How to lower audience overlap in Advantage+ Shopping Campaigns on Facebook ads
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What is ASC on Facebook & Instagram ads?
Advantage Plus Shopping Campaigns, or ASC, on Meta Ads, which were released fully to all Meta advertisers in early 2023 as an AI-powered targeting tool, has already become a popular tool for Meta to improve the performance of their advertising campaigns. However, there has been an ongoing debate about how to use ASC effectively, particularly in relation to the issue of audience overlap. ASCs work by broad targeting via AI a broad audience, with the only exception being excluding a percentage of 0-30% of retargeting customers, called the Existing Customer Budget Cap. Advertisers set the Existing Customer Budget cap in Business Manager as an account-wide audience group of all customers.
Audience overlap refers to the situation where ads from different campaigns are served to the same user. While overlap can be a powerful tool for retargeting, it can also lead to wasted advertising spend and lower performance if not managed correctly. It can also increase the cost of advertising (like CPMs) due to increased competition for reaching the same audiences.
One of the issues with ASC is that it works differently from other Facebook optimization tools. ASC is designed to combine both prospecting and retargeting in a single campaign, allowing advertisers to target new users and re-engage with existing ones. However, this approach can lead to overlap and confusion about which ads are being served to which users.
ASC represents a fundamental shift in the way Facebook brings ads to users. It requires a different approach to advertising than previous optimization types, and this can be challenging for marketers who are used to excluding certain users or running separate prospecting and retargeting campaigns.
Combatting Audience Overlap between ASCs & other campaigns
Run only one ASC per country, as this can reduce the risk of overlap.
Pay attention to each campaign’s frequency — a general rule of thumb is that full prospecting campaigns should not get over a ~2.5x over a 7-day window, and the higher the Existing Customer Budget Cap percentage allowed on an ASC, the higher the frequency can be (likely no higher than a 3-3.5x over a 7-day window)
Use a 1% Existing Customer Budget cap on ASCs, as Meta has said the AI cannot confirm exactly 0% of a retargeting audience will be targeted with an ASC, but 1% is more accurate to real targeting.
Separate ASCs by product, collection, landing pages, or other variables, especially if audiences are different for each. This way, if customers are targeted in multiple campaigns and there is overlap, it is less of a problem, as they are being served different ads for different products. Also, by separating ASCs by these differentiators, the AI should learn what types of customers convert for which products/collections/ASCs, therefore will target differently based on each campaign.
Give each ASC enough budget to be able to get enough conversions to be able to self-optimize. A good general rule is to launch a new ASC with a budget that you can stay steady with regardless of performance for at least 10-14 days. Usually we see ASCs take time to ramp up, get learnings, and optimize, but will begin to improve performance by day 7+ and into the two-week mark.
Ultimately, ASC is a powerful tool for digital marketers, but it requires a different approach to advertising than previous optimization types like standard lowest cost campaigns. By understanding how it works and how to manage overlap, marketers can maximize the performance of their campaigns and drive better results. It’s also important to stay up-to-date on what’s happening with Meta ads, as they’re changing constantly — whether it be platform bugs, new products and tools, best practices, what’s working now, and more. The best way to do this? Join us in the Foxwell Founders Community! We’d love to have you :)
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