:38is in terms of vitamin to solve your
- 1:10:39particular problem. It does it in a
- 1:10:41format that's super organic. It then
- 1:10:43maintains that organic feeling by not
- 1:10:45having the brand and company name
- 1:10:47attached with the post, and then this is
- 1:10:49obviously driving off to cold audiences,
- 1:10:51probably driving off to this guy's
- 1:10:52audience, which is even better up
- 1:10:54because we're obviously piggybacking off
- 1:10:56his organic. This is an advertorial
- 1:10:58static card. These are really good. They
- 1:11:00perform incredibly well. They only
- 1:11:02perform well though if you go to an
- 1:11:03education-based landing page or you use
- 1:11:05the primary text to educate heavily. So,
- 1:11:07let's break it down. The best hair
- 1:11:09growth products of 2025 and the ones to
- 1:11:11avoid. Here's what the big brands are
- 1:11:13not telling you. And then we have a
- 1:11:14bunch of different products here. So, we
- 1:11:16know or we at least assume, okay, this
- 1:11:18is some kind of blog. This is some kind
- 1:11:20of article that's going to educate us
- 1:11:21around what hair growth products we
- 1:11:23should actually be buying. Now, even
- 1:11:24better, it's running through a doctor's
- 1:11:26page. Okay, so there's a bit of
- 1:11:28authority here. As a dermatologist, I
- 1:11:30set out on a mission to find the most
- 1:11:31effective hair growth products. Not very
- 1:11:33long copy, so they're not selling us on
- 1:11:34anything here. Okay, so we want to find
- 1:11:36out more. So, what do we do? We go and
- 1:11:38we go and click learn more. Now, from
- 1:11:39here we end up on a website called
- 1:11:41dermatologist reviews. Now, this website
- 1:11:43is owned by the brand that's trying to
- 1:11:45sell you on something. This is a really
- 1:11:47good funnel. So, hi, who is the person?
- 1:11:50Why do they have authority? This is the
- 1:11:51blog posted. I set out on a mission and
- 1:11:54here are just the products. Right. And
- 1:11:55then it goes into all of the reasons as
- 1:11:58to why and it goes into selling that
- 1:11:59product. And then it does go into the
- 1:12:01other ones, but it goes into why yeah, I
- 1:12:03probably wouldn't choose these. They're
- 1:12:04not the best. Now, why is this a
- 1:12:06giveaway that this is actually a brand
- 1:12:08pushing? Well, because if we look at the
- 1:12:09rankings here, you can't click on any of
- 1:12:11these, right? But you can click on this
- 1:12:13one. And if you click on this one, goes
- 1:12:14to a custom landing page that then takes
- 1:12:16you through a quiz funnel. You go
- 1:12:18through a quiz funnel and then you get
- 1:12:19pushed through to the conversion. So,
- 1:12:21this is a really good funnel that
- 1:12:23they're running here. I really like it.
- 1:12:24And almost to make sure they're a little
- 1:12:25bit compliant, I imagine. As you scroll
- 1:12:28down, this takes you to the same funnel,
- 1:12:29but as we continue going down, look at
- 1:12:30all the green ticks here. So many green
- 1:12:32ticks, one red. Only available online.
- 1:12:34And then him and hers, oh, widely
- 1:12:37available online. Oh, that's the best
- 1:12:38thing about it. All of these negatives,
- 1:12:40but you can still click here and it
- 1:12:41takes you to an Amazon affiliate link.
- 1:12:44And so they're like, "If people are not
- 1:12:45clicking on us, then we may as well
- 1:12:46still redirect them somewhere." And then
- 1:12:48obviously you can see they've put the
- 1:12:50the into reviewing all of these and all
- 1:12:51the reasons as to why they wouldn't buy
- 1:12:53them. This is a super effective funnel.
- 1:12:54I imagine this is doing quite well for
- 1:12:56them. If your target demographic is 50
- 1:12:57plus, you can serve on Facebook feeds,
- 1:12:59this ad type crushes. It's static image
- 1:13:02ads with long-form copy. And the reason
- 1:13:03why they do so well is they go through a
- 1:13:05massive story that speaks to an unaware
- 1:13:08audience and slowly pulls them into
- 1:13:10being problem aware, pulls them into
- 1:13:12being solution aware, then pulls them
- 1:13:13into being product aware, and then
- 1:13:15finally, they're all the way at the
- 1:13:17stage in which they can convert. These
- 1:13:19ads will crush on cold audiences, but it
- 1:13:22takes an enormous amount of skill to
- 1:13:23actually be able to write this copy
- 1:13:25properly. Like, yes, you can be AI
- 1:13:26assisted, but if you don't know
- 1:13:28fundamentals of how to emotionally
- 1:13:29appeal to a specific target demographic,
- 1:13:31then it's not going to work. And this is
- 1:13:33ultimately where getting good at
- 1:13:34copywriting really matters. If you can
- 1:13:36get good at copywriting and you can get
- 1:13:37good at pulling people through the
- 1:13:39stages of customer awareness, then that
- 1:13:41is ultimately how you can create these
- 1:13:43static image ads with long-form copy
- 1:13:45that are going to absolutely crush. Now,
- 1:13:47in addition to that, to keep it
- 1:13:48contextual to 2026 in the time in which
- 1:13:50this video is being made, a type of
- 1:13:52video asset that does incredibly well
- 1:13:54right now on older target demographics
- 1:13:56is a VSL, a video sales letter. The
- 1:13:58reason why these types of ads do so well
- 1:14:00is because they pull people through all
- 1:14:02of the stages of awareness and they're
- 1:14:03highly educational. You can also really
- 1:14:05leverage AI within them. We make a lot
- 1:14:08of just AI VSLs end-to-end, and they do
- 1:14:11quite well. And then some of them do
- 1:14:12unbelievably well and hold hundreds of
- 1:14:14thousands of dollars in ad spend. So,
- 1:14:15what we're going to do now is I'm going
- 1:14:17to pop up a few examples of VSLs and me
- 1:14:19breaking them down so you can see an
- 1:14:21example of what this ad type looks like.
- 1:14:23>> IBS, leaky gut, or bloating, you're
- 1:14:26probably missing this one thing.
- 1:14:29>> That's a really good VSL. First off, it
- 1:14:31starts with a persona callout. If you
- 1:14:33have these issues, keep watching.
- 1:14:34>> Doctor probably told you to just manage
- 1:14:36it with a course of pills. That's
- 1:14:37because
- 1:14:38>> Then it's going into objection handling,
- 1:14:40the common way to fix it.
- 1:14:41>> They're treating the symptom, not the
- 1:14:43cause. But here
- 1:14:44>> Then it problem educates and opens a
- 1:14:46curiosity gap. Okay, I thought it was
- 1:14:48actually going to cause us to fix the
- 1:14:50problem, but this ad is saying it's not.
- 1:14:52All right, I'm going to keep watching.
- 1:14:53>> Here's what they're not telling you.
- 1:14:55Your gut isn't broken, it's starving.
- 1:14:57Your gut is an ego
- 1:14:58>> I don't love that because it's an AI
- 1:15:00script. So, that's called contrast
- 1:15:02negation, which is where you say it's
- 1:15:03not X, it's Y. You see a lot of this in
- 1:15:05a lot of scripting these days. I
- 1:15:06probably would take that out.
- 1:15:08>> an ecosystem of trillions of bacteria.
- 1:15:10When the good bacteria die and bad
- 1:15:12bacteria take over, everything
- 1:15:13collapses. When you get inflammation, a
- 1:15:16leaky gut, and your body stops absorbing
- 1:15:18nutrients. This
- 1:15:19>> Really good educational piece.
- 1:15:21>> is dysbiosis, and it's not rare. 40% of
- 1:15:24people have it. Most of them don't even
- 1:15:25know. You might be among them, but
- 1:15:27here's the problem with
- 1:15:29>> Really good way to enforce that no, you
- 1:15:31do have this problem because when you
- 1:15:33prescribe a problem to someone,
- 1:15:35particularly when it's like a disease or
- 1:15:37it's a physical medical issue, the
- 1:15:39immediate reaction is, well, I probably
- 1:15:41don't have this. I imagine this is rare.
- 1:15:43So, instantly increasing the TAM by
- 1:15:44knowing that 40% of people actually have
- 1:15:46this problem is a really good way to
- 1:15:47keep people watching to go, okay, maybe
- 1:15:49I do have the problem. Tell me a little
- 1:15:50bit more about it.
- 1:15:51>> with every gut supplement you've tried.
- 1:15:53They just throw probiotics at it. That's
- 1:15:55like sending a single soldier into a war
- 1:15:57zone. One probiotic can't survive in a
- 1:15:59toxic gut. It dies. It doesn't colonize.
- 1:16:02It doesn't help. I AM 8 daily ultimate
- 1:16:04essentials doesn't just add probiotics.
- 1:16:07First, digestive enzymes clear
- 1:16:09>> I don't love the bridge. If the ad
- 1:16:11team's watching this, I would extend for
- 1:16:13another 15 seconds and educate around
- 1:16:15how the I AM 8 ingredients actually fix
- 1:16:17the issue and then introduce I AM 8 as
- 1:16:20the solution that has those ingredients.
- 1:16:22>> and undigested food. Second, prebiotics
- 1:16:24create a safe environment for good
- 1:16:26bacteria. Third, 10 billion CFU of
- 1:16:28probiotics flood in and colonize.
- 1:16:31Fourth, postbiotics strengthen your gut
- 1:16:33lining and stop the leaks.
- 1:16:34>> So, the 10 to 15 seconds would be
- 1:16:36saying, uh the way that you get
- 1:16:38probiotics to work is that you have
- 1:16:39prebiotics and postbiotics around it,
- 1:16:41and that's actually what creates the
- 1:16:43system to work. Fortunately, Biome Aid
- 1:16:45has put all of those three solutions in
- 1:16:46one sachet, so you can get them all at
- 1:16:48once, and it can fix the issues that we
- 1:16:50agitated at the start.
- 1:16:51>> It's a complete military operation, not
- 1:16:53a single soldier.
- 1:16:54>> That's an AI script once again, contrast
- 1:16:56negation. I'll try to avoid that.
- 1:16:58>> And it works. In a 12-week clinical
- 1:17:00trial, 85% of
- 1:17:01>> And then it goes into social proofing,
- 1:17:03it keeps going on. Overall, really good
- 1:17:04ad. Just some small points of
- 1:17:05improvement.
- 1:17:06>> This ad has 25 million views. It's been
- 1:17:08running for 3 to 4 years now. It's
- 1:17:10absolutely crushing, and I'll show you
- 1:17:12what it does so well. It takes a really
- 1:17:14common format of VSLs, and then it adds
- 1:17:16objection handling UGC to the front. So,
- 1:17:19let's click play and start to watch the
- 1:17:20ad.
- 1:17:21>> I want to talk to you about something
- 1:17:22that's been making waves on social media
- 1:17:23lately. You've probably seen this guy
- 1:17:26all over your feed claiming that cutting
- 1:17:28carbs is
- 1:17:29>> So, they're using the split screen for
- 1:17:30engagement and to add more context to
- 1:17:32the video.
- 1:17:32>> necessary for weight loss. No need for
- 1:17:34long hours on the treadmill, either.
- 1:17:36Now, I know it sounds too good to be
- 1:17:37true, but let me tell you, there's more
- 1:17:39to this than meets the eye.
- 1:17:40>> I decided When you're watching this, you
- 1:17:41think that this guy is obviously going
- 1:17:43to disagree with the cutting carbs
- 1:17:45because he's coming from a news
- 1:17:46authority perspective, and it kind of
- 1:17:48feels like a collab video. Like, this
- 1:17:50guy is talking about how you don't need
- 1:17:51to eat carbs, it's crazy. Like, what is
- 1:17:53he talking about?
- 1:17:54>> I decided to delve into this topic and
- 1:17:55do some research. Turns out, this guy is
- 1:17:57a celebrity trainer who's gained a
- 1:17:58massive following for challenging
- 1:18:00mainstream advice. He claims that what
- 1:18:02we've been told about weight loss is
- 1:18:03wrong, completely wrong. And you know
- 1:18:05what? Makes a lot of sense when you
- 1:18:06listen to what he has to say. So,
- 1:18:09>> So, that's the first time in which he
- 1:18:10validates the person he's talking about,
- 1:18:12but everything through that first 28
- 1:18:14seconds was contrarian hooks, contrarian
- 1:18:16takes over and over again.
- 1:18:18>> Celebrities don't cut carbs.
- 1:18:20>> That ain't how you lose weight. I don't
- 1:18:22do that. None of my clients do that.
- 1:18:25Nobody that has ever asked me how to
- 1:18:26lose weight have I ever told them to do
- 1:18:28that because it simply just doesn't
- 1:18:30work. For anyone who doesn't know their
- 1:18:31metabolic type, listen up. The fastest
- 1:18:34way to burn fat and get shredded is not
- 1:18:36keto, it's not paleo, it's not
- 1:18:39carnivore, it's not vegan.
