06/02/2024
Our 2 best strategies for great ad performance: Targeted Messaging and Unique Offer Mechanism = More leads, cheaper leads, better quality leads.
Was chatting with a few established education players recently (one's spending close to $100k a month and the other had close to 20 centres) and they both asked me the same questions:
What are our best strategies to get more leads, cheaper leads and better quality leads via FB ads? Do we do anything unique in our ad targeting or anything else?
Answer: Always focus on Targeted Messaging & Unique Offer Mechanism.
1. Targeted Messaging: Get rid of short, 5-line ads and write longer, targeted messaging ads that give your prospect a full understanding of why your brand is unique / why your product is powerful for them.
We’ve noticed a pattern as brands grow to become more established, they focus a lot on brand guidelines, corporate look and feel, and brand visuals.
As an effect of this, their creatives/visuals get a lot nicer…
While their ad copy gets shorter and more generic.
And while definitely understand the importance of strong branding for larger, established players -
They start seeing a big drop in qualified leads/conversions because short copy, generic messaging tends to lead to:
- High volume but lower quality leads
- Leads that have a lot of enquiries but drop off after asking about things like price
- Leads that don't understand the brand’s key differences versus the competition, so they haven't "bought in" and aren’t ready to buy.
So we’ve always advised that regardless of a brand's size, ads must always revolve around targeted messaging that hits the prospect where it matters most in their head:
> What does the prospect want at this stage of their life / What events are happening in their life that you have to speak to them about?
> How do you position your brand differently from the competition to make the prospect “buy in” to your brand?
In the example of education -
> What does the prospect want at this stage of life?
Parents want very different things for their children depending on the age range.
0-2, they want to know things about how well the child is taken care of, and nutrition.
2-5, they want to know about early mental skills development.
6 and above, they want to know about education / school success.
Depending on which age range you’re targeting, messaging must be specific to that age group.
We’ve seen a lot of ads make the mistake of calling out to a wide age range like 5 - 18 years old, and these ads never perform.
> What are the differentiating points of the brand that must be communicated in the ads?
Things like credibility, unique curriculum, teacher training systems, and state-of-the-art facilities.
All these can be explained in-depth in the ad copy to help prospects understand the uniqueness of the brand.
This can be done across all industries, regardless of coaching, education, interior design, real estate etc.
But to be able to fit these critical messaging into ads, brands must not be afraid to write long ads.
In fact, it is very possible to write long copy that positions the brand well, while still making sure the “branding” and “brand association” is kept intact -
Because branding can be achieved via careful choice of words, tone, language, and creative design. (And a great copywriter)
2. Unique Offer Mechanism “Skin” your offer differently with a Unique Offer Mechanism that is tailored to be extremely relevant and exciting for your prospects, so they’re attracted to your event instead of your competition’s.
When you’re in a market with lots of competition, everyone’s ads start to sound the same after a while.
E.g.
Education - Come for our Trial / Diagnostic / School Tour / Open House
Real Estate - Register for our webinar / Take this survey
Coaching / Agency - Come for our Strategy Call
Interior Design - Register for our Design Consultation
The market becomes “numb” cause everyone is selling the same thing.
The fastest way to combat this without actually changing anything in operations is to change the “skin” of the offer - A.K.A Unique Offer Mechanism.
So while you’re leading leads to the same thing, you’re calling it something different and explaining it differently,
Making it unique and stand out to your leads.
Some quick examples (extremely generic as these must be customised to a brand's unique positioning):
For Education, instead of School Tour you can say “30-Minute Play-Based Live Activity: Your child will get to do X activity on the spot and you will experience our Y state-of-the-art facility so you can see how it helps your child achieve Z outcome immediately.
Instead of Open House, you can say "60-Minute What Your Child Must Know About The 2025 Primary Math Syllabus” Live Parent Workshop Conducted By X Expert
For Interior Design, instead of saying register for a design consultation you can say “Book your Home Exploration Session, Meet Our Degree-Qualified Designers and Our Master In-House Carpentry Team”
As part of this unique mechanism, we explain exactly:
> What happens when they register on the ad
> What they’re going to look forward to after they register
> What unique activities, experiences, and benefits they’ll get that no one else in the market is offering
We’ve followed this formula to great success over the years (Over $1.3m spent on FB, 100,000 leads and $15m generated for clients.)...
Without focusing much on ad targeting or “technical” stuff -
Because truth is, unless you’re a global brand with huge audience data, targeting on FB is straightforward, and the FB algorithm is smart enough to reach your target customer for you.
Where brands lose results is not because their ads aren’t being shown to the right people, but because their ads aren’t written well enough to stand out from the competition
Apply these to your ads, and you'll see a drastic improvement in your ad ROI.