“Will Facebook Ads Work For My Brand?” It takes more than the right ad. You need the right product and the right target market. Read on to learn more.
This content was originally published in the No Best Practices newsletter on 2.26.2023.
Something that marketers often forget: our marketing channels are made up of people (just like our revenues!). Those people are not on Facebook and Instagram to look at your ads. They’re on FB/IG to catch up with friends, get inspired, get entertained, or simply due to force of habit.
A FB/IG user logs on with a specific intent. At least 50% of what they’re seeing is organic content–posts from friends, creators and brands. The ads you develop need to work within that context or you’ll stick out like a sore thumb and get filtered out.
The nature of your product is the primary driver of this context. Many brands who struggle to make Meta advertising a scalable channel simply suffer from poor product-channel fit.
I’m going to share a checklist of 9 traits that make a product/brand a good fit for Meta ads, and then share some advice if your brand doesn’t tick many, or any of those boxes.
“Will Facebook Ads Work For My Brand?” 9 Things That Will Improve Your Odds
1: Product Margin Of 70%+
This means that if your product’s MSRP is $100, your landed cost of goods sold is $30 or less. Meta is a relatively high cost channel, even if your strategy is optimized to the hilt.
Your CAC for that $100 product is going to be $30-50 on average. That will get “choppier” the more you scale spend–it may be $30 today and $50 tomorrow. So you need that product margin cushion to absorb your CAC profitably.
2: Priced Between $50 and $200
Lower than $50 and it will be difficult to maintain a profitable CAC at scale. Not impossible, but much harder.
Higher than $200 and you’ll shift outside of the “impulse buy” zone for most Americans. This will make your consideration period longer, which makes your feedback period for ads longer, which increases your overall risk and required level of investment.
You can succeed outside this price band, but you’ll be playing the game on hard mode.
3: Addresses A Broad Audience, Or Multiple Niche Audiences
If your product’s target audience is “women over 50”, it’s going to be relatively easy for Meta to find your relevant audience. If your product’s target audience is “women 35-45 with small breed dogs and PHD degrees in the humanities”…good luck.
If your audience is demographically diverse, but can self-identify based on profession or problem statement, this can also work. Think about a laundry detergent formulated for people with sensitive skin. You could target new moms, people with allergies, people with skin conditions like eczema, etc.
4: Addresses a “Hole In The Market”
Some of today’s largest brands (Victoria’s Secret comes to mind) addressed a hole in the market in the 1980s or 1990s. A hole in the market is an unmet need in distribution, audience served or product feature.
Finding one of these is harder than ever because the barriers to starting a brand are lower than ever. But if you do find one, you can speak directly to the audience that is being shortchanged by the current offering in the category. This makes for more powerful, resonant advertising.
5: Solves A Problem Or Delivers Results
People with a problem on their hands are more primed to buy–they want to solve that problem. But the definition of “problem” is pretty flexible. It could be something broad and quantifiable–”I want to lose 30 pounds”–or something vague and sensual–“I feel old and farty, I want to refresh my appearance”.
If you can frame your product or brand as the solution to a problem, you’ll reach an audience with higher purchase intent. This increases conversion rates, which reduces CAC.
6: Eye-Catching, Still Or In Action
Eye-catching products are “scroll stopping”–more Facebook/Instagram users stop scrolling and pay attention to your ad content. And that often translates to more clicks, and more conversions.
Eye-catching could mean bright colors or ~sparkles~. Eye-catching could also mean dramatic results, or a cool effect when the product is in use.
Sign up for a Twitter account and pay attention to the ads you’re served–these are often good examples.
7: Low(ish) Return Rates
A return rate >25% will really eat into your ability to be contribution margin profitable on the first purchase. I deep dive into the math behind that in this post.
Return rates become challenging when product quality is inconsistent, fit is a major component of the purchase (jeans, shoes, etc.) or your marketing is making promises that your product doesn’t deliver.
8: Is Trendy Or Cheugy
Click this link to learn about the core, engaged Meta user. If you could imagine her using your product in her GRWM story or talking to her friends about it, your path to scale will be a lot smoother than the alternative.
9: Isn’t A “Forbidden Category”
If you’re selling guns, knives, CBD, or other products that Meta explicitly bans, you won’t be allowed to point campaigns to product pages for those items. There are ways to work around this, but it will make your results less predictable. The ban hammer will always be hanging over your head.
What To Do If Facebook Ads Don’t Work For Your Brand
If your product doesn’t tick off many, or any, of the nine points above, all hope is not lost. Here are some alternatives you can explore, both inside and outside of Meta.
Try Meta Anyway, But Go All Out
A product with really strong channel fit can afford to forgo some Meta platform “best practices”. But a product with weak channel fit needs to pull out all the stops:
- Account consolidation–try to get your ad sets driving 50+ conversion events per week.
- “Ads that don’t look like ads” i.e. vertical video shot on iPhone that feels like it could be a reel or a TikTok.
- Direct response-style creative–messaging that meets high intent folks where they are in the buying journey. More on that here.
- Landing pages. Cody did a great writeup on that here.
Use Meta As A Complement
“U must go broad” types hate this. But sometimes, the only way to do profitable acquisition is to not scale, and not go broad. I wrote a thread about that here. You’ll have to build out a more diversified marketing mix to grow, potentially outside of digital channels.
Use A Customer-Focused, Channel-Agnostic Strategy
This is treating your “go to market” strategy like a military invasion. Who is the target customer? Where do they live? What stores do they shop in? What media do they consume? Who do they view as credible within your domain?
Develop a strategy that covers all of those bases, starting with the avenues that you can afford. This isn’t as predictable as Meta advertising, but it can be incredibly successful.
Validate Your Idea IRL
You tried to use Meta ads to launch your brand. You burned through several thousand dollars and nothing seemed to work. Go out into the IRL world, touch grass, and then try to get your first 100 sales.
Figure out where your target market spends time and then (physically) get in front of them. Farmer’s markets, little league games, the mall, etc. Sell things out of the trunk of your car. Even if folks don’t convert, you can get some valuable feedback if you’re nice.
Make Your Product/Brand A Better Fit
This can be as simple as bundling to get your AOV up or only featuring the best fitting segment of your assortment in ads. Or can be as complex as building out a diffusion line that is better aligned with Meta’s preferred price range.