- 1:18:41>> Note that this creative is just going
- 1:18:44very, very hard on contrarian takes.
- 1:18:47It's pretty much the entire strategy of
- 1:18:48this whole ad is like, how do we put as
- 1:18:50many contrarian takes in here as
- 1:18:51possible to continue to string people
- 1:18:53along as we kind of educate and we kind
- 1:18:55of hint towards that we have our own
- 1:18:57system. And then eventually we obviously
- 1:18:59bridge into that system. So they're
- 1:19:00creating a curiosity gap through this
- 1:19:02whole thing. Okay, if no one needs to
- 1:19:04cut carbs, then what is the actual
- 1:19:06solution?
- 1:19:07>> And it's definitely not super intense
- 1:19:09exercises like this. Cuz listen, if
- 1:19:11you're trying to get in shape and I
- 1:19:13don't care what it's for, a wedding,
- 1:19:14vacation, summer, don't care. If you're
- 1:19:16trying to get in shape fast, you need to
- 1:19:18follow a plan for your body type. And
- 1:19:20there is a very simple breakdown of body
- 1:19:23types. There's three body types. Uh you
- 1:19:25have the skinny person who's trying to
- 1:19:27put on muscle. Then you have someone
- 1:19:28who's kind of in the middle, maybe has a
- 1:19:30little bit too much fat
- 1:19:31>> turns going to go into the educational
- 1:19:33piece. It's effectively going to sell
- 1:19:34his system in the way that he views
- 1:19:36weight loss and body types and
- 1:19:37programming, etc. This is such a good
- 1:19:40ad. In the last 5 days it's got 2,000
- 1:19:42likes. Let's break down exactly why.
- 1:19:45>> So you hop on chest is
- 1:19:46>> opens with a contrarian hook and
- 1:19:48obviously the visuals pull you in.
- 1:19:50>> What I would say if I was a caveman that
- 1:19:52wasn't aware of all the way
- 1:19:54>> builds contrast and then goes into an
- 1:19:55educational piece.
- 1:19:57>> is that you can boost it naturally.
- 1:19:58Being low T can be caused by many fac
- 1:20:00>> switches over to a different format,
- 1:20:02which is the faceless format, which is
- 1:20:04better in it to education, particularly
- 1:20:06on organic and we're trying to make this
- 1:20:08ad feel organic.
- 1:20:09>> High stress, vitamin deficiencies, not
- 1:20:11enough fat in your diet, not enough good
- 1:20:13sleep, microplastics, high estrogen,
- 1:20:15high inflammation. It's become a serious
- 1:20:17problem for young men who often feel
- 1:20:19like there's only one solution.
- 1:20:21>> Af
- 1:20:21>> So notice they'll problem agitate and
- 1:20:23then they'll educate. Problem agitate,
- 1:20:25then educate. So there's all the
- 1:20:26problems, here's the solution. This
- 1:20:28isn't the solution for you. Goes back
- 1:20:30into problems.
- 1:20:31>> After all, global testosterone levels
- 1:20:33have dropped over 30% in the last 50
- 1:20:35years. Young, fit, healthy
- 1:20:37>> So, there's the education, and then
- 1:20:39here's the problem agitation.
- 1:20:40>> guys will have the testosterone of a
- 1:20:4170-year-old that has never seen the
- 1:20:43inside of a gym in their life. It's a
- 1:20:45grim side effect of our modern society
- 1:20:47with low test taking away the feeling of
- 1:20:49being a real man. A consequence of this
- 1:20:51is a wave of young men, even teenagers,
- 1:20:54hopping on TRT out of desperation and
- 1:20:57because they don't want to fall behind.
- 1:20:58But, injecting test is a minefield of
- 1:21:00side effects. Rapid hair loss, high
- 1:21:02estrogen causing gyno, mood swings,
- 1:21:04>> objection handling around the core
- 1:21:06premise of the hook, which was injecting
- 1:21:08test, and so now he's explaining why
- 1:21:09that's not a good idea.
- 1:21:10>> There's infertility and acne, not to
- 1:21:12mention a big-ass needle injected
- 1:21:14multiple times a week. In amongst this
- 1:21:16chaos, how do I, a lifetime natural,
- 1:21:19have more testosterone than most guys
- 1:21:21running cycles? Whilst I'm dialed with
- 1:21:23my sleep, training, recovery, and diet,
- 1:21:25so many guys who are low T. However, my
- 1:21:27secret weapon is a Nattie Plus all of
- 1:21:30me.
- 1:21:30>> And there you go, there's the product.
- 1:21:31So, the product's been introduced after
- 1:21:32about a minute and a half into the
- 1:21:34creative, which is why it's done so
- 1:21:35well. It's why it's scaling so well.
- 1:21:37It's on an influencer profile. People
- 1:21:38know this influencer. It's likely
- 1:21:40prioritizing getting served to his own
- 1:21:41audience. And so, when people are
- 1:21:43watching this, they're not knowing it's
- 1:21:44an ad. They're thinking it's
- 1:21:45educational. And honestly, it's a great
- 1:21:47educational piece. It goes into
- 1:21:48everything you need to know about
- 1:21:49testosterone and why you would want to
- 1:21:51get behind and buy this product. And it
- 1:21:52does it in a way that's very
- 1:21:54entertaining. It's fast cuts. It's
- 1:21:55constantly changing formats. It's built
- 1:21:58native for the platform, which is why
- 1:22:00it's scaling so well.
- 1:22:01>> One important PSA here is DPAs, okay?
- 1:22:04DPAs, dynamic product ads, those are the
- 1:22:07carousel ads that will dynamically pull
- 1:22:09in the product that someone visited on
- 1:22:10the website, as long as your pixel is
- 1:22:12set up correctly, pushing back in data
- 1:22:14on which pages were viewed. DPAs cause a
- 1:22:17death spiral in a lot of brands. I see
- 1:22:19this in fashion particularly, uh which
- 1:22:21is that DPAs have really good attributed
- 1:22:23ROAS. The ROAS number is very high. Now,
- 1:22:26the ROAS actually isn't very high once
- 1:22:29you delineate out existing customers.
- 1:22:31So, if you remove existing customers, it
- 1:22:33drops precipitously. And then, you also
- 1:22:36want to delineate the attribution model
- 1:22:37down to incremental attribution. And so,
- 1:22:41you can do this by clicking on the
- 1:22:44breakdown button in the top Actually,
- 1:22:46sorry. You click on the columns button,
- 1:22:48compare attribution settings,
- 1:22:51incremental attribution, apply. And
- 1:22:53then, you'll get a split out of what the
- 1:22:55incremental ROAS is on the ad. A quick
- 1:22:57lesson on how incremental attribution
- 1:22:59works is that every single day, Meta is
- 1:23:01targeting, let's say, 10,000 people in
- 1:23:03this square. It will hold out 10% of
- 1:23:05users, and it will look at these people
- 1:23:07that didn't see your ads, how many of
- 1:23:08them converted. Let's say, 1% of them
- 1:23:10converted. Over here, the people that do
- 1:23:12see your ads, 2% of them convert. Okay,
- 1:23:15great. What we can do, what's called in
- 1:23:17data science, is a
- 1:23:18difference-in-difference calculation,
- 1:23:19which is simply minusing the control
- 1:23:21versus the treatment. This equals 1%.
- 1:23:24So, your ads are actually having a 1%
- 1:23:26impact, not a 2%. And so, when we see a
- 1:23:28five ROAS on that DPA, let's say as an
- 1:23:31example, we actually need to adjust that
- 1:23:33down by 50% to 2.5. So, that's what
- 1:23:35incremental attribution is doing. That's
- 1:23:37what it's going to show you on the ROAS
- 1:23:38here. And the ROAS in your DPAs is going
- 1:23:40to be way lower than you think it is,
- 1:23:42particularly on new audiences. I am
- 1:23:43still yet to see an ad account where
- 1:23:45this is a great scalable ad type on cold
- 1:23:47audiences. Now, is it an ad type that
- 1:23:49can work on cold audiences? For sure.
- 1:23:52Can you spend a thousand dollars a day
- 1:23:53on it?
- 1:23:54For sure. We have some ad accounts that
- 1:23:56do.
- 1:23:57Can you spend fifty thousand dollars a
- 1:23:58day on it? Absolutely not. Like, you
- 1:24:01just can't scale DPAs that well on cold
- 1:24:03audiences. Most people are way
- 1:24:04overspending cuz the ROAS number looks
- 1:24:06good. So, just be super careful. Cuz
- 1:24:07what ends up happening there is because
- 1:24:09DPAs sit at the bottom of the funnel
- 1:24:11down here, is that people start
- 1:24:12reallocating their budgets from these
- 1:24:14top-of-funnel efforts that have bad
- 1:24:17return on ad spend, and they just start
- 1:24:19moving budget down here. And when you
- 1:24:21start moving budget down here, you start
- 1:24:23losing the quantity of users that are
- 1:24:24coming through from the top of funnel,
- 1:24:26and you start scaling something that
- 1:24:27isn't scalable, and the whole funnel
- 1:24:29topples over, and return on ad spend
- 1:24:30declines, and everything goes poorly.
- 1:24:32So, in fact, when you're thinking about
- 1:24:33funnel budget allocation, you want to be
- 1:24:35thinking about 70% to 90% of budget
- 1:24:38going towards top of funnel. You want
- 1:24:4020% ish of budget going to middle of
- 1:24:43funnel, and then you want really like 5%
- 1:24:45to 10% of budget going to bottom of
- 1:24:46funnel. There's actually a better way to
- 1:24:48calculate bottom of funnel budgeting,
- 1:24:49which I'm going to show you later in the
- 1:24:50video. But, this is rough split on how
- 1:24:53it should look. Now, what's interesting
- 1:24:54these days is that you used to do this
- 1:24:56through campaign structure. So, you
- 1:24:57would have your top of funnel ads, and
- 1:24:59you would just set your budget here,
- 1:25:00you'd have your middle of funnel, you'd
- 1:25:01set your budget here, and then you'd
- 1:25:02have your bottom bottom of funnel. Uh
- 1:25:03the issue right now is there actually is
- 1:25:05a lack of campaign structure. You
- 1:25:06shouldn't be structuring like this. You
- 1:25:07should just consolidate these down, and
- 1:25:09you might be able to have a bottom of
- 1:25:10funnel that sits separate. And so,
- 1:25:11because of that, the actual budget
- 1:25:13allocation is coming from the creative
- 1:25:15production volume. And so, you want 70%
- 1:25:17to 90% of the volume of assets you make
- 1:25:20to be at the high stages of awareness,
- 1:25:22and you want 20% of them to be at the
- 1:25:24middle to bottom of funnel stages of
- 1:25:26awareness. So, this is more so a
- 1:25:28percentage allocation of creative
- 1:25:30production than it is a percentage
- 1:25:32allocation of budgets across a campaign
- 1:25:33structure. I would say one of the most
- 1:25:35underutilized
- 1:25:37formats in 2026 is partnership ads. Now,
- 1:25:39I think people are catching on to this
- 1:25:40actually, and the arbitrage is probably
- 1:25:42coming towards its end. So, by the time
- 1:25:43you watch this video, if you're way into
- 1:25:45the future, this might not be the case
- 1:25:46anymore. You might have missed it. But,
- 1:25:48partnership ads, what they are is they
- 1:25:49run through the creator's profile. So,
- 1:25:51you'll have your profile here, so your
- 1:25:53company name on the top of the post, and
- 1:25:55then you'll have and and then the
- 1:25:57influencer's profile right here. Now,
- 1:25:59these days there's actually a setting
- 1:26:00that allows them to change the
- 1:26:02combinations, and so sometimes you'll
- 1:26:03just see the company, sometimes you'll
- 1:26:04just see the influencer, sometimes
- 1:26:06you'll see both, and it will split test
- 1:26:07and decide on whatever the best mix is.
- 1:26:09Uh but, the reason why these ads do so
- 1:26:11well is that the targeting uses the
- 1:26:14audience on both handles. And so, if
- 1:26:16this is an influencer that's actually
- 1:26:18somewhat contextually relevant to your
- 1:26:19target demographic, which I hope it is,
- 1:26:21this ad will go and reach their
- 1:26:22audience, and it will use their audience
- 1:26:24data to find new people. And so, you're
- 1:26:26effectively leveraging the influencer's
- 1:26:28audience to help in your targeting on
- 1:26:31cold, not even just targeting on warm.
- 1:26:33And that's why they end up doing so
- 1:26:34well. They also feel super authentic.
