Just like all things online, you can’t trust everything that Facebook/Instagram recommends to their advertisers!
One of the benefits of Facebook and Instagram advertising is that there are an abundance of features and tools that you can take advantage of to make the most out of your ad campaign’s. And, while we recommend that you test almost every tool and feature out for yourself, there are 2 Facebook/Instagram advertising features that we think that you should avoid all-together, “Multi-Advertiser Ads” and “Optimize Text Per Person”.
While Meta may claim that these tools have been proven to be beneficial, from our perspective, we think that these tools only sound like a good idea on the surface.
So, if you want to ensure that you aren’t wasting any of your advertising dollars, continue reading to learn more about the pitfalls of Multi-Advertiser Ads and the Optimize-Text-Per-Person feature.
Multi-Advertiser Ads
The first checkbox that you need to watch out for while setting up your Facebook/Instagram ad campaign’s is for a feature that appears on the ad level, after you select your ad format – Multi-Advertiser Ads.
With this feature turned on, your ad will appear alongside other ads that Meta deems related to your own. So, if someone in your target audience is scrolling through Facebook or Instagram, they can see your ad, followed by a carousel of your competitors, or vice versa.
While Meta states that their tests have proven the effectiveness of Multi-Advertiser Ads, we have 2 reasons that we recommend that you keep this feature turned off.
First, this feature may increase your ad impressions, but, due to the format of Multi-Advertiser Ads, the impressions that you do earn will be lower quality, and less likely to convert. With this feature turned on, Meta can essentially multiply the amount of ads that they display since each feed ad can be followed by a carousel. So, instead of displaying 1 ad every few scrolls, Facebook/Instagram can display 1 ad, followed by several more in a carousel, therefore, increasing the total impressions that each ad earns. However, an increase in impressions from Multi-Advertiser ads are significantly less beneficial than an increase in impressions for a standard feed ad.
To put this into perspective, let’s compare this ad format to ads in a traditional newspaper. When you purchase advertising space in a newspaper, larger spaces are more expensive since larger ads attract and retain more attention. Now, if we apply that same concept to Multi-Advertiser Ads, this feature may display your ads more frequently, but your ads can be placed beneath a competitor in a smaller space. So, even if you do earn additional impressions, your ad can simply be overshadowed by your competition.
The second reason that we recommend that you stay clear from Multi-Advertiser Ads, is that you rely on Meta to determine which ads are displayed with yours. While Meta AI is continuously improving, this feature can result in your ads being placed in less than favourable positions. For example, let’s say that you have a clothing brand, and you are promoting your new line of winter jackets. In this instance, your line of jackets could be advertised with a variety of different products from other businesses, including:
– Competitor Jackets
– Competitor winter accessories (Scarves, gloves, thicker socks etc.)
– Winter sports gear (snowboards, skis, goggles etc.)
In each of these examples, there can be negative consequences for your business. If your line of jackets are displayed with your competitors, this means that your target audience will instantly be given more options to choose from. Similarly, if your clothing brand also sells winter accessories like scarves and gloves, this also means that your target audience will instantly be given more options to choose from. And, if your line of jackets lean towards fashion as opposed to function, and they are promoted alongside winter sports gear, your ads may not reach the right audience. Plus, Meta could feature your jackets with something completely unrelated!
So, in the vast majority of cases, when your products are displayed with others, whether they are closely related to yours or not, the Multi-Advertiser Ad feature is going to pose a challenge for your business. Furthermore, even if you have the absolute best product on the market, you could lose to a more affordable competitor. And, if you have the most affordable product on the market, you could lose to a competitor that better caters to their target audience’s needs.
Unless you achieve the impossible, which is having the best and most affordable product on the market, we really can’t see a situation where the Multi-Advertiser Ad feature can benefit your business.
In summary, while this feature may earn you more total impressions, not only will the impressions be of lower quality, but you can also give your business more challenges to overcome. So, we always recommend that you keep this feature turned off!
Optimize Text Per Person
The second thing that you should watch out for is an easy-to-miss checkbox that appears on the ad level, after you fill in the primary text, headline, and description of your ad – Optimize Text Per Person.
While this feature sounds ideal at a glance, in practice it doesn’t quite work. Plus, it can be easy to check off because it sounds similar to another feature that is automatically enabled. Essentially, Optimize Text Per Person will utilize performance data to shuffle your primary text, headline, and description, to better achieve your objective. While the name of this feature makes this option sound like a no-brainer, based on how this feature actually functions, it should definitely be turned off.
For example, let’s say that you just opened a Yoga studio, and you’re offering a free class to attract new members. The text of your ad could look something like this:
Primary Text
Enjoy your first class for FREE 🧘
To celebrate the opening of our new Yoga Studio, we are offering a FREE class for all new members! Whether you’re a seasoned Yoga veteran, or you want to try something new, we’d love to welcome you to True Balance Yoga!
Contact us to learn more:
📞 555-555-5555
Headline
Visit Our Website
Description
First-Timers Welcome!
With Optimize Text Per Person turned on, Meta can shuffle each of these text elements. So, your description can take the place of your primary text, or your headline can take the place of your description, and so on. So, unless your primary text, headline, and description are all 3 words each, this feature really wouldn’t work… And, if your primary text is only 3 words, you’re simply not taking full advantage of your creative space.
That being said, we mentioned that Optimize Text Per Person sounds like a feature that is automatically enabled with Meta Advertising. And, unlike Optimize Text Per Person, we almost always recommend that you take advantage of it.
While setting up the text portion of your ad, you may notice the option to:
– Add text option (primary text)
– Add headline option
– Add description option
This feature gives you the ability to include up to 4 alternate options for your primary text, headline, and description. And, if you do include alternate versions for each of these text sections, Meta will automatically swap between your alternate text options, to optimize your results. However, unlike the Optimize Text Per Person feature, your primary text will only swap between each of your primary text options, and your headline will only swap between each of your headline options, and so on. So, with this feature, you won’t run into the same text length issues that you would face with Optimize Text Per Person.
You can see how it can be easy to be misled or confused by these features!
So, despite its attractive name, when you create your next Facebook/Instagram Ad Campaign, you need to make sure that Optimize Text Per Personis turned off. If you leave it on, you can waste your advertising budget by running ads with mismatched text that don’t really make sense.
In conclusion, in today’s blog post, we covered 2 Facebook/Instagram advertising features that may sound beneficial on the surface, but in practice, can result in a waste of time, effort, and most importantly, your advertising dollars – Multi-Advertiser Ads and Optimize Text Per Person. While many of Meta’s advertising tools and features have made advertising on Facebook or Instagram either easier to manage, or generally more effective, at the moment, we believe that these features should be avoided for virtually every type of business. So, the next time that you set up, or update an ad campaign, you need to make sure that these features are turned off!
Looking to launch a Facebook or Instagram advertising campaign with help of expert marketers? Contact us to learn more about our Social Media Advertising services.
