Facebook ads case study: Skincare brand grows revenue by 1,164.36% in 16 months

Strategy Overview

Our primary goal was to generate ROI from Facebook & Google ad campaigns.

Therefore, we applied a simple & tested formula:

• Choose a locale with the highest chance of success.
• Run conversion ads optimized for purchases. 95% of our campaigns were optimized for website purchases (with a few webinar & online event campaigns.)
• In the initial phase, test audiences, ad creatives, products/product categories & campaign structures.
• Analyze & evaluate the data to determine which ads & campaign structures generate the highest ROI.
• Keep the best-performing ad variations running.
• Turn off all non-performing ads (low/negative ROI, high cost per customer acquisition, high cost per link click.)
• Test more ad creatives & products with the winning ad campaign structure & audience.
• Rinse & Repeat.

Account & Campaign setup:

• Before running a single campaign, we set up all the technical details (pixels, conversion events, conversion API, UTM link tracking, Google Analytics E-commerce tracking, etc.)
• Campaign objective – Sales / Conversions. 
• Conversion event – Website Purchases.
• Winning campaign structure – one campaign, one ad set with a 50 euros per day budget, and many individual ads linking to each product or product category page. When testing, I added the new ads to the winning ad set. 
• Target Audience – Women, 25+, Broad targeting (no interests, lookalikes, etc.) Exclusions – 30-Day Purchases.
• Budget – First three months 500 euros / month on FB, then 1500 euros / month on FB & 300 euros / month on Google Display. Additional budget boost on sales campaigns. On Black Friday, we increased the budget up to 100 euros/day on FB.
• Placements – Automatic. I’ve tested auto vs. feeds only vs. story only, and automatic placements outperform manual placements every single time. I do recommend creating & adding the correct image/video sizes for each placement.
• Metrics – Reach, impressions, frequency, link clicks, cost per link click, Link click-through rate, Add To Cart, Initiate checkout, Ad spend, Purchases, Cost per purchase, ROAS.
• I compared Facebook ads manager data with Google Analytics data to get a more accurate representation of campaign performance. This is important because Facebook uses a different attribution setting (7 days after clicking or 1 day after viewing) than Google Analytics (last-click attribution). Also, Facebook reports have had slightly inflated & inaccurate conversion metrics in many of the accounts I’ve worked on. 

Creative strategy:

Ad Copy:

• • Most of the ads followed the AIDA formula – Attention, Interest, Desire, Action.
  • For body copy, there’s a limited amount of characters before the text is cut off by the “see more” button. The main purpose here is to attract the attention of our audience.
  • If the person clicks on the see more button, the rest of the ad explains the benefits of the product.
  • At the very end, there’s a call to action. 
  • The strongest appeal usually is self-interest. What’s in it for them? 
  • For headlines, I like to figure out the most compelling benefit or the results we’re promising. Making it short & straight to the point worked best.
  • For sales/discount campaigns, short & punchy copy with discount percentages & dates when the promo is running worked best. 

Visuals

• • We used 95% of image ads for our campaigns because they are faster & cheaper to design than video ads. 
  • The best performing images are usually collages:
    • If you’re selling a physical product, the product should take up most of the space & should be the focal point of the ad.
    • A human face or body (depending on the product) helps attract the attention of our target audience.
    • If the product is marketed to women, use a picture of an attractive woman. 
    • If the product is marketed to men, use a picture of an attractive man.
    • The images of the people you use in the ads should have the qualities your prospects are looking to acquire.
    • Stay away from basic stock photos as most people can recognize them. Authentic-looking photos worked best. 
    • For organic skincare products, using some of the ingredients found in the product for your collages can also be utilized. 
    • Since Facebook removed the 20% text rule, adding text with benefits or product use cases to the image can also be utilized.

Compliance

• • The personal attributes policy is the most commonly violated policy.
  • To avoid getting your accounts disabled, follow these principles:
    • Focus on the product benefits, not the user.
    • Don’t call out the user directly.
    • Don’t use direct questions like “Do you have baggy eyes?”
    • Don’t make the users feel like you know any personal information about them.
    • Even though using the word “you” in ads isn’t prohibited, I avoid using it when working in health-related niches.
  • Here are approaches that have worked for me:
    • Write in a general, non-user-user-specific way. Talk about the problem, the solutions, the transformation & the results your customers have had in a general way. 
    • Write about the ingredients your product has, and how each element helps with specific problems. 
    • Write a story about a person (whether real or fictional) who struggled, but overcame their issues by using the product.
    • Write a story of transformation in the first person. “How I overcame…” 
  • The policies are written ambiguously for a reason. This allows Facebook to evaluate and enforce the policies on a case-by-case basis. 
  • Your track record matters. If you abide by their rules and build up a solid reputation, you may get away with a more direct approach.
  • Using gray area tactics will be detrimental to your longevity on the platform. 

Sales campaigns

We ran a total of four major sales campaigns within a year and a few minor ones on seasonal holidays. 

The four sales campaigns:

• August sales campaign – Buy one, get one free.
• Early November Sales Campaign – up to 50% off.
• Black Friday – up to 70% off.
• Christmas Sales campaign – Gift Sets/bundles up to -20%.

Sales campaign structure:

• A week before the campaign, launch an ad announcing the dates and discounts to build up anticipation.
• About four hours before the campaign launch, add the sales campaign ads. If you have a less seasoned account, you might want to do this earlier or even pre-schedule the ads to launch at the specified time.
• Then on the morning of the last day of the sales campaign, add a scarcity ad announcing that the sale is about to close.

The best timeframe for a sales campaign was four days. 

The first and last day of the campaign generates most of the sales volume.

Results

Facebook data

• Total ad spend – €21,996.54
• Purchase conversion value – €305,544.78 
• Reach – 310,746 people reached
• Impressions – 6,979,629 total
• Frequency – 22.46 per person
• CPM – €3.15 Per 1,000 Impressions
• Link clicks – 54,450 total
• Cost per link click – €0.40 per action
• CTR – 0.78% per impression
• Add to carts – 28,133
• Initiate checkout – 16,288
• Purchases – 6,198

Google ads data

• Ad spend – €3,596.95
• Clicks – 75,391
• CTR – 0.96%
• Purchases – 330.00
• Revenue – Google ads conversion tag wasn’t set up properly so the data isn’t accurate. 

Google Analytics data

All traffic sources:

Facebook campaigns

• Users – 48,653
• New users – 37,127
• Sessions – 58,034
• Transactions – 1,084
• Revenue – €46,003.35

Google ads campaigns

• Users – 32,100
• New users – 23,710
• Sessions – 59,325
• Transactions – 214
• Revenue – €14,262.02

Key Takeaways:

• Test ad creatives, products, product categories, and campaign structures to find out what produces the best results.
• Once you have the data – scale up your winners.
• It’s important to set up the technical details before running a single campaign.
• Optimize for sales and choose the correct conversion event – purchases.
• Compare the data of the ad platforms with google analytics. There’s a high chance you’ll see discrepancies. 
• Use UTM parameters to get accurate data in google analytics.
• It’s easier & more profitable to scale a best-selling product than it is to sell a product that is not in demand.
• Most of the efforts should be focused on designing the best ad creatives. The AI algorithms of the ad platforms are highly advanced & sophisticated. If you set up your campaigns for sales, they’ll try to get you as many sales as possible.
• If you have high-quality ad creatives & a fairly broad audience, your ads can run for months without annoying the people even with high frequency (ours was 22.46 per person).