- 1:26:36When you get an ad from a uh influencer
- 1:26:38profile like this, it doesn't feel as
- 1:26:40much so like an ad, so it doesn't feel
- 1:26:41like you're getting sold to. So, when
- 1:26:42you're getting an organic piece of
- 1:26:43content, it resonates better. And some
- 1:26:45accounts that we're working on, we have
- 1:26:46ad spend up to 40% of total account
- 1:26:48spend running through partnership or
- 1:26:50collaborator ads. And so, this is a
- 1:26:52really important thing that you should
- 1:26:53have in your account. If you are not
- 1:26:55running them, you were just at a
- 1:26:56disadvantage to competitors. All right,
- 1:26:57so going into the testing framework and
- 1:26:59how this then translates into the ad
- 1:27:01account, this is what the testing cycle
- 1:27:03looks like, which is that you build a
- 1:27:05hypothesis, which is you define what
- 1:27:07you're actually testing. So, when we're
- 1:27:09introducing new creative, generally the
- 1:27:11test is the concept, and particularly
- 1:27:13one of those four variables that we're
- 1:27:14changing in the creative. Then we want
- 1:27:16to build a bunch of ads under that
- 1:27:17concept. One big mistake that a lot of
- 1:27:20people make is that they come up with a
- 1:27:21concept, they build it all out, it looks
- 1:27:23amazing, and then they make one ad, or
- 1:27:24they make two ads, or they make three
- 1:27:25ads. Like, really, if you want to test a
- 1:27:27concept properly, you want at least 10
- 1:27:29plus ads, considering that most people's
- 1:27:31hit rates in their account are around
- 1:27:32about 5%. And so, technically speaking,
- 1:27:34if you have a new concept coming in, you
- 1:27:36would need to do, if you had a 5% hit
- 1:27:38rate, you'd need to do at least 20 ads
- 1:27:40to expect a winner. And so, thinking
- 1:27:41about your hit rate in the account as a
- 1:27:43function of how much volume you need to
- 1:27:45do to be able to validate the hypothesis
- 1:27:47is critical. Then you want to go and
- 1:27:48launch, and I'm going to show you with
- 1:27:50the exact structure that you should
- 1:27:51launch into. You then want to go and
- 1:27:52analyze, particularly against the
- 1:27:54hypothesis. So, what did we expect? What
- 1:27:56How much spend did we want to go
- 1:27:57through? How many conversions did we
- 1:27:58expect? What was the ROI? And then how
- 1:28:00did that compare? If it worked, we want
- 1:28:02to be looking at how we can employ
- 1:28:03strategies to scale, and then we want to
- 1:28:05go down and iterate. And this iteration
- 1:28:07process gets faster and faster the
- 1:28:09bigger your ad spend. So, now when we
- 1:28:11think about account structure and
- 1:28:12introducing tests into the account, this
- 1:28:14is where there becomes a lot of
- 1:28:15flexibility. And this is where we prefer
- 1:28:17not to actually make broad sweeping
- 1:28:20account structure recommendations
- 1:28:21because the fundamentals of account
- 1:28:23structure is that the complexity of the
- 1:28:25ad account should be a product of the
- 1:28:27complexity of the business. And so, if
- 1:28:29you run a startup that's doing $10,000 a
- 1:28:32month in revenue and you have one
- 1:28:33product and you have one persona that
- 1:28:35you're trying to crack, the account
- 1:28:36structure should be unbelievably simple.
- 1:28:39You don't need 100 different campaigns.
- 1:28:41On the other hand, if you're an $800
- 1:28:43million fashion retailer with 50 new
- 1:28:45SKUs coming out per week and you have
- 1:28:48all of these different business units
- 1:28:49and regions within the business, well,
- 1:28:51the ad account's probably going to be
- 1:28:52pretty complex because it needs to match
- 1:28:54that complexity in some degree so that
- 1:28:55we can align the commercial goals of the
- 1:28:57business with the structure that is
- 1:28:59being run in the ad account. And so, the
- 1:29:00structure I'm about to give you is a
- 1:29:02very broad sweeping, this will work if
- 1:29:05you're a small to mid-size business, but
- 1:29:07it's probably not exactly what you
- 1:29:08should run right now and moving into the
- 1:29:10future as it will likely evolve as the
- 1:29:13business dynamics evolve. But to keep it
- 1:29:15simple, you generally want a testing
- 1:29:17campaign. Now, whether this is an or
- 1:29:20a CBO is honestly going to come down to
- 1:29:22personal preference and I'll tell you
- 1:29:23how to think about this problem in a
- 1:29:25moment, but then underlying this, you
- 1:29:27have your concepts at the ad set level.
- 1:29:29So, this is concept one, this is concept
- 1:29:32two,
- 1:29:33this is concept three,
- 1:29:35etc., etc. Now, you're either setting
- 1:29:37budgets across these manually using an
- 1:29:39or the CBO's just going to
- 1:29:41distribute budget. Under here, you're
- 1:29:42going to have all your ads. A common
- 1:29:44question I get is, "Well, okay, we go
- 1:29:46and put four ads or five ads under here.
- 1:29:48How many ads should we launch and when
- 1:29:49we come up with new ads for this
- 1:29:50concept, do we launch it in here or do
- 1:29:52we launch a new ad set?" Which is both
- 1:29:54really good questions. In terms of ad
- 1:29:56volume, this is really open based on
- 1:29:58budgets, but you generally want a
- 1:29:59minimum of three ads and then a maximum
- 1:30:03of probably 50 to 100, but honestly, the
- 1:30:05limit is kind of the sky based on your
- 1:30:07ad spend. And so, I wouldn't really be
- 1:30:09thinking about upper funnel upper
- 1:30:10limits. I would just be thinking about
- 1:30:12lower limits, which is a minimum of
- 1:30:13three.
- 1:30:14When you then want to go and introduce
- 1:30:15more ads, this is based on whether
- 1:30:17you're hitting KPI. So, what is going to
- 1:30:20happen when you introduce more ads under
- 1:30:22this ad set is you were going to reset
- 1:30:24the learning phase to some degree.
- 1:30:26Because there is sequencing that is
- 1:30:27occurring across all of these different
- 1:30:29creative. And then when you go and
- 1:30:30launch more ads in here, you disrupt the
- 1:30:32sequencing and it relearns how to
- 1:30:34distribute your spend. Now, that is not
- 1:30:36good if the ad set's performing well.
- 1:30:39If this ad set is crushing it and you're
- 1:30:40really happy with it and you're scaling
- 1:30:42it up, don't go and mess with the
- 1:30:44learning phase. Don't go and inject a
- 1:30:46bunch of new ads. You might mess the
- 1:30:48performance up. And I've actually
- 1:30:49personally done this years ago and so
- 1:30:51that's why I'm very big on not touching
- 1:30:53stuff that's working. If it's not
- 1:30:54hitting KPI, and this is way
- 1:30:56underperforming,
- 1:30:58go for your life. Do whatever you want.
- 1:30:59You can turn ads off. It doesn't matter
- 1:31:01cuz yes, you're going to break some
- 1:31:02sequencing, but the sequencing isn't
- 1:31:03working. So, who cares? Go and launch as
- 1:31:05many ads as you want in here, right? Do
- 1:31:07whatever you want cuz it's not a KPI.
- 1:31:09So, you need to change something. But if
- 1:31:11things are working, definitely don't go
- 1:31:12and launch more ads in here. If you go
- 1:31:14and make more ads for this concept,
- 1:31:16let's say the concept's crushing it, so
- 1:31:17you go and make 20 more ads, go and
- 1:31:19launch another ad set, right? And call
- 1:31:21it concept one and then like shoot two.
- 1:31:24Or obviously, whatever naming convention
- 1:31:26you want to use to be able to clarify
- 1:31:28the difference between these, but then
- 1:31:29also be able to filter that they are the
- 1:31:31same concept. Now, the question becomes,
- 1:31:32well, how do you scale? Let's say
- 1:31:33concept one is performing well. What do
- 1:31:36we do? Well, number one, increase
- 1:31:37budgets. Never turn this off. A big
- 1:31:39mistake that people make is they take
- 1:31:41something that's winning and they turn
- 1:31:42it off and they go and launch it in like
- 1:31:43a scaling campaign. It's such a rookie
- 1:31:45mistake, just fundamentally speaking,
- 1:31:47because if something works, don't touch
- 1:31:49it. Leave it.
- 1:31:50Increase the budget. Now, in addition to
- 1:31:52that, sure, you [snorts] can take these
- 1:31:54post IDs and you can wrap them around
- 1:31:56into a scaling campaign. That's fine.
- 1:31:58And that will work. It works in a a of
- 1:32:00accounts. We run scaling campaigns in a
- 1:32:02lot of accounts, a lot of accounts we
- 1:32:03don't run scaling campaigns. Once again,
- 1:32:05it's dependent on the actual ad account
- 1:32:06and the business. You can run a scaling
- 1:32:07campaign, you can take these, you can
- 1:32:09post them over here. If it doesn't work,
- 1:32:10don't do it. Just keep it in the
- 1:32:11testing. And then next to these two, the
- 1:32:13only third campaign that I would usually
- 1:32:14recommend is to have a retargeting
- 1:32:17campaign that is generally on existing
- 1:32:20customers. So, it gives you the ability
- 1:32:22to exclude existing customers from here
- 1:32:25and exclude existing customers from
- 1:32:26here. So, these can surely be cold and
- 1:32:28that allows you to control budgets.
- 1:32:29Depending on how long the customer
- 1:32:30journey is as well, you might want an ad
- 1:32:32set here on 90-day website visitors as a
- 1:32:34mid-funnel. But, this is only if you
- 1:32:36think that you need to increase
- 1:32:37frequency on engaged audiences. Now,
- 1:32:39what are the metrics that matter for
- 1:32:41being able to measure the performance of
- 1:32:42creative? Let's list them out in order
- 1:32:45of reliability. Number one is amount
- 1:32:47spent. Now, this is counterintuitive. A
- 1:32:49lot of people look at this and go, "Why
- 1:32:50would budget distribution to an ad be
- 1:32:52the most important proxy for performance
- 1:32:54over extended time periods?" And the
- 1:32:56reason being is due to the sequencing
- 1:32:58that we talked about before. Right? So,
- 1:33:00if you have a bunch of different ads,
- 1:33:01attribution's only going to go to the
- 1:33:03last ad. So, if we use ROAS as the
- 1:33:04primary KPI, we're going to miss the
- 1:33:07fact that Meta's actually putting all
- 1:33:08your budget here. Why? When this only
- 1:33:10has a 1.7 and this has a 2.2, why would
- 1:33:12all the budget go here? Probably because
- 1:33:14this ad is causing purchases elsewhere
- 1:33:17in the account. And so, this is actually
- 1:33:19a great top-of-funnel asset that likely
- 1:33:21has a low frequency that's cutting
- 1:33:22through on new audiences. And so, if
- 1:33:23you're going to look at these three ads,
- 1:33:25I would say that this is the highest
- 1:33:27performer if it has double the spend of
- 1:33:28the other ones. Even though this is a
- 1:33:30higher ROAS, sure. But, if this could
- 1:33:31scale, it would have more spend in it
- 1:33:32and it doesn't. And so, amount spent
- 1:33:34becomes the best proxy for performance
- 1:33:36when looking at creative. Number two,
- 1:33:39sure, is ROAS or CPA. You just want to
- 1:33:42be making sure you're looking at 7-day
- 1:33:43click or incremental attribution. Number
- 1:33:45three is going to be CPC and CTRs. This
- 1:33:49is a leading indicator for the
- 1:33:52effectiveness of the ad. Obviously, you
- 1:33:54can have good CTRs and good CPCs, but
- 1:33:57the conversion rate of the ad can suck
- 1:33:58and that's not a good ad. And so this
- 1:34:00obviously isn't a primary indicator of
- 1:34:02the quality of a creative. That is where
- 1:34:04you have to use multiple different
- 1:34:06metrics in conjunction to be able to
- 1:34:08assess quality.
- 1:34:09Um but it is a good leading indicator,
- 1:34:11particularly on the fringes. So like if
- 1:34:13we look at CPCs as an example, and let's
- 1:34:15say this is what your CPCs on average
- 1:34:17look like across all of your ads. If
- 1:34:19above this point is let's say a $3 CPC,
- 1:34:22and none of these ads have ever been
- 1:34:24profitable, we can use this as a leading
- 1:34:26indicator to know that these ads at very
- 1:34:28early spend will actually never work cuz
- 1:34:29it's too expensive to drive traffic. The
- 1:34:31next two are hook rates and hold rates.
- 1:34:33These only apply to video assets,
- 1:34:34obviously, because the hook rate is how
- 1:34:36many people make it past 3 seconds in
- 1:34:38the video, and the hold rate, there's
- 1:34:40different definitions of hold rate. We
- 1:34:41actually look at a lot of different
- 1:34:42definitions in our reporting, but as a
- 1:34:45generalization, this is how many people
- 1:34:46make it past 15 seconds. Obviously, hook
- 1:34:48rates and hold rates are not correlated
- 1:34:52to conversion performance, but they are
- 1:34:54a diagnostic tool that allows us to
- 1:34:56iterate on creative based on what we
- 1:34:58think is letting us down.
