What’s working (and what we’re testing) in March 2024

One of the hardest parts of digital marketing and advertising on platforms like Meta, TikTok, Google, Pinterest, Bing, and others, is how fast everything changes. What’s working one month (or heck, one week) may not work the next. Test results may be outdated by the time the test concludes. This is exactly why we started the Foxwell Founders Membership — to share best practices and worst practices, as well as what’s working, what’s not, what we’re testing and why, findings from those tests, and so much more, including simple gut checks of “…am I doing this right?”

Throughout February and early March, we’ve been discussing in the membership what’s working across the globe. This content was too good to not share with the world, so here you have it — what’s working in March 2024 from 450+ of the best Meta and Google advertisers in the world.

Interested in joining this elite group of marketers? We’d love to have you. Check it out here. Also a huge thank you and shout out to Founders Member Phil Kiel with Hello Earth Agency on his submission for many of these tactics listed below.

What’s working on Meta ads in March 2024

• View-through attribution

  • There’s a lot of conversation around whether we should be using view-based conversions. The point is not whether to track, but rather that a lot of accounts aren't aware or tracking it. If you've made a conscious decision to use 7DC1DV, then you need to be keeping an eye on the % of sales coming through view through, does it change over time, why did it change? Should we setup a 7DC only campaign next time? Knowing this data will help you make a data-based decision on which attribution method is best for your brand and also what data to optimize off of.

• Targeting

  • Broad, interest, lookalike, Advantage+ Audiences - it all works at some point, the trend we're seeing is accounts just sticking to one type of targeting for a LONG period of time. Test changes, most things work at some point in the year, there's potentially an opportunity cost for sticking to your current setup.

• Manual bidding

  • There’s been a ton of conversation recently about whether lowest cost or bid cap/cost cap are the best way to go right now. While the actual answer is - you’ve gotta test it - we do have data to share with you to help make this decision.

  • In a test where Founders member Phil Kiel switched one of his accounts from 100% lowest cost bidding to 100% cost cap, results showed a 54% decrease in Meta ad spend, 18% decrease in shop revenue, 44% decrease in MER (% of marketing spend to revenue), a 35% increase in new customer ROAS, 80% increase in overall ROAS, and a 22% decrease in nCPA. So is it worth it? YES, if you’re okay with decreased spend and revenue.

  • Cost caps are working right now, but only as long as you are willing to potentially sacrifice scale (budget), some creative testing, potentially the amount of new customers, and because of a potentially lowered budget, also lowered revenue. It also may take time to find the sweet spot for a bid that is providing you a lower CPA while still spending a majority of the budget set per campaign.

  • We generally recommend to start a cost cap at 1.5x the current last 30-60 day in-platform CPA and the budget at 2-3x the CPA per day, then alternate adjusting the cost cap bid up or down depending on performance (usually by 10-15% every 4 days) and on the opposite days, so two days after the first change, adjust the budget to spend more if you can by 10-15%, and alternate budget increases every 4 days, two days opposite the cost cap increases. This will allow for stability while also working to ideally lower the cost cap and increase the budget.

  • We talk about this kind of stuff every week in the membership! So if you aren’t there already, join us!

• ASCs, but manual creative review/optimization

  • Also seeing that ASCs as a whole are not as strong this Q1/heading into Q2 as they have been previously - we're testing more manual campaigns and are not scaling ASCs as much this month

  • Using ONLY existing customers in the Existing Customer Budget cap to use the tool as it was intended. The only exception to this is if it’s a smaller-spending brand that doesn’t have as much purchase data, OR if it’s a high AOV product/long purchase window product that might need to lean on website visitors/adds to cart to optimize who might ultimately end up purchasing

• Combining multiple countries per campaign

  • All of our international accounts in some way, will use campaigns with multiple countries in them, we've always seen great performance and efficiency this way, plus easier to manage (we can use that time to benefit us elsewhere in the account) - the majority of multi country accounts we audit massively overcomplicate things (multiple ad accounts or pixels, multiple campaigns) - it doesn't need to be this complicated, again without testing a different setup you don't know what you're missing.

  • Group Tier 1 countries together, time zone doesn't need to be considered too much

  • For example: Campaign US + CA

    • Ad set targeting both US + CA

    • Ads are linking to one site, USA for example, and then we'll ensure the site has a redirect or popup setup.

    • The drop in CVR because of the redirect or popup is almost always beaten by the positive impact because of:

      • Social proof on fewer ads (i.e Canada get to see all of the USA comments and hype

      • Consolidated events in fewer ad sets = learning phase etc.

      • Easier to manage

• Top creative angles to create and test right now

  • Founder Story with Bold Intro + Claim - well produced with tongue and cheek humor to bring it down to earth

  • Sticky Note Ugly Ad (static)

  • An amazing UGC testimonial (great authentic creator with clean cuts and script without sounding scripted)

  • I watched my (dad/brother/mom/friend, etc.) struggle with (XYZ) long form videos

  • Short form video clips on repeat with text overlays that have snappy and relevant copy

  • Videos answering FAQs or misconceptions in a video based on ad comments

  • “Science” video - basically how the product works and debunking the negative marketing

• Social proofing as much as possible

  • Comments and reviews FOR THE WIN right now!

• Customized catalogs for DPAs/DABAs (with apps like Socioh)