How to make video ads of Tested Advertising Methods produce more CTR and eventually more than 0 leads? (Part 2 – Video)
Two types of video ads will be analyzed – Facebook and YouTube.
How many views TAM* got comparing to other content pieces?
(Budget: 10$, Duration: 1 week.)
METRIC (During ad activity period) | YOUTILITY | CONTENT INC. (2 Weeks Average) | CONTENT RULES | COLLIER | TESTED ADVERTISING |
Impressions(Total) | 52,640 | 57,229 | 50,480 | 53,243 | 38,905 |
Views(Total) | 1,026 | 1,238 | 995 | 1,164 | 1,075 |
CTR(A/B Test Average) | 1.94% | 2.16% | 1.97% | 2,26% | 2,76% |
Outstanding results for TAM which beat every one of the previous 4 content pieces. (2.76%)
Why these results?
3 Differences
There are 3 differences that I observed, which is why I don’t know which of them is responsible for the outstanding results. To really find out we’ll have to isolate each of them and test them one by one. But first, what were they?
1. Different thumbnail with text on it
Text emphasizing ACTION is included
Before
After
Robert Collier Letter Book
Content Rules
Tested Advertising Methods
2. Different Audience - 10 Best Performing "Places"
After the analysis of RCLB*, I decided to focus on 5 best performing “places” – channels out of thе ones I was already using.
But google ads requires a minimum of 10 “places”, so I chose 5 additional ones and launched the TAM ad.
Before
After
Robert Collier Letter Book
Content Rules
Tested Advertising Methods
3. Different headlines - News and Action Orientation
Before
After
Here are the individual results of each headline of the “Tested Methods” Ad. Note the In-Feed(I.E. By Click) view rate.
To be clear about it, the headline with the highest CTR in the last 5 pieces was one of RCLB’s test and showed 2.62%. 3% is just another league.
Testing - Responsibility Share of Each of The 3
The way I see it, there are two options to test how responsible each one of the 3 is for the outstanding results
1. Apply only one of the differences in each one of the 3 next content pieces’ ads.
2. Apply only one of the differences 3 times for the ad of the same content piece (TAM).
Both options are meant to isolate 1 variable at a time, but…
One Option Is More Accurate
When we test on different content pieces it adds one more variable, so, it is a little less accurate.
So although it will cost a bit more to run more ads for just TAM, that’s the option I’ll go with.
The Detailed Plan of Launching The Ads
Let us start with a single ad which I plan to launch after the video publication of HTWAGA*(When advertising HTWAGA), and two others. A week apart each.
Here’s their format
Advertisement 1: Control + Winning Headlines (When advertising HTWAGA)
Thumbnail – no text
Audience – Like CR*. Why CR? Because it’s the latest piece that has a “default” format thumbnail [with author, whiteboard background and book cover on it. (RCLB doesn’t.)].
Headline(A) – “My Next Marketing Book?”
In order to purely test the effect of CR vs. TAM, I.E. the thumbnail and subhead may all have an author and book cover and whiteboard background, but they are still different because those are different authors and book covers
Headline B(Winning - 3%)
Headline(B) – 4 Principles and ACTIONS for Content Improvement
Now, for example, if “MNMB?” gets 2.3% CTR
and the new head gets 2.7% (+0.4%)
Then, if CR had “MNMB?” perform at 2.1%
I can consider that the new head would perform at 2.5% (+0.4%) because it is the exact same headline
This way I may find out which relative part of the 3% CTR should be attributed to the headline.
Sidenote: A simultaneous test of MNMB vs. new head is launched with RCLB. If both tests are consistent, I shall replace future and RCLB+TAM headlines with the winner.
Advertisement 2: New Audience
Thumbnail – no text
Audience – the new one – 10 places
Headline – “My next marketing book?” – no A/B, meaning, half the budget of the first ad.
Advertisement 3: New Thumbnail
Thumbnail – with text
Audience – Like CR
Headline – “My next marketing book?” – no A/B, meaning, half the budget of the first ad.
