The DEFINITIVE GUIDE to Why Broad Targeting DOESN'T WORK

While broad targeting is effectively the Holy Grail of Facebook marketing, often it doesn’t look like it’s working as well as other options. So let’s unpack why Broad “doesn’t work” and what you can do about it to take your account from a place of reaction and uncertainty, to confidence and scale.
Chapters
02:00 Detailed Targeting: Lookalike Audiences, Interest Groups & Retargeting
12:00 Incremental Lift vs ROAS or MER
22:00 Transition Plan to get to 100% Broad
Resources:
Learn more about the Facebook Ads MBA Program @ MBA.FacebookDisrupter.com
~ See MORE SUCCESS and LESS STRESS while you SCALE WITH CONFIDENCE by learning the systems, process, documentation, execution, architecture, communication, & business development skills you need to MANAGE YOUR TEAM AND TIME AND PROJECTS FOR PROFIT.
The Shape of Disrupt to Come: Newsletter.FacebookDisrupter.com
Facebook Ads insights from a Top 100 Advertiser
~ Weekly Articles, Videos, Interviews & Deep Dives into Best Practices for E-Commerce, DTC, Lead Gen & MORE!
Follow Me:
Twitter: bit.ly/3wb9IWR
Instagram: bit.ly/3lh8m6F
TikTok: bit.ly/3N1HSli
Pinterest: bit.ly/3sOB6b5
Facebook Group: bit.ly/3ytD58g
Subscribe:
Video: bit.ly/37DQQGs
iTunes: apple.co/3Fxrpml
Spotify: spoti.fi/3M2hlEn
Detailed Targeting: Lookalike Audiences, Interest Groups & Retargeting
When running detailed targeting alongside broad audiences, detail targeting will often have a more efficient outcome, beer at a much smaller spend. This can make it look like Broad Targeting is actually not effective. When we look solely at a single day ROAS or CPA in these isolated situations, I can give the appearance that these audiences are of far more value.
What this information doesn’t show you though is how these audiences are far less stable or scalable, or predictable. Seeing isolated results that don’t themselves form reliable trends, is not a high-value data set to do high-confidence planning.
The most valuable assets we have are ones that appreciate over time. Every conversion that a temporary asset like an interest group or a look-alike gets attribution for, is one more that prevents Broad from getting better. Broad gets incrementally better over time with each result building compounding interest of its value.
Because broad is the absence of inhibition on every ads own look-alike audience, it is the most stable, and most scalable, and projectable option for targeting in Facebook. Not only does it start is the cheapest option, but I get smarter and smarter with every single impression.
Paying more money, to reach fewer people, in a way that makes your account less stable, to develop an asset that you will ultimately get rid of is a very bad investment.
Incremental Lift vs ROAS or MER
Facebook at its core is a market research and intent creation device. The value of running ads to a “prospecting audience“ is to bring in new potential customers and generate brand awareness at scale. Because interest groups and lookalike audiences are by their nature much smaller and more expensive with respect to CPMs, they do this job much more poorly than broad targeting.
The value of using Facebook for prospecting is not in what you will see as a “day of” AOV over ad spend, which is a nearly impossible to control ROAS metric. The value is also not in MER, because much like ROAS, but to an even greater extent, it’s even less impacted by the ads that you're running on Facebook.
The value and advertising on Facebook is primarily in how it can amplify your existing business model. We measure this by focusing on incremental lift. What does advertising on Facebook do to every other marketing channel and revenue stream in the business?
Rather than focusing on what revenue can we try to give credit to what ad, to what user, that we were lucky enough to maybe tracked…
How can we confidently improve our entire business at the lowest cost highest confidence effort?
Broad is the single best option for this objective!
Transition Plan to get to 100% Broad
If you want to take your account into a one hundred percent fraud situation, you’re gonna need a plan. It’s going to be a very bad idea to abandon everything that you’re doing right now and take all of it directly into broad right away. You’ve invested heavily in these other assets, don’t destroy that investment.
The plan here is simple:
Build your one campaign with the cities at broad
As it begins to outperform the worst options of look-alikes, interest groups and Retargeting… Begin to shift that liability budget into your new appreciating asset.
This might take weeks or months
As you do this, look to the overall business results that you see from all other marketing channels and revenue streams. You will see a direct correlation to incremental lift as you abandon old thinking.
Move slowly and with confidence
The results will be undeniable!