Solved: Facebook Ads Budget Goes to Wrong Ad Creative

Hi there,

Thanks for reaching out and asking for my advice. I'm happy to give you some initial thoughts and guidance on your Facebook Ads campaign for your façade cleaning business in Germany. I understand you're having trouble with Advantage+ campaigns pushing budget to a non-performing ad, and I can certainly offer some suggestions based on my experience.

We'll need to look at Advantage+ Campaigns...

Advantage+ campaigns, while designed to automate and optimize ad spend, can sometimes be a bit of a black box, particularly for local lead generation campaigns. The algorithm *should* be allocating budget to the best-performing ad, but it doesn't always get it right, especially in smaller regions with limited data. It's not unheard of for Advantage+ to need a little nudge sometimes. I've seen some dodgy campaign behaviors, so it is important to test what works best.

I remember working on a software campaign where we were aiming for signups. We were using Meta Ads and saw that the algorithm wasn't always allocating budget in the most efficient way. It can be pretty frustrating when you're seeing good metrics from one ad, but Meta's not giving it the chance to shine. This is a non-sensical allocation that wastes your budget in the short term.

The key is to find ways to signal to the algorithm that the better ad is worth investing in. There's a few ways you can go about it.

I'd say you try Duplicating the Ad...

One of the simplest tricks is to duplicate the ad that's already bringing in leads within the same Advantage+ campaign. By creating a second instance of the successful ad, you're essentially telling Facebook that there's more potential there and that it should allocate more budget to that creative. You can duplicate the add, but the copy should be unique for each add. I've seen this work on quite a few campaigns, where I have been able to shift the algorithm's focus to a stronger performer. Don't just duplicate without changing copy. This is just a short-term hack in my experience, the algo *will* eventually start pushing budget to another add.

The idea here is that Facebook will see two identical ads performing well and recognise that there's something about that creative that resonates with your target audience. This, in turn, should encourage the algorithm to shift budget away from the non-performing ad and towards the duplicated ad. This should resolve the immediate issue you are facing without more drastic approach. It's a relatively low-effort tactic that's worth trying before you start messing with the campaign structure.

This being said, you should consider if the ads are still relevant. Is the offer correct? How are the creatives? If these are not up to par, then they need a rework. It is important to not simply blame the algo. Also, keep in mind that any approach can only work short term.

You probably should test a Split-Test Campaign...

While duplicating ads can be a useful trick, it's not always a long-term solution. If you want to get a clearer picture of which creatives are truly resonating with your audience, a split-test campaign might be a good option, albeit with some caveats. I usually opt for this if the quick hack does not work. It's important to test what works.

The advantage of a split-test is that it allows you to directly compare different creatives against each other in a controlled environment. By running multiple ad sets with different creatives and allocating budget evenly across them, you can see which ads generate the most leads at the lowest cost. However, for this the sample size need to be significant. If that is not the case, split testing is not a good idea. The biggest worry is that there is no decisive conclusion and your budget will be even more spread. I have seen these issues before.

However, keep in mind that split-testing can also spread your budget too thin, especially if you're targeting a small local market. With a limited budget, it can take longer for each ad set to gather enough data to reach statistical significance, which can slow down the learning phase and make it difficult to draw meaningful conclusions. This is especially pertinent if you don't have huge budget. In a smaller niche, this can be really tough.

So, while split-testing can be a valuable tool for creative testing, it's important to weigh the potential benefits against the risk of over-splitting your budget and slowing down the learning phase. If you do decide to go this route, make sure you have a clear hypothesis in mind and that you're testing significantly different creatives.

You'll need to review the Manual Campaign Structure...

If duplicating the ad and split-testing don't produce the desired results, you might need to consider reverting to a manual campaign structure with separate ad sets. This approach gives you the most control over budget allocation, but it also requires more hands-on management. For some businesses, it works quite well. For others, not so much. I generally lean towards recommending manual campaign structure, as I can test different audience sets without impacting other tests.

With a manual campaign structure, you can create separate ad sets for each of your creatives and allocate budget independently to each one. This allows you to ensure that the better-performing ad gets the lion's share of the budget, while the non-performing ad gets less or none. However, by allocating budget to different audience and creative combinations, you should get a good insight on what works well. This said, it will be important to keep track of everything. Usually I keep a log with a google sheets.

The downside of a manual campaign structure is that it requires more time and effort to manage. You'll need to constantly monitor the performance of each ad set and adjust budgets accordingly. You'll also need to be more proactive in identifying and addressing any issues that arise. The flip side is that you can have greater flexibility.

However, if you're willing to put in the extra effort, a manual campaign structure can give you the control you need to optimise your ad spend and ensure that your budget is being allocated to the creatives that are generating the best results. This also means you can be much more flexible than the Advantage+ campaigns.

I've detailed my main recommendations for you below:

In summary, when you're dealing with Advantage+ campaigns and seeing budget misallocation, it's worth trying a few different tactics to nudge the system in the right direction. Duplicating the ad can be a quick fix, split-testing can provide more clarity, and a manual campaign structure can give you ultimate control.

Of course, every situation is different, and what works for one business may not work for another. Ultimately, the best approach is to test and experiment to see what works best for your specific situation. We are always looking for what is best.

If you're feeling overwhelmed or you'd like a more in-depth analysis of your campaign, feel free to book in a free consultation with us. We can take a look at your account, review your strategy, and offer some tailored recommendations to help you get the most out of your Facebook Ads budget. We've helped B2B software companies get B2B decision makers for $22 CPL using LinkedIn ads. I'm sure we could help you out further.

Regards,

Team @ Lukas Holschuh