Are your brand’s ads not performing the way you’d like them to? Sometimes it can be difficult to pinpoint why they are struggling. Ads can fail to convert for a number of reasons, so let’s take a deep dive to help you troubleshoot your ad performance.
1. You don’t have a proven product market fit.
This can be done either organically or with paid ads, but you MUST first test to see if the products that you choose to market are actually going to be purchased by your ideal customers (and who are those ideal customers?) at the price point you’ve set for it. We have had numerous clients in the past who had not proven this before coming to us, though they thought they had. As a result, their ads struggled to convert until they performed extensive testing to find their exact product market fit. Once they finalized a product, target audience, and price point that worked, they finally began to gain traction.
2. Your creatives are not professional enough to resonate with your audience.
This is especially important post iOS 14 update. It is essential that you have professional product photoshoots for your website, ads, social media, emails, and more. Wherever your brand is represented, displaying professional and visually-appealing creatives that clearly demonstrate the quality of your products and capture your brand’s style will make a world of difference in getting you to that next step in your business.
3. Your USP is not clearly defined.
Your USP (Unique Selling Point) is crucial because it tells customers what sets your products and brand apart from the competition. What makes your business special? Why should they choose to buy from you vs. somewhere else? The stronger your USP, the better your ads will perform.
4. Your website conversion rate is below 2%.
Because the average website conversion rate is 2%, you need to at least be at that level or higher before launching ads. Ad strategy is like building a house: you must first have a solid foundation in place before you can even think about building the roof. In this analogy, ads are the roof and your website conversion rate is an extremely important part of your foundation before you begin to run ads.
If your website is not converting at 2% or higher, this will hurt your business in multiple ways. Not only does it cost you extra money without putting extra ad spend behind it, but you miss out on the sales you would have gotten with a website that converted the way it should have. Raising your website conversion rate from 1% to 2% will double your sales without extra ad spend. Furthermore, if your website doesn’t at least convert at the average rate, the algorithm behind ads will take into account that you’re not converting as high as the competition and therefore it won’t send you the best audiences. Once your website hits a 2% or higher conversion rate, the algorithm will begin to favor your ads and will get you better-qualified audiences that lead to substantial business growth.
5. Your CRM list is below 1,000.
Instagram and Facebook/Meta ads now require that you upload a list of at least 1,000 people. If you have a CRM list that is below that, you can only rely on interest-based audiences and you won’t be able to take advantage of lookalike audiences. Lookalike audiences are key to running successful paid ads because they include the people who look like the ones on your list or those who have purchased your products, browsed your website, added to cart, etc. That is why you’ll want to build up this list as much as possible, and a good place to start is about 1,000 people.
6. You haven’t tested your ads enough.
Before running ads, you must perform thorough tests to make sure that your ads are effective. The variables you should be testing are:
- Several distinct audiences
- Various price point bids
- Different creatives – test multiple photos, videos, and graphics for each
- Hook – what will you use to entice people to shop? This could be a discount code, your USP, etc.
7. You don’t have a full-funnel structure for your ad campaigns.
Your ad campaigns should include all of the following stages of the funnel:
- TOF (Top of Funnel)—This is your cold audience.
- MOF (Middle of Funnel)—This retargets people who have interacted with your brand in some way (e.g., visited the website or viewed your social media profile).
- BOF (Bottom of Funnel)—This includes people who have taken a step further (e.g., added to cart or initiated payment) but haven’t yet purchased.
- BTF (Beyond the Funnel)—This is a crucial part of the funnel that people often forget. These are the people who have purchased from you before. Don’t forget to advertise to previous buyers as this will result in the highest ROAS of any other campaign.
8. You’re forgetting about your loyal customers.
Ideally, your RCR (Returning Customer Rate) should be at least 30%. However, you won’t get there overnight, especially when you’re just starting out. While this is something you must continuously build over time, it has proven to be the most rewarding. The top clients that we have grown to 7 and 8 figures (and beyond) are the ones who have an RCR of above 50%.
9. You don’t have a strong organic presence.
It can be difficult to keep up with posting on social media, and many businesses are guilty of posting a couple of times and then forgetting about it. However, the most successful brands connect and engage with audiences by posting consistently on the most popular organic channels. Brands that stay on top of responding to comments and are strategic about the content they publish are the ones that continue to flourish in the world of digital marketing. Paid advertising is like the fuel to the fire – anything you do organically (podcasts, posting on Instagram/Facebook/TikTok, etc.) is amplified by paid ads, which is why maintaining a solid organic presence should be an integral part of your ad strategy.
10. You don’t have Omnichannel marketing.
Omnichannel marketing means that you take into account the ways in which people interact with and consume your information on a daily basis. The average person uses email, SMS, Instagram, and Google every day. Many people also use TikTok, Facebook, and even Bing. Omnichannel marketing takes advantage of each of these channels and makes them work together to retarget and remind customers to make the purchase.
Now that we’ve shared the top 10 reasons your ads may not be working for you, have you identified the bottlenecks in your brand’s marketing strategy?
If you still aren’t sure why your ads are struggling or you feel like you need some guidance on how to improve your advertising approach, Book a Free Strategy Call with our experts now!