- 1:35:00And so we may have a creative that we
- 1:35:02thought was going to do really well, but
- 1:35:04the hook rate is terrible against our
- 1:35:05average. And so we try to switch the
- 1:35:08hook out to try to fix that to see if
- 1:35:09the body actually performs. Same thing
- 1:35:11applies to hold rate. People might not
- 1:35:12be holding through the bridge. Turns out
- 1:35:14the bridge was actually done poorly, so
- 1:35:16we redo that part of the video and then
- 1:35:18we can iterate accordingly. So before I
- 1:35:19said I would explain versus CBO and
- 1:35:22the risk profile here. So the reason why
- 1:35:24you would choose one over the other is
- 1:35:26actually based on risk tolerance. So
- 1:35:27what happens when you use CBO is that
- 1:35:29it's going to play in to Pareto's
- 1:35:32principle. This applies literally
- 1:35:34everywhere I've ever seen it, which is
- 1:35:36that 80% of something will drive will be
- 1:35:39driven from 20%. So this applies into
- 1:35:42companies where 20% of people will drive
- 1:35:4480% of revenue generation. This applies
- 1:35:46into the ad account, which is that 20%
- 1:35:48of ads will drive 80% of revenue. 20% of
- 1:35:51ads will hold 80% of revenue. Crazy
- 1:35:53thing about Pareto's principle is that
- 1:35:55it compounds in on itself and you see
- 1:35:57this within every single data set I have
- 1:35:59done on ad accounts breaking down their
- 1:36:01ad profile. Which is that of this 80%,
- 1:36:0580% of this which comes out to 64% of
- 1:36:08total is driven by 20% of this, which
- 1:36:10this comes out to 4%. So, 4% of ads will
- 1:36:14hold about 64% of total spend and total
- 1:36:17revenue generation within the business.
- 1:36:19Now, CBOs play into Pareto's principle.
- 1:36:23And what that means is that if you just
- 1:36:24allow the campaign to distribute budgets
- 1:36:27however it wants, it will naturally end
- 1:36:29up distributing budgets like this. Where
- 1:36:31majority of all of your budget in the
- 1:36:32account will go to 4% of your ads. Now,
- 1:36:35that's fine cuz that's going to yield
- 1:36:36the best efficiency and performance, but
- 1:36:39it is super risky. Because if these ads
- 1:36:41fatigue, you are in a very bad position.
- 1:36:43You don't have backups. If we go back to
- 1:36:46the start of the video, which is
- 1:36:47portfolio management, CBOs are terrible
- 1:36:50for portfolio management. Okay? Because
- 1:36:52you're going to over leverage into a few
- 1:36:55ads. This also becomes an issue when you
- 1:36:57want to control sell through rates
- 1:36:58across multiple different products. And
- 1:37:00so, you might have a large product
- 1:37:02portfolio that all sit under the one CBO
- 1:37:04and then all of the spend just goes to a
- 1:37:06few to particular products. Because
- 1:37:08Pareto's principle applies into a
- 1:37:10product level as well. 20% of products
- 1:37:12will drive 80% of revenue. And so, your
- 1:37:14entire business will end up skewing and
- 1:37:16increasing the risk profile, which you
- 1:37:17might be fine with, but that's the
- 1:37:19trade-off that you have to make. So,
- 1:37:21when you think about these two,
- 1:37:22CBO is increased risk,
- 1:37:25but likely increased ROI. This is
- 1:37:28decreased risk, but likely slightly
- 1:37:31lower ROI. And it depends on which
- 1:37:33position you want to be in. I
- 1:37:34personally, if I'm running the business,
- 1:37:36I actually choose this every day of the
- 1:37:39week, dependent on like what season and
- 1:37:42where you are in the business. And so,
- 1:37:43there are periods in time in which I
- 1:37:45would actually switch over to CBO if I
- 1:37:47need a quick spike in efficiency,
- 1:37:49efficiency is isn't where we need it to
- 1:37:50be. I don't care about testing and
- 1:37:52de-risking right now. We just need ROI
- 1:37:54to come through. But then, ideally, you
- 1:37:56want to be in a steady state over here
- 1:37:58where the business is de-risked across
- 1:38:00more ads, across more products, and a
- 1:38:02lot more stuff is working so that if
- 1:38:04something stops working, you aren't in a
- 1:38:05terrible position. Uh this next point
- 1:38:07I'm particularly calling out cuz we work
- 1:38:09with a lot of nine-figure large
- 1:38:10retailers here in Australia. And if any
- 1:38:12of them are watching, then they'll know
- 1:38:14that this problem exists, which is that
- 1:38:16in a lot of large retailers who a lot of
- 1:38:18my audience is spent on, there is this
- 1:38:2090/10 problem with desire versus pain
- 1:38:23point led content. And this
- 1:38:24fundamentally comes from old-style
- 1:38:26marketing, which is campaign shoots. And
- 1:38:28so, a lot of these large uh retailers in
- 1:38:31fashion or whatever industry it is, they
- 1:38:34were built around campaign shoots. And
- 1:38:36campaign shoots do one thing, and that
- 1:38:38is that they build desire. And so, they
- 1:38:40have models, they have shots that make
- 1:38:42you want to desire having the product,
- 1:38:44but play to pain points at all. And so,
- 1:38:47you end up with the ad account being
- 1:38:48significantly overweighted towards
- 1:38:50desire rather than towards pain. And at
- 1:38:52the end of the day, the best performance
- 1:38:54marketing assets are those that sit on
- 1:38:57pain. And so, I would strongly recommend
- 1:38:59looking at your current creative mix
- 1:39:01through this lens and thinking about how
- 1:39:03do we actually start to shift this ratio
- 1:39:06over to 60/40. Now, I personally think
- 1:39:08that the best brands are probably closer
- 1:39:11to 70/30 here. You can almost think of
- 1:39:13this in a way of like this is
- 1:39:15performance marketing driven assets.
- 1:39:17This is branding driven assets. Now, one
- 1:39:19last thing in the testing framework is
- 1:39:20assets for retargeting. So, how should
- 1:39:23you be thinking about retargeting ads on
- 1:39:25bottom of funnel? This is something I've
- 1:39:26been saying for a very long time. This
- 1:39:28is probably one of my first YouTube
- 1:39:30videos that we put out, which is that on
- 1:39:32your bottom of funnel retargeting
- 1:39:33campaigns, you want to think about
- 1:39:36objection handling. This is the primary
- 1:39:38purpose of a product aware ad. And you
- 1:39:40can think about this mathematically,
- 1:39:42which is that let's say you have a 5%
- 1:39:44conversion rate on the website. That
- 1:39:46means that 95% of people did not buy.
- 1:39:49Now, the question is, why didn't these
- 1:39:52people buy? What were their objections?
- 1:39:54Maybe 20% of them had a price objection.
- 1:39:58It was just price too high. They never
- 1:40:00will buy at that particular price. Now,
- 1:40:02they might buy in the future when you're
- 1:40:03on sale, but right now they won't buy.
- 1:40:0520% of people
- 1:40:06don't trust the brand. There wasn't
- 1:40:08enough trust credibility markers on the
- 1:40:10website or the ads that they
- 1:40:11particularly saw to reinforce them to
- 1:40:14actually purchase the product. 20% don't
- 1:40:17like the quality. They think the quality
- 1:40:19is probably going to be bad. Now, this
- 1:40:20is arguably a trust issue, but these are
- 1:40:22really two different things and they
- 1:40:23should be come at in two different ways.
- 1:40:25And then maybe another 20% of people are
- 1:40:27just not ready to buy yet. Okay, so it's
- 1:40:29too soon. It was the first ad they've
- 1:40:32seen. It was the first ad they've
- 1:40:33clicked on. They just need a little bit
- 1:40:35more time to purchase. So, we want to
- 1:40:37understand this mix. We want to
- 1:40:38understand why people aren't buying, and
- 1:40:40then we want to handle all of these
- 1:40:42objections in our bottom of funnel
- 1:40:43creative. And so, on the price
- 1:40:45objection, we want to be showing
- 1:40:46discounts. We want to be value
- 1:40:48anchoring. We want to even going for a
- 1:40:50creative that's like a cost per use
- 1:40:52angle. These actually crush on bottom of
- 1:40:54funnel. So, if you're selling like a
- 1:40:56supplement, you compare it to a coffee.
- 1:40:58It's a cost the price of a coffee with
- 1:40:59the same caffeine, etc., etc. If they
- 1:41:01don't trust the brand, we want to come
- 1:41:03in with social proofing. How many
- 1:41:05customers do we have? How many five-star
- 1:41:06reviews do we have? Do we have any
- 1:41:08user-generated content testimonials that
- 1:41:09we can use here? If they're doubting the
- 1:41:11quality of the product, we want to show
- 1:41:13UGC of the product actually in use. We
- 1:41:15want before and afters. We want
- 1:41:17demonstrations. And if it's simply too
- 1:41:19soon for them to buy yet, we want to be
- 1:41:21staying present and top of mind with
- 1:41:23educational or lifestyle content. And
- 1:41:24then this is what the mix should be in
- 1:41:26all of our bottom of funnel assets. And
- 1:41:28this is how you ultimately yield strong
- 1:41:30conversion rates once people have been
- 1:41:31moved through the funnel. The question
- 1:41:33is, does diversity or volume matter more
- 1:41:35when it comes to creative? So, you want
- 1:41:36to be thinking through volume through
- 1:41:38this hierarchy, which is that volume
- 1:41:40matters the most, then concept quality,
- 1:41:43then hook strength, then editing
- 1:41:44quality, then UGC talent, then
- 1:41:46storytelling all the way down the
- 1:41:47bottom. Now, it's not to say that any of
- 1:41:49these components aren't important, but
- 1:41:51it's the fact that volume ends up
- 1:41:53creating quality, and hit rates are
- 1:41:55limited within an ad account. And so, a
- 1:41:57way to conceptualize through this idea
- 1:41:59is that if you take the best creative
- 1:42:01strategists, you can pull 10 of them out
- 1:42:03of 10 different businesses, and you can
- 1:42:05show them five ads that are all
- 1:42:07objectively good creative, and you tell
- 1:42:09them which of these five was the winner.
- 1:42:12Which one produced the most spend or the
- 1:42:14most return? None of them will be able
- 1:42:16to guess it. It will just be a complete
- 1:42:18guessing game. They'll a-
- 1:42:20assign reasons as to why they believe
- 1:42:21this creative is better than the other
- 1:42:23ones. Might have been due to the concept
- 1:42:24quality, might have been due to the
- 1:42:25hook, but the reality is is that people
- 1:42:28are not very good at guessing the top
- 1:42:30end level of creative performance. And
- 1:42:33so, instead, you want to understand
- 1:42:35where the bar of quality is, and just
- 1:42:37ensure that ads are reaching that
- 1:42:39standard. And so, if all of these five
- 1:42:41ads sit above this bar of quality, and
- 1:42:44we could objectively say that this is a
- 1:42:45seven out of 10. So, if an ad is better
- 1:42:48than a seven out of 10,
- 1:42:50it meets that bar, and it is
- 1:42:52indistinguishable from any other
- 1:42:54creative in being able to try to guess
- 1:42:56its performance. Where you end up dying
- 1:42:58in creative strategy is trying to win
- 1:43:01the game of understanding which ads will
- 1:43:04perform well at a high level. No one is
- 1:43:06able to objectively do this well. I've
- 1:43:08never seen anyone be able to pick
- 1:43:09winners. And so, you instead want to
- 1:43:10become very good at understanding what
- 1:43:12is the minimum bar of quality, what does
- 1:43:14a good ad look like, and then how do we
- 1:43:16reach that level of quality, and then
- 1:43:18maximize volume above it. Where people
- 1:43:20get volume completely wrong, and the
- 1:43:21example that I gave way back at the
- 1:43:23start, which was people were
- 1:43:24misunderstanding activity for creative
- 1:43:26strategy, is that they were putting tons
- 1:43:28of ads into the account, but they didn't
- 1:43:30have an understanding internally of what
- 1:43:32the bar of seven out of 10 actually
- 1:43:34looks like. And so when you go and do an
- 1:43:36ad breakdown of all the creatives that
- 1:43:37they were putting into the account,
- 1:43:38which was thousands a month, the ads
- 1:43:40just weren't very good. They didn't have
- 1:43:43any of the elements of a good concept.
- 1:43:45They didn't have any of the elements of
- 1:43:46a good hook. They didn't have any of the
- 1:43:48elements of formats that were relevant
- 1:43:50to the stage of awareness of the
- 1:43:51creative that they were trying to
- 1:43:52produce. And so because of that, yes,
- 1:43:55they put tons of volume in the account.
- 1:43:56Yes, they followed this hierarchy, the
- 1:43:58most important thing on it. But it was
- 1:44:00just junk volume. It was just a bunch of
- 1:44:02ads that aren't even good.
- 1:44:04And so instead, you need to focus your
- 1:44:05efforts on how do we understand where
- 1:44:06the bar is, then how do we maximize
- 1:44:08volume, and then how do we start
- 1:44:10step-stoning down through all of the
- 1:44:12different priorities to create a good
- 1:44:14ad. The question off the back of this
- 1:44:15then becomes, okay, well, how much
- 1:44:16volume do we actually need then? And
- 1:44:19there's a really easy, simple answer,
- 1:44:21which I'll give to you, and then there's
- 1:44:22a more complicated answer that you'd
- 1:44:23have to go and build a financial model
- 1:44:25out for. And if you're an e-commerce
- 1:44:26brand, uh we'll give it to you
- 1:44:27completely for free. We'll put the link
- 1:44:29in the YouTube description below.
- 1:44:31So the simple answer is, for every
- 1:44:33$1,000 in monthly spend, you want one
- 1:44:36new ad.
- 1:44:38And so if you're spending 30K a month,
- 1:44:3930 new ads. 50K a month, 50 new ads. Now
- 1:44:42this is in AUD. Also translate this into
- 1:44:44USD. Roughly that ad volume is fine. Now
- 1:44:47the better way to do this is to back
- 1:44:49propagate based on hit rates and
- 1:44:51expected spend per ad. So what you can
- 1:44:53do is you can calculate the average
- 1:44:54spend of an ad. So if you know that
- 1:44:56across the last year of ads, you've
- 1:44:58launched, let's say, 500 ads,
- 1:45:01and you've spent $500,000,
- 1:45:03well then each ad here, on average,
- 1:45:06spent $1,000.
- 1:45:08Now if you know the average return of an
- 1:45:10ad, which you can look at either your
- 1:45:12acquisition MER, which is new customer
- 1:45:14revenue divided by ad spend in the
- 1:45:15business, or you could just look at
- 1:45:17ROAS, but if you're going to look at
- 1:45:18this, look at it on a 7-day click basis.
- 1:45:21And let's say your average ROAS is a
- 1:45:23three,
- 1:45:24and you've got $1,000 in mean spend,
- 1:45:28well then we know that the average
- 1:45:29return, or you could call this the
- 1:45:31expected value,
- 1:45:33if we're using probabilistic math,
- 1:45:35is then three thousand dollars in
- 1:45:38revenue. So, every time we launch an ad,
- 1:45:41we should expect on average, on a larger
- 1:45:43data set, that we generate three
- 1:45:44thousand dollars in revenue. So, then we
- 1:45:45can start to back propagate this into
- 1:45:48our actual revenue targets. Now, more
- 1:45:50specifically, I would actually delineate
- 1:45:52this down into new customer revenue to
- 1:45:54be specific to acquisition. So, if you
- 1:45:56have a 300K
- 1:45:59monthly new customer revenue target, you
- 1:46:02take 300K, you divide by your 3,000, 100
- 1:46:05creatives per month
- 1:46:08are required. Now, there's a few nice
- 1:46:10things about this. Number one, you can
- 1:46:11flex the actual volume of creative in
- 1:46:14conjunction with spend, which is what
- 1:46:16you should be doing. As you go through
- 1:46:17the year, and your forecast changes
- 1:46:21in terms of expected new customer
- 1:46:22revenue, your creative volume should
- 1:46:24flex accordingly. So, this should be
- 1:46:26exactly what your revenue looks like,
- 1:46:28but also what your creative volume looks
- 1:46:30like. Now, there are two disadvantages
- 1:46:31to this simplified model, which is that
- 1:46:33number one, it doesn't take into
- 1:46:34consideration the average time of an ad
- 1:46:37spending, and so these ads might
- 1:46:39generate three thousand dollars in
- 1:46:41revenue, but it might take four months.
- 1:46:42And so, that needs to be factored in cuz
- 1:46:44obviously volume needs to be a lot
- 1:46:45higher then. And it also doesn't factor
- 1:46:47in the difference between a winner and a
- 1:46:48loser. If you got 100 losing ads this
- 1:46:52month, you will generate barely any
- 1:46:54revenue. If you got 100 winners, you'll
- 1:46:56generate like multiple millions in new
- 1:46:58customer revenue.
- 1:47:00And so, you need a forecast losing ads
- 1:47:01versus winning ads separately, and then
- 1:47:03you need to add the time component.
- 1:47:05We've built a model that does all of
- 1:47:07this. Once again, if you're an e-com
- 1:47:08brand and you want it, you can click the
- 1:47:10link in the description, uh fill out the
- 1:47:12form, and we'll send it out to you. Now,
- 1:47:13when we're thinking through creative
- 1:47:14budget, how much budget should go
- 1:47:16towards production versus actual
- 1:47:18distribution of the assets? If you're at
- 1:47:20four to 30K a month in spend level,
- 1:47:23there is no reason as to why your
- 1:47:25content shouldn't be super founder led.
- 1:47:27And the actual budget here on production
- 1:47:29is your time rather than money. Because
- 1:47:33you really don't need to go and pay for
- 1:47:34production on this kind of spend level.
- 1:47:36This can all be done literally through
- 1:47:38statics in most businesses, but even
- 1:47:40just founder led videos can get you to
- 1:47:4230K a month in spend easily. And
- 1:47:44honestly, I would challenge that the
- 1:47:45founder of a business at this size
- 1:47:47should be creating content because
- 1:47:49content and creative is the largest
- 1:47:50lever that exists within the business.
- 1:47:52And so, understanding what good looks
- 1:47:54like, what good creative looks like,
- 1:47:55getting an understanding for how to
- 1:47:56piece it together, what the editing
- 1:47:58process looks like, what the ideation
- 1:48:00process looks like, gives you the
- 1:48:01ability to then KPI and train people
- 1:48:03moving forward on one of the most
- 1:48:05critical roles in the business. As you
- 1:48:06then move into 30 to 100K per month in
- 1:48:09ad spend, you want to be thinking of
- 1:48:10allocating 25% of media budget towards
- 1:48:13production. So, at 100K a month, that's
- 1:48:1425K a month into creative production.
- 1:48:17This is way more than like 99% of brands
- 1:48:20are actually spending. And that's also
- 1:48:22one of the reasons why brands don't
- 1:48:24actually scale and do that well. It's
- 1:48:25because they significantly under weight
- 1:48:27the allocation that needs to go into
- 1:48:28their media budget. Now, this is an
- 1:48:29uncomfortable range because the cost of
- 1:48:32production is so high excessive to the
- 1:48:35scale of the business right now that it
- 1:48:36feels off. It feels like this is too
- 1:48:39high, but it does democratize as you
- 1:48:41achieve more scale. Once you crack
- 1:48:43through 100K plus, this percentage
- 1:48:45really should asymptote down to around
- 1:48:47about 10% of media budget. And so, as a
- 1:48:50function of revenue in the business,
- 1:48:52let's say that you're at a 25% MER, 10%
- 1:48:55of this would therefore be 2.5% of total
- 1:48:58revenue in the business. So, 2.5% of
- 1:49:00total revenue should be going towards
- 1:49:01media budget. This kind of spend
- 1:49:03allocation allows diversity in the
- 1:49:05creative that you're putting in. This is
- 1:49:06enough budget to have UGC going into the
- 1:49:09account, to have partnership ads going
- 1:49:11into the account, to have a full-time
- 1:49:13either international designer or someone
- 1:49:15part-time uh in-house on statics, and it
- 1:49:18can likely support a low-cost uh agency
- 1:49:21in some capacity to supplement with
- 1:49:23another creative type in here as well.
- 1:49:24Maybe it's VSLs or something. I'll give
- 1:49:26you a real example of a client that
- 1:49:28unfortunately we had to part ways with
- 1:49:30about uh 6 to 8 months ago because we
- 1:49:33couldn't get this concept across to
- 1:49:35them. And this is why I stress this so
- 1:49:36much in a lot of content that we put out
- 1:49:38now, and it's really important that
- 1:49:39people understand this particularly
- 1:49:40through the initial discussions when
- 1:49:42they start talking with us because we
- 1:49:44really don't want to onboard brands that
- 1:49:46aren't across this concept. So, this
- 1:49:48brand was spending 350k
- 1:49:52per month on Meta when they started
- 1:49:53working with us. Their CAC was declining
- 1:49:56pretty steadily over the course of the
- 1:49:57last 2 years.
- 1:49:59Now, they only had about 15 ads live
- 1:50:03within the account on a 350k a month
- 1:50:05spend, which is crazy. And so, right out
- 1:50:07the gates, we made a bunch of media
- 1:50:09buying changes. The account was super
- 1:50:11over-segmented. The previous media buyer
- 1:50:13was doing so much over the top stuff
- 1:50:15because he didn't have anything to work
- 1:50:17with from an ad and creative
- 1:50:18perspective. And so, when you don't have
- 1:50:20anything that you can do on creative,
- 1:50:22what do you do? Well, you go to the next
- 1:50:23thing, and that's let's create 25
- 1:50:25different campaigns. Let's use big caps,
- 1:50:27cost caps. Let's try everything to try
- 1:50:29to squeeze these 15 ads, which
- 1:50:31ultimately isn't the lever that's going
- 1:50:32to double this business. And so, when we
- 1:50:34did the audit, we identified this as the
- 1:50:35bottleneck. And what we did immediately
- 1:50:37is as we came in, we went and took all
- 1:50:40old performers and started relaunching
- 1:50:41and reworking them a little bit. Even
- 1:50:43though at the time we weren't doing
- 1:50:45creative production in house, we just
- 1:50:46threw this on top cuz we knew that this
- 1:50:49was the limiter and that we had to get
- 1:50:50this done. So, we took the ad account up
- 1:50:52to about 60 ads. Nowhere near where it
- 1:50:54needs to be, but this is all we could do
- 1:50:56in terms of high-quality assets that
- 1:50:57have been turned off in the past. Now,
- 1:50:59what the results ended up being for this
- 1:51:01brand is we actually turned them around,
- 1:51:04which was one of the most insane case
- 1:51:05studies that we've done cuz we did it
- 1:51:07with no new creative. And we actually
- 1:51:09took them from 350k a month in spend. We
- 1:51:11increased their spend by about another
- 1:51:1340k and we decrease their CAC by about
- 1:51:1520 to 30%. And so new customer revenue
- 1:51:18expansion off the top of my head,
- 1:51:20there's a case study out there on this
- 1:51:21somewhere, I think it was about like
- 1:51:2328%. And so we were able to turn this
- 1:51:25brand around substantially because of
- 1:51:27this. Now the issue was that this
- 1:51:30founder was very much so of the opinion
- 1:51:33that this spend on Meta is a revenue
- 1:51:35driver and he spent towards creative
- 1:51:37production is a cost center. And so
- 1:51:39because of that, they refused to do any
- 1:51:42more creative production. We intro'd
- 1:51:44them to multiple agencies, they went and
- 1:51:45chatted to them. Uh they actually signed
- 1:51:47on and then pulled out a lot of a lot of
- 1:51:49those deals. And so we weren't able to
- 1:51:51get any more ads,
- 1:51:52any more creative. And so because of
- 1:51:54that, there's only so far that you can
- 1:51:56push media buying over time and so
- 1:51:58performance started to come down. And
- 1:52:00then as performance started to trickle
- 1:52:01down due to these 60 ads fatiguing, ads
- 1:52:04started to need to be turned off, spend
- 1:52:05started getting distributed away from
- 1:52:07them and the account slowly fell back to
- 1:52:09what it was previously. Now the
- 1:52:10proposition that we put forward to this
- 1:52:12brand well before any of that happened
- 1:52:14was that if you took just $10,000 of
- 1:52:18this budget, just 10k out of it, and you
- 1:52:21decrease from Meta and you moved it over
- 1:52:23to creative production, this could get
- 1:52:25us with an agency that we were talking
- 1:52:26to about 40 assets. Not all unique, some
- 1:52:29were just hook swaps, some were statics,
- 1:52:30but it would give us 40 assets.
- 1:52:32This would allow us to almost double the
- 1:52:33amount of active ads in the account,
- 1:52:35which would likely unlock at least a 5%
- 1:52:38improvement in efficiency. Now a 5%
- 1:52:41improvement in efficiency on 350k is the
- 1:52:44equivalent of times 2.5%, a 17.5k
- 1:52:49saving. So we could either drop 17.5k
- 1:52:52out of this budget, which we already
- 1:52:54did, we dropped 10, so we've effectively
- 1:52:55made 7 and a half grand, or we could
- 1:52:58keep the budget where it is and this
- 1:52:59would provide us with an incremental 3x
- 1:53:02was their return at the time on this, so
- 1:53:04we would make an extra 40 to 50k a
- 1:53:06month. And so you would actually get
- 1:53:07revenue expansion in this business by
- 1:53:09keeping spend the same but
- 1:53:10redistributing it over to production.
- 1:53:13It's a similar concept to just changing
- 1:53:14between channels, but instead of it
- 1:53:15being a channel, it's creative with an
- 1:53:18output. But unfortunately, this founder
- 1:53:19was very set on the fact that they
- 1:53:21didn't need new creative, that we could
- 1:53:23just repurpose these existing assets,
- 1:53:25and that would continue the business
- 1:53:26going. And this all definitely could
- 1:53:28have been fixed well ahead of time
- 1:53:30simply through a slight allocation of
- 1:53:32this budget over into production. So,
- 1:53:34definitely avoid being that brand that
- 1:53:37sees creative as a cost center rather
- 1:53:39than a revenue driver. Now, one last
- 1:53:41tactical piece of advice here that
- 1:53:43applies right now as of April 2026, this
- 1:53:47might change as the algorithms change,
- 1:53:49this might not apply into the future,
- 1:53:51but one of the best ways to quickly test
- 1:53:53high volumes of assets right now, we
- 1:53:55actually do this on all of our own ads,
- 1:53:57is that you post them as trial reels and
- 1:53:59you cut the CTA off. So, if there's a
- 1:54:00call to action at the end, cut the call
- 1:54:02to action out, throw it up as a trial
- 1:54:04reel on the business page that's going
- 1:54:05to run through or the personal page
- 1:54:06that's going to run through, and then
- 1:54:08what you will get back is two things.
- 1:54:09Number one, you'll see how viral does
- 1:54:11the post actually go, does it get any
- 1:54:13views, does it not, so you're going to
- 1:54:14have comparative data. But number two,
- 1:54:15you're also going to get retention
- 1:54:16graphs, which is going to show you how
- 1:54:18you've retained viewers throughout the
- 1:54:21ad. Now, the retention graph is going to
- 1:54:23show you was the hook bad, was the
- 1:54:24bridge bad, was the body bad, and this
- 1:54:27lets you iterate quickly on the next
- 1:54:29shoot without needing to actually push
- 1:54:30the ad straight into the ad manager. And
- 1:54:32you can do this before it's perfected.
- 1:54:34So, if there's some issues with the
- 1:54:35captions or there's some stuff that
- 1:54:36isn't great and needs to go in for
- 1:54:37another round, you can just take the V1,
- 1:54:40throw it as a trial reel, cut the call
- 1:54:41to action off in app, and get feedback
- 1:54:44while that round two version is actually
- 1:54:45getting worked on. And then you could
- 1:54:47pass even more feedback on during that
- 1:54:49round two within 24 hours before you've
- 1:54:52even got the final asset. And so, we
- 1:54:53found this is a really effective way to
- 1:54:55take a bulk amount of creative and
- 1:54:57quickly test, particularly on hook
- 1:54:58variations as well. So, we can take like
- 1:55:0020 hook variations, throw it up as trial
- 1:55:02reels, what hooks actually perform the
- 1:55:03best, and then only put five ads into
- 1:55:05the account rather than wasting 20 ads
- 1:55:07and spending money on trying to figure
- 1:55:08it out. So, now we move into creative
- 1:55:10fatigue. So, there's two concepts to
- 1:55:12understand with creative fatigue. Number
- 1:55:13one is the two reasons why creatives
- 1:55:15fatigue, and the other concept is to
- 1:55:17understand the maximum spend threshold
- 1:55:20of an ad over time. So, when you think
- 1:55:22about launching an ad, and on the Y axis
- 1:55:24we'll put spend, and on the X axis we
- 1:55:27have time.
- 1:55:28You launch the ad, it does well. And so,
- 1:55:31one of two things happen. Either you
- 1:55:32start manually spending more on it, so
- 1:55:34you start increasing budgets, or Meta
- 1:55:36will go and automatically distribute
- 1:55:38spend to it. And so, spend goes up and
- 1:55:39up and up and up. Eventually, there will
- 1:55:41be a limit in how much daily spend that
- 1:55:44ad can hold.
- 1:55:46You'll reach that limit, you'll probably
- 1:55:47go past it, you'll course correct, and
- 1:55:50then you'll find the maximum daily spend
- 1:55:52limit of the ad. Let's say it's at like
- 1:55:53$500 a day or $1,000 a day.
- 1:55:56From there, this ad will continue
- 1:55:58spending moving forward in time. It will
- 1:55:59eventually start fatiguing. It will
- 1:56:02start falling off, you'll either start
- 1:56:03pulling budgets or the CBO will pull
- 1:56:05budgets out of it, and then eventually
- 1:56:06you will just turn it off entirely or
- 1:56:08Meta will stop distributing spend.
- 1:56:10Now, this area under the curve here is
- 1:56:13the total spend capacity of the ad. So,
- 1:56:15you can go and do derivative math and
- 1:56:18just get an understanding of how much
- 1:56:19area there is there, and you will have
- 1:56:21total spend capacity. Now, what's
- 1:56:24important to understand is number one,
- 1:56:26every ad has a total spend capacity,
- 1:56:28every ad will fatigue, every ad will get
- 1:56:30turned off. Number two is you can change
- 1:56:32what this graph looks like over time.
- 1:56:34And so, if you want, you can squeeze ads
- 1:56:37harder in the short term, but they will
- 1:56:40fatigue faster. And so, you could take
- 1:56:42this ad all the way up to here in daily
- 1:56:44spend, but it just means it's probably
- 1:56:45going to fatigue and be turned off here.
- 1:56:47Or you could go even more aggressive and
- 1:56:49you could actually launch it at a high
- 1:56:50budget, take it way up, but then it's
- 1:56:51going to fall off. Or you could
- 1:56:53obviously do the opposite. And you
- 1:56:55could, under portfolio management
- 1:56:57theory, which is what we did at the
- 1:56:58start, is that you actually just want to
- 1:57:00introduce this ad, but keep it at $100 a
- 1:57:02day, and you'd rather have it live for 6
- 1:57:05months than die off within 6 weeks. Now,
- 1:57:08this is ultimately more so going to be a
- 1:57:10product of the inventory constraint and
- 1:57:12demand within the business. So, if you
- 1:57:14have a lot of inventory that you need to
- 1:57:15sell through for the current
- 1:57:17profitability position in that month,
- 1:57:19then obviously you should go with option
- 1:57:21one here and just squeeze the winning ad
- 1:57:23to sell through as much product as
- 1:57:24possible, even if it's at a degraded
- 1:57:26MER. On the other hand, if you don't
- 1:57:28have much inventory, um or if you're
- 1:57:30waiting for more inventory to happen, or
- 1:57:32if you're growing too quickly that your
- 1:57:33cash conversion cycle can't actually uh
- 1:57:35keep up with the growth rate, well, then
- 1:57:37why would you do this? This would be a
- 1:57:39ridiculous decision. You would instead
- 1:57:41want to operate at higher efficiency and
- 1:57:42let the ad breathe for 6 months.
- 1:57:44However, if you're working with an
- 1:57:46agency, they don't have any of that
- 1:57:48wider context within the business unless
- 1:57:50they're asking for it unless you're
- 1:57:51actively giving it to them, and so they
- 1:57:54will see an ad that's winning, and they
- 1:57:55will go, "Let's squeeze the hell out of
- 1:57:57it." Because of two things. Number one,
- 1:57:59we just started working with this brand,
- 1:58:00and this will give us a great
- 1:58:0130-to-90-day case study. And number two,
- 1:58:04is well, this is giving us the best
- 1:58:05ROAS, and we report on ROAS or
- 1:58:07efficiency and profit, and so let's do
- 1:58:09this. But the issue is it completely
- 1:58:11screws up the long-term longevity of the
- 1:58:12ad account and the business because
- 1:58:14you've over-prioritized short-term gain
- 1:58:16for the long-term stability in the ad
- 1:58:18account and the inventory purchasing.
- 1:58:21So, you're just going to go out of stock
- 1:58:22here, and you're going to ruin a lot of
- 1:58:23what's going on. Then the two drivers of
- 1:58:25creative fatigue. Number one, is the ad
- 1:58:27itself just becomes stale.
- 1:58:29So, this is a function of it's just
- 1:58:31reached its maximum spend capacity, and
- 1:58:33it will ultimately just achieve at the
- 1:58:34end of its life cycle.
- 1:58:36Um this could also be just a function of
- 1:58:38the ad has the same visuals, it has the
- 1:58:40same concepts, it's targeting the same
- 1:58:42audience as the other creatives in the
- 1:58:44account, and so you'll get much more
- 1:58:46faster fatigue because you're targeting
- 1:58:47the same audience with the same value
- 1:58:49propositions. The second reason ads
- 1:58:51fatigue is that the audience is actually
- 1:58:53just too small. When we went through the
- 1:58:55persona component of uh this video, we
- 1:58:58talked about how specificity in the
- 1:59:00persona is critical to being able to
- 1:59:02script a better ad that resonates with a
- 1:59:04very specific target demographic. This
- 1:59:06is also going to generate way better
- 1:59:08results cuz you're talking to a few
- 1:59:10people rather than a lot. Making very
- 1:59:12good top of funnel unaware ads is
- 1:59:14incredibly difficult. The skill ceiling
- 1:59:16is very high. Most people shouldn't try
- 1:59:17to do it unless you're already a $50
- 1:59:20million plus brand. Now,
- 1:59:22with that, if you speak to a very small
- 1:59:24persona, there is obviously going to be
- 1:59:27a maximum daily spend capacity that you
- 1:59:29can spend talking to that persona. And
- 1:59:31so, if we go back to the example before
- 1:59:34of men trying to run sub-4-hour
- 1:59:37marathons that have gone to the gym,
- 1:59:39that are trying to cut 5 minutes off
- 1:59:40their time using creatine, very specific
- 1:59:43target demographic. Now, there's still a
- 1:59:44lot of people there. There are a lot of
- 1:59:45people are trying to run marathons and
- 1:59:46trying to run sub-4, but you're not
- 1:59:48going to be able to spend, particularly
- 1:59:49in the Australian market, $10,000 a day
- 1:59:51on that creative. It's just not going to
- 1:59:53happen. And so, you need to find out
- 1:59:55what the spend capacity is, keep it
- 1:59:57there, rotating creative so that once
- 2:00:00they use fatigue, we can continue to hit
- 2:00:01that audience over and over again,
- 2:00:03because that is an audience that churns,
- 2:00:05which is really important. So, people
- 2:00:06will enter into that audience, then run
- 2:00:08a marathon and enter out of it. So,
- 2:00:09there's constantly new people coming in
- 2:00:11that we can continue to saturate. But,
- 2:00:14we don't want to oversaturate,
- 2:00:16over-prioritize, overspend, drive up
- 2:00:18frequency, and then just ruin the
- 2:00:20profitability of us targeting this
- 2:00:21audience altogether. Now, an obvious key
- 2:00:23learning here is that broader audiences
- 2:00:28will scale much further.
- 2:00:30And so, if you have a top of funnel
- 2:00:32unaware ad that speaks to a much larger
- 2:00:34TAM, total addressable market, you will
- 2:00:36obviously be able to spend a lot more
- 2:00:38money on that. In a B2B context, an
- 2:00:40example of this is that if I have a
- 2:00:42persona call out at the front of one of
- 2:00:44our ads that says e-commerce CFOs in
- 2:00:47Australia earning over a hundred million
- 2:00:50dollars a year in your business. That is
- 2:00:52such a tiny pool. There's like how many
- 2:00:54people fit that particular persona in
- 2:00:56Australia? It's probably a thousand,
- 2:00:59maybe two thousand. And so because of
- 2:01:01that, when I go and put that ad in
- 2:01:02market, I can't spend a lot on that ad.
- 2:01:04There would be no point of me going and
- 2:01:05putting ten thousand dollars a day
- 2:01:07behind that creative because I would
- 2:01:09then just be hitting the thousand people
- 2:01:10like six hundred times a day. Makes no
- 2:01:12sense. But then if I expand the persona
- 2:01:15callout to e-commerce founders earning
- 2:01:17over a hundred K a year, well then
- 2:01:19that's a much larger target demographic.
- 2:01:21So the daily spend capacity improves.
- 2:01:24Now does that mean I should just do
- 2:01:25broad callouts? Absolutely not because
- 2:01:28broad callouts means you have to have
- 2:01:29better creative that resonates with more
- 2:01:30people. And so you're actually better
- 2:01:32off having the more specific persona
- 2:01:35callouts that force you to create better
- 2:01:36assets and then move into broader
- 2:01:38audiences once you hit a particular
- 2:01:40scale. In terms of tactical things that
- 2:01:42you can do when creative fatigue, there
- 2:01:45are changes that you can make. Number
- 2:01:46one is you can make iterations. And so
- 2:01:48you can take an asset that's already
- 2:01:50done well, which I mentioned before, a
- 2:01:51hero ad that started to fatigue, and you
- 2:01:53can just rotate new hooks on and you'll
- 2:01:55be able to get more spend through that
- 2:01:56asset. Number two is you can move the
- 2:01:58ads over into a cost cap campaign and
- 2:02:01you can try to get more spend through
- 2:02:02here. Now this will also work. It will
- 2:02:04fatigue the creative faster and it's a
- 2:02:06short-term tactical media buying
- 2:02:08strategy. It's not something that's
- 2:02:10really going to materially change the
- 2:02:11business. Number three, you could go and
- 2:02:13duplicate ad sets. It's not something
- 2:02:15that I would recommend. I'm not even
- 2:02:17going to go and put it down here. I know
- 2:02:18it's something that people still argue
- 2:02:20works. I think it's too tacky as a media
- 2:02:22buying strategy. It used to work back in
- 2:02:24the day and I could explain the concept
- 2:02:25as to why it works and why it doesn't
- 2:02:27now. But if it's something you want to
- 2:02:28do, you can do it, but I wouldn't
- 2:02:29recommend it. You can take the post ID
- 2:02:31of the creative so it retains all of the
- 2:02:33engagement and you can go and move that
- 2:02:36into another campaign like a scaling
- 2:02:37campaign to try to get more spend
- 2:02:39through it. This sometimes works, but
- 2:02:41once again, like this isn't going to
- 2:02:42save the account. And then you could
- 2:02:44rotate, which is kind of a variation of
- 2:02:45number one. You could rotate formats.
- 2:02:48And so if this is a video that's doing
- 2:02:50really well, you could try to translate
- 2:02:52it into an image. If it's a VSL that's
- 2:02:54doing really well, you could try to
- 2:02:56translate it into UGC. If it's an image
- 2:02:59that's doing really well, you could try
- 2:03:01it translated into an unaware long-form
- 2:03:03copy Stan image, which is actually
- 2:03:05completely different strategy. So
- 2:03:07they're really the four options as a
- 2:03:08creative fatigue. It is just worth
- 2:03:10noting that once a creative fatigue
- 2:03:11fatigues, there's not like a whole lot
- 2:03:13you can do about it. You're That's why
- 2:03:14you need the portfolio management
- 2:03:16approach, and you need other ads that
- 2:03:17are doing well so that you can fall back
- 2:03:19on them. There are things that you can
- 2:03:20do though just to squeeze a little bit
- 2:03:22more out of the back end of a creative,
- 2:03:24which is what these tactics are. Tying
- 2:03:26all of that back into portfolio
- 2:03:28management, on account spending greater
- 2:03:30than 50k per month, really the job of
- 2:03:32the media buyer is portfolio management
- 2:03:35across the ads and diversifying risk
- 2:03:38here. Portfolio management against the
- 2:03:40products, and assuring commercial
- 2:03:43objectives within the business is
- 2:03:45aligned with what is actually occurring
- 2:03:47within the ad account. And so the 80/20
- 2:03:49Pareto principle's rule applies into
- 2:03:52ads, and so the question becomes, do we
- 2:03:54want this naturally occurring within the
- 2:03:56account, or do we want to force back
- 2:03:57against it through introducing some
- 2:03:59structure so that we're not
- 2:04:01over-leveraged on ads?
- 2:04:02Same thing applies into products. And
- 2:04:04then on commercials, this becomes, are
- 2:04:06we making a balance sheet or a P&L play?
- 2:04:09And what I mean by that is that agencies
- 2:04:11will always optimize to maximize profit.
- 2:04:14Okay, the idea is how do we have the
- 2:04:15highest efficiency, how do we have the
- 2:04:17highest profit contribution? That is
- 2:04:19what they are KPI'd on. But often in a
- 2:04:21lot of businesses, if you do that, if
- 2:04:23you over-optimize towards profit, you
- 2:04:24end up end up under-optimizing towards
- 2:04:27the balance sheet, and you end up in a
- 2:04:29position where you have a lot of unsold
- 2:04:30inventory sitting on the balance sheet
- 2:04:32that isn't selling through. And yes, you
- 2:04:34are making profit, and yes, you are
- 2:04:35spitting out cash, but the cash gets
- 2:04:37tied up in the balance sheet quite
- 2:04:39quickly. And so, you could have a P&L
- 2:04:41that says $2 million in profit, but then
- 2:04:44you have a balance sheet that has $3
- 2:04:46million in unsold inventory, and this
- 2:04:48business is actually negative $1 million
- 2:04:49in cash because all of this cash that
- 2:04:52they produced just moved into unsold
- 2:04:53inventory. And this is fixable through
- 2:04:55paid media, through the account
- 2:04:57structure. You just need to restructure
- 2:04:59the account to sell through this stock.
- 2:05:01It's not going to give you the best
- 2:05:02return. Your efficiency isn't going to
- 2:05:03be that good. You're going to have to
- 2:05:04make creatives around this stock as
- 2:05:06well, which is going to be a hard pill
- 2:05:07to swallow, but it's going to allow you
- 2:05:09to get out of this position and
- 2:05:10rebalance the business. And this is
- 2:05:12ultimately what the media buy needs to
- 2:05:13be across. If the media buy isn't across
- 2:05:15inventory, that is not good. Creative
- 2:05:18strategy is worthless without the
- 2:05:20production. And so, moving into creative
- 2:05:22production, teams briefing, and the
- 2:05:24process, I want to start with the three
- 2:05:26content types. Number one is winning
- 2:05:28content replications. So, this is taking
- 2:05:31your winners and replicating them in
- 2:05:33some capacity, okay? Whether that's
- 2:05:34iteration on the hook, whether this is
- 2:05:36translating them into different formats,
- 2:05:38you're taking concepts, you're taking
- 2:05:40ideas, you're taking creatives that have
- 2:05:41already worked in the past, and you're
- 2:05:43replicating on them. This is by far the
- 2:05:45highest impact content type that you can
- 2:05:48do across paid as well as organic. If
- 2:05:51you have organic content that's
- 2:05:52performing well, what most people don't
- 2:05:54do enough is just repost the same stuff,
- 2:05:56redo the same stuff over and over and
- 2:05:58over again because every single time you
- 2:05:59do it, it performs just the same, but it
- 2:06:01reaches a new audience. So, this is
- 2:06:03where a lot of your effort should go.
- 2:06:05Then you move into iterative content.
- 2:06:06This is trying to fix underperformers
- 2:06:08through changes in hooks, changes in
- 2:06:10formats. You're working on tangential
- 2:06:13creative ideas. So, if you have a
- 2:06:15concept that's working, you're making a
- 2:06:16slight change to a new persona, or
- 2:06:18you're introducing a new offer, and
- 2:06:19you're trying to get it to work. This is
- 2:06:21the second highest priority prioritized
- 2:06:24by leverage. And then down the bottom
- 2:06:26here is net new concepts. This is
- 2:06:28testing completely new new completely
- 2:06:31new angles, completely new concepts. You
- 2:06:34should be doing this and you should be
- 2:06:35allocating time and energy to it. How
- 2:06:37much you allocate is based on the
- 2:06:39performance up here as well as your risk
- 2:06:41profile. What I would not recommend is
- 2:06:43some people do 0% here. This is a
- 2:06:45terrible idea because all of this will
- 2:06:47eventually fatigue and fall off and
- 2:06:49you'll be in a very terrible position.
- 2:06:50So, you need to constantly be finding
- 2:06:51new stuff to then flow up to the top of
- 2:06:53the funnel here. But, I would say that
- 2:06:55most people actually overweight towards
- 2:06:58net new concepts. I would say that I
- 2:07:00actually do this myself in my own
- 2:07:02organic content, which is that probably
- 2:07:0480 to 90% of the content I put out is
- 2:07:07net new. It's new concepts, it's new
- 2:07:09ideas, it's new stuff I've never spoken
- 2:07:11about before and 10 to 20% is just the
- 2:07:14exact same stuff over and over again.
- 2:07:15And what ends up happening is all of the
- 2:07:17winning content replication always does
- 2:07:19unbelievably well, holds 80% of the
- 2:07:21views and this stuff doesn't really work
- 2:07:22that well. It does allow for continuous
- 2:07:25winners to be pushed up here, but this
- 2:07:27is probably an over-allocation. And so,
- 2:07:29my recommendation, generally speaking,
- 2:07:31this is going to change contextual to
- 2:07:33the business, is that you want about 20
- 2:07:36to 30% of effort down here, another 20
- 2:07:39to 30% of effort down here, and about 50
- 2:07:43to 60% effort up here. Now, when it
- 2:07:45comes to briefing in creators, the key
- 2:07:48here is that the quality of the output
- 2:07:50of the creator is going to be a product
- 2:07:52of the quality of the brief. Okay, so
- 2:07:54you want to do two things when you're
- 2:07:55sourcing creators. Number one is you
- 2:07:58want to check what they've made in the
- 2:07:59past. You want examples and if you're
- 2:08:01not doing this, that's kind of crazy.
- 2:08:03That this is kind of self-evident, but
- 2:08:05you want examples of what they've
- 2:08:05produced in the past. But, not only
- 2:08:07that, this is kind of where the
- 2:08:08additional source is is that you go
- 2:08:10under that and you get the brief
- 2:08:13of the example that they created. Cuz
- 2:08:15that's going to give you a direct
- 2:08:17one-for-one comparison of how does this
- 2:08:18creator produce against a brief? Was the
- 2:08:21brief super in-depth and therefore we
- 2:08:23need to match that level? Did this
- 2:08:24creator make something amazing with a
- 2:08:26terrible brief? Okay, then we know that
- 2:08:28we can give them relatively broad
- 2:08:29strokes and they're going to pull it
- 2:08:30into something that's going to be good.
- 2:08:32Now, generally speaking, I want the
- 2:08:34highest quality, most in-depth in-depth
- 2:08:36brief possible. If they don't want to
- 2:08:37hold to the script, that's fine. Shoot
- 2:08:39one that's held to the script, shoot one
- 2:08:41that feels more natural. We can choose
- 2:08:43the best, we can run them both. Um but
- 2:08:45you really want examples and the briefs
- 2:08:47associated with those examples to be
- 2:08:49able to set yourself up for success when
- 2:08:51you're going and building out creative
- 2:08:52briefs. When it comes to building out
- 2:08:54teams around production, I've seen a lot
- 2:08:56of different teams that all produce
- 2:08:58enormous amounts of volume, but there's
- 2:08:59a few different key hires that you
- 2:09:01should think through when you're
- 2:09:02thinking about maximizing volume within
- 2:09:04a team. Uh number one is a video editor,
- 2:09:06specifically for video ads.
- 2:09:10Now, if this person can be AI native or
- 2:09:12someone that uh has built a lot of AI
- 2:09:14creatives in the past, this is even
- 2:09:16better because this just unlocks the
- 2:09:17ability to make way more assets and work
- 2:09:20with way more footage that doesn't
- 2:09:22actually exist yet.
- 2:09:23Another one is a designer for statics.
- 2:09:26Okay, now both of these can be based
- 2:09:28anywhere globally. Both of them can be
- 2:09:31part-time contractors based on actual
- 2:09:33outcome or they can be full-time within
- 2:09:34the business. Then as a third, you want
- 2:09:37a creative strategist. Now, this is a
- 2:09:39new role that didn't really exist two to
- 2:09:42three years ago and therefore there
- 2:09:43aren't actually many creative strategist
- 2:09:45out there. So, what do you actually look
- 2:09:47for when hiring for this role? Well, you
- 2:09:50you look for number one, copywriters
- 2:09:52because creative strategy is primarily
- 2:09:55copywriting. They're writing the
- 2:09:57scripts, they're writing the brief for
- 2:09:59the static image, they're ideating on
- 2:10:00new personas. This is exactly what
- 2:10:02copywriters have been doing except
- 2:10:04copywriters are now redundant because
- 2:10:06LLMs will just produce most of it. And
- 2:10:08so, these people are coming up with the
- 2:10:10ideas and then they're moving this into
- 2:10:12a Claude scale, which needs to be built
- 2:10:14by you and brand purposed to then output
- 2:10:16an actual script that then goes into
- 2:10:18production. The next option is you just
- 2:10:20poach a creative strategist from
- 2:10:22somewhere else. There's enough floating
- 2:10:23around now that you can probably find
- 2:10:25one. Or the third is you actually
- 2:10:28backfill this role from a designer or a
- 2:10:30video editor. And so, you train a
- 2:10:31designer or a video editor editor up
- 2:10:34into becoming a creative strategist. And
- 2:10:36this actually allows for faster feedback
- 2:10:38loops cuz they can ideate on all the
- 2:10:40ideas and then they can design and then
- 2:10:42they can obviously brief in for any
- 2:10:43video edits. These are really the two
- 2:10:45pathways into creative strategists as it
- 2:10:47currently stands. Now, in terms of a
- 2:10:48side note here, what a lot of people
- 2:10:50will do with their creative strategists,
- 2:10:52which depending on the scale and volume
- 2:10:54that you're at, depends on whether you
- 2:10:55want to do this or not, is they will
- 2:10:57actually pay out a percentage of ad
- 2:10:59spend
- 2:11:00based on the creatives that they
- 2:11:02obviously come up with and then brief
- 2:11:04in. And so, the creative strategist is
- 2:11:06directly incentivized to maximize hit
- 2:11:08rates because if their ads don't get
- 2:11:09spend and don't perform, they don't get
- 2:11:11paid. Typically, this sits at about 3%
- 2:11:14of ad spend. So, you'll pay out the
- 2:11:15creative strategist on top of a base
- 2:11:17salary with a percentage variable model
- 2:11:20that is obviously directly proportional
- 2:11:22to the results within the account. Now,
- 2:11:24I've seen this work really well on
- 2:11:25mid-size brands. When you get really
- 2:11:27big, this gets outrageous cuz these
- 2:11:28creative strategists end up getting paid
- 2:11:30like $80,000 a month and so then the
- 2:11:32model kind of breaks and you end up
- 2:11:33moving away from it. A really important
- 2:11:35part of this whole component of all
- 2:11:38production is where does AI fit into the
- 2:11:41mix? When you break down the creative
- 2:11:43process end to end, you've got ideation
- 2:11:46as step number one. You then have
- 2:11:48briefing. You then move into the actual
- 2:11:50production and then you move into the
- 2:11:52publishing into the account and
- 2:11:54ultimately the analysis process that
- 2:11:56feeds back into here on future ideation.
- 2:12:00Now, a lot of people are going and
- 2:12:02applying AI and they're building clawed
- 2:12:03skills for this right here, the ideation
- 2:12:06process. This right now, at least at the
- 2:12:08time of recording, is not the place
- 2:12:10where you want to automate because the
- 2:12:12reality is is that all of the LLMs just
- 2:12:14output the mean. And so, no matter how
- 2:12:16much context you provide, no matter how
- 2:12:18much documentation you have, no matter
- 2:12:20how much you build out your skills to go
- 2:12:22and scrape Reddit and all of these
- 2:12:23different forms to come up with unique
- 2:12:24ideas, ultimately the ideation process
- 2:12:27here ends up not being strong enough to
- 2:12:29differentiate from competitors, and you
- 2:12:31still need a creative strategist to
- 2:12:32really do a lot of heavy lifting here to
- 2:12:34validate the concepting.
- 2:12:36When you then move into briefing and
- 2:12:38script writing, this is when this can be
- 2:12:40heavily leveraged with AI. That's when
- 2:12:42you want to build a Claude skill to be
- 2:12:44able to walk you through like a
- 2:12:4620-question questionnaire about who's
- 2:12:48your persona, who's the concept, who's
- 2:12:49the offer, do you want this to be
- 2:12:51long-form, what stage of awareness is it
- 2:12:53at? And so, you're answering all of
- 2:12:54these questions, and then ultimately at
- 2:12:56the end of it, it pumps you out a script
- 2:12:58or a brief that's going to be 99% of the
- 2:13:00way there, and you just have a 1% tweak.
- 2:13:03On production, there's a lot of leverage
- 2:13:04right now in AI as well. It's obviously
- 2:13:06going to speed up workflows, but in VSLs
- 2:13:08and static image ads as well, you can
- 2:13:11pretty much get away with AI for 90% of
- 2:13:13it. Then in the analysis process, this
- 2:13:15is also where AI becomes a little bit
- 2:13:18dangerous because it won't over weight
- 2:13:20to the hierarchy of metrics that you're
- 2:13:21looking at, and won't sit towards the
- 2:13:23importance of the account structure and
- 2:13:25aligning the context of the creative to
- 2:13:28the commercial objectives of the
- 2:13:29business. So, there is leverage here.
- 2:13:31You can use it in analysis. We use it in
- 2:13:34analysis. But there is so much context
- 2:13:36required that it still misses a lot of
- 2:13:38the time, and if you're using AI
- 2:13:40analysis to make core decisions within
- 2:13:42the business,
- 2:13:43a lot of the time it actually misleads
- 2:13:44you in the wrong direction. And so, with
- 2:13:46AI application, I would try to skip the
- 2:13:48outsides and really maximize throughput
- 2:13:51on the middle. Want to make a quick note
- 2:13:52here on content-first brands, which is
- 2:13:56brands that are starting with organic
- 2:13:57content first before they even touch
- 2:13:59paid. I think this is the approach for
- 2:14:02'26 and '27 because it's not due to the
- 2:14:05fact that organic content outperforms
- 2:14:07paid, but it's due to the fact that
- 2:14:09organic content forces you to become
- 2:14:11good at creative, which then compounds
- 2:14:13into paid when you know how to make
- 2:14:15content that people actually want to
- 2:14:16watch. And so my recommendation to
- 2:14:18smaller founders that are watching this
- 2:14:20video is that I would be posting
- 2:14:22organically every single day. I would be
- 2:14:24getting good at figuring out what good
- 2:14:25content looks like, see what actually
- 2:14:27gains views, look at the retention
- 2:14:28graph, look at the share and save rates
- 2:14:31because this is ultimately going to
- 2:14:32improve your ability to make ads that
- 2:14:34are actually at a good quality. Another
- 2:14:36side note here is that when it comes to
- 2:14:38creators, you want to make sure that
- 2:14:41they're regional to where you're
- 2:14:42actually targeting. So as an example of
- 2:14:44this, in Australia, you want Australian
- 2:14:46accents. When you go to the US and you
- 2:14:48try to translate an Australian accent
- 2:14:50into the market, it just does not
- 2:14:51perform as well. So you need native US
- 2:14:53accents. Uh UK to AU actually translates
- 2:14:57decently well, but still native accents
- 2:14:59always outperform. So you want to make
- 2:15:00sure the creative is a native to the
- 2:15:02actual region that you're targeting. It
- 2:15:03can be the exact same script, it just
- 2:15:06has to be a local creator. And then one
- 2:15:07final recommendation when it comes to
- 2:15:09production is on copywriting.
- 2:15:11Copywriting is still one of the highest
- 2:15:13leverage skills when it comes to
- 2:15:15building out video assets scripts and
- 2:15:18also building out static images.
- 2:15:21Particularly long-form copy static
- 2:15:22images. There are four books on
- 2:15:24copywriting that I have read and I
- 2:15:26recommend you read all of them if you're
- 2:15:28wanting to become good at creative
- 2:15:29strategy and copywriting. Number one is
- 2:15:31Breakthrough Advertising by Eugene
- 2:15:33Schwartz. Number two is Scientific
- 2:15:34Advertising by Claude Hopkins. Number
- 2:15:36three is Ogilvy on Advertising by David
- 2:15:39Ogilvy. And then number four is
- 2:15:41Influence, the Psychology of Persuasion.
- 2:15:44If you read those four books, you will
- 2:15:45become exponentially better at being
- 2:15:47able to actually script out copy that
- 2:15:50will convert better through ads. So if
- 2:15:51we now go and put it all together, the
- 2:15:53foundation is that you want to
- 2:15:54understand how the ad platforms work.
- 2:15:56Understand that the creative is the
- 2:15:58targeting. Concept separation is what's
- 2:16:00going to allow you to reach new
- 2:16:01audiences. Then when it comes to
- 2:16:02concepts, you want to understand how to
- 2:16:04split up a concept, start with personas,
- 2:16:06move into angles, then move into the
- 2:16:08offer, and as the final component, you
- 2:16:10want to bring in the format. Hooks drive
- 2:16:1280% of the view through within an ad, so
- 2:16:14it's really important to spend time in
- 2:16:16optimizing that portion of the ad, and
- 2:16:18usually hook testing across multiple
- 2:16:20different videos. The three components
- 2:16:21of a hook is the visual, the copy, and
- 2:16:23the audio. You can change any three of
- 2:16:26these variables and improve performance.
- 2:16:28Then, you move into the format. You want
- 2:16:30to start with the concepting first, then
- 2:16:31always move into formats. Statics are
- 2:16:33great for quick testing on new concepts,
- 2:16:35and then they can be validated and moved
- 2:16:37into videos. Statics also are incredibly
- 2:16:39underrated, and most people don't think
- 2:16:41they perform well because it's a skill
- 2:16:42issue. I have seen static image ads
- 2:16:44spend $500,000 in lifetime spend. And
- 2:16:47you want to always be careful on DPAs.
- 2:16:48DPAs are good, but they generally
- 2:16:49overspend and the ROAS number over
- 2:16:51inflates them. When it comes to testing,
- 2:16:53you always want to be testing one
- 2:16:54variable at a time. You want amount
- 2:16:56spent to be the best proxy for
- 2:16:58performance, then ROAS and the tertiary
- 2:17:00metrics. And the actual structure of the
- 2:17:02ad account should be a product of the
- 2:17:03complexity of the business. When it
- 2:17:05comes to thinking through volume versus
- 2:17:07quality, you want as much volume as
- 2:17:08possible, as long as it meets the bar of
- 2:17:10quality that we would classify it as a
- 2:17:13good ad. If it's a good creative, no one
- 2:17:15will be able to guess which one will
- 2:17:16win, so put them all into the account.
- 2:17:17When ads fatigue, it's because you're
- 2:17:19either trying to push too much spend
- 2:17:21through a niche audience, and it's
- 2:17:22driving up frequency, or the ad has
- 2:17:25simply reached its lifetime spend, it's
- 2:17:27falling off, and you need to diversify
- 2:17:29by thinking through portfolio management
- 2:17:31risk. When it comes to production, we
- 2:17:33ran through all of the relevant and tame
- 2:17:35structure that you should think through,
- 2:17:36as well as the fact that you want to be
- 2:17:38putting majority of your production cost
- 2:17:40towards iteration, rather than net new
- 2:17:42concept design, because that's going to
- 2:17:43drive most of the performance. And then
- 2:17:45if we do one final breakdown of spend
- 2:17:48per month, and the recommendations on
- 2:17:50how you should approach creative, at 4
- 2:17:52to 30k a month, the founder's creating
- 2:17:54the content, it can be done on an
- 2:17:55iPhone, you want it to come across
- 2:17:57natural, all the leverage is going to be
- 2:17:58in how strong the scripts are. You You
- 2:18:00to be working on three core concepts,
- 2:18:02you really don't need more than that at
- 2:18:03this scale. You just want to do these
- 2:18:05well.
- 2:18:06You want a high testing allocation.
- 2:18:08Realistically, 60 to 80% of your
- 2:18:09budget's going to go towards testing
- 2:18:10because you just don't have enough spend
- 2:18:12yet to even scale winners. And then you
- 2:18:14can use trial reels as well as a hack
- 2:18:16for validating ideas. Once you move into
- 2:18:1830 to 100k per month, you want two to
- 2:18:21three UGC creators. 25% of this spend
- 2:18:24needs to be going towards production.
- 2:18:26You're going to move into five to six
- 2:18:27concepts. You want to start branching
- 2:18:29out and de-risking. You're going to have
- 2:18:31an and then likely a scaling
- 2:18:33campaign. You're sitting at 30 to 100
- 2:18:35new creatives per month here, or you're
- 2:18:37using our creative calculator and it'll
- 2:18:38give you an exact amount. And then as a
- 2:18:40little hack at the bottom, you want to
- 2:18:42be introducing partnership ads. And then
- 2:18:44if you're at over 100k per month in ad
- 2:18:46spend, you really want a full creative
- 2:18:48team. Someone who's doing scripting, you
- 2:18:50want an editor, you want four to six
- 2:18:52creators, and you want a designer. Now,
- 2:18:54these could be part-time, but you want
- 2:18:56these resources in place so that you
- 2:18:58have the production machine in place to
- 2:19:01churn out creative. That's really what
- 2:19:02you want to be looking for at this ad
- 2:19:03spend level, is you need a system that
- 2:19:05consistently produces creative on an
- 2:19:07ongoing basis. If that isn't in place,
- 2:19:09you're just constantly going to be
- 2:19:10scrambling and creative will be the
- 2:19:12bottleneck. You want at least 10% as a
- 2:19:14minimum budget going towards creative at
- 2:19:16this spend level. You want eight to 10
- 2:19:18active concepts within the account. You
- 2:19:20want at least 100 new assets per month
- 2:19:22based on the basic 1k per ad formula.
- 2:19:25And you want a financial model in place
- 2:19:26that's tracking your cost per asset,
- 2:19:28ideally across the different sources.
- 2:19:30So, how much is these creative pieces
- 2:19:33costing you? And then, what is the
- 2:19:35average profit contribution per ad on
- 2:19:37these creatives? So, we can start to see
- 2:19:39if the cost per asset of these different
- 2:19:41content types is actually worth it. And
- 2:19:43you want to be tracking ROI at an
- 2:19:44individual ad level based on ad spend
- 2:19:47against the cost of production. For most
- 2:19:49people right now, creative is the
- 2:19:50constraint on meta. You don't know what
- 2:19:53good looks like until you start doing
- 2:19:54volume, building out concepts,
- 2:19:56scripting, getting ads in the account,
- 2:19:58and beginning that feedback loop. So, as
- 2:20:00a wrap-up, if you're a performance
- 2:20:02marketer and you have at least 2 years
- 2:20:03experience, please reach out to us in
- 2:20:04the description below. We're always
- 2:20:06hiring. And if you're an e-commerce
- 2:20:07brand or a retail business doing at
- 2:20:09least 5 to 10 million dollars a year at
- 2:20:10a minimum, you can also click below or
- 2:20:12reach out to us and we'll do a
- 2:20:13completely free audit where everything
- 2:20:15that you've learned in this video, we
- 2:20:17will actually translate directly into
- 2:20:19the ads that you're running, directly
- 2:20:20into your ad account. We'll pick it
- 2:20:21apart so that you can know how to unlock
- 2:20:23the current bottleneck that's stopping
- 2:20:25you from growing. And also, please
- 2:20:26subscribe.
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