All these tests are here to eventually tell us what gets more clicks on ads (and organic content).
The next part in the process is the video itself getting views for form/landing page.
What could be done to get more of those?
5 Content (Not Ads) Lead Capture Improvements
1. State the offer promptly
The earlier we state the offer the more leads(inquiries) we’ll get according to Victor O. Schwab
"Inquiries ... 10 Ways To Increase Them ... 5. You may feature your offer at the very top of the advertisement, picturing it in display or referring to it in your headline or your main subhead."
2. Summarize Before The CTA (Step 4 HTWAGA)
Make a summary in the end of a video as described in step 4 of the How To Write a Good Advertisement framework.
3. Tying Up To CTA
Then, tie it up smoothly into the CTA
Example: The How To Write a Good Advertisement framework consists of 5 steps.
1. Grabbing the reader’s attention ( No attention no sales )
2. …
3. …
4. …
5. …
If you think these 5 fundamentals may help you write better content,
They won´t. Not unless you act on them.
That´s why I prepared the 5 fundamentals FILLABLE workbook PDF for you…
4. Replace 10 FREE Audiobooks With Workbook
I assume a worksheet is more attractive as a call to action than the 10 FREE Audiobooks pdf (In videos too, not just blog posts!) let us put this to the test in the form of a PDF workbook CTA in HTWAGA.
5. Explain How and When to Take Action
Also, when tying to CTA explain how and when you suggest the audience to use the CTA.
Example: Instead of watching more videos and getting more theory, replace the time block you usually devote to theory with filling out a workbook and actually apply something!
Facebook Ad (Video)
"Facebook Ad Manager" beats "Meta Business Suite"
After more than 10 hours of total chatting with Meta support and trying to understand why the “Clicks to Reproduce” metric is shown only on some ads and not in others, I found that Facebook Ad Manager allows more customizing options, in contrast to Meta Business Suite which shows just the metrics it wishes.
For example, now I may compare “link clicks” with “link clicks”, and not “link clicks” with “clicks to reproduce” (finally).
Below are the results of TAM compared to two other ads which had the “Traffic” goal apparently (omitting the two that had the “Video views” goal) – Also something I found out in Ad Manager.
METRIC | CONTENT INC. | YOUTILITY | TESTED |
Reach | 2,640 | 450 | 2,305 |
Clicks on Link | 36 | 32 | 22 |
CTR | 1.36% | 7.11% | 0.95% |
Why The Low CTR?
It seems that YouTube hit home run, while Facebook flopped (CTR 0.95%).
After a quick check of what might have caused the difference, I found the audience tags [E.G. Writing, Public Relations etc.] metric is the same in CI and TAM but is different in YTLT*( (1.36%, 0.95% and 7.11% accordingly)
Before researching any further I think we should test if this was the cause in the next content piece by using the same audience as YTLT does.
Plan Of Action After That
1. When audience effect on CTR is clearer, see if it may be leveraged to reduce cost per click. (Because it seems that even though the CTR in Youtility is high, I still get a similar amount of clicks for the same amount of money)
2. Analyze in Google Analytics why despite the clicks, the forms got 0 views and 0 leads(according to ConvertKit).
Which brings me to suggest to…
Set Up Your Google Analytics.
As of July 2023, Google Analytics stopped recording analytics data and requires a migration to a new Google analytics tool – GA4 property.
My temporary lack of access to its data makes it difficult to understand why the forms got 0 views and leads despite the clicks, which reminds me of its importance.
I have now migrated, and will have access to it hopefully when analyzing the next content piece’s results, and suggest you set it up/ migrate it too 🙂
When it works, test 2 assumptions
I see two possible reasons for the 0 lead/views result as of now:
-Too long page loading
-Not enough interest in the page content
Stay tuned to find out which was the naughty one.
Next piece goal: 1 Lead or More.
Bonus: Determine Your Most Effective Audiences
If you’re doing paid advertising you may also find it interesting how I discovered the 5 most performing channels out of about 50 I was targeting, and use it in your own advertising(PDF below) (Your numbers may vary)