Testing – A core component in every successful Social Media Strategy for business
Traditional Testing Methods
Testing has always been an age-old dynamic in advertising, particularly in direct response. However, the ability for brands to conduct proper testing has always been limited to the nature of the channel being used.
For instance, if a brand wanted to test which version of a TVC would generate a more favourable outtake from their audience, they had to spend tens of thousands of dollars in surveying controlled audience groups, showing different ad forms to them and generating feedback – the old school way.
In other cases, such as traditional direct response, different ad copy in print, or even different versions of long form TVCs (infomercials) would be shown at different times, and success would be measured by how many times the phone rang and how many sales were generated.
Leveraging Facebook for testing
Today, a key part in a Facebook social media strategy for business is to use the A/B testing functionality, particularly in direct response, to assess what creative, copy and audiences generate the highest Return on Ad Spend and overall ROI.
We’ve seen this first-hand with many of our clients. Often, the most surprising and unexpected aspects of our creative are the winners. For example, we run Social Direct Response campaigns for Allergenics – a hair testing allergy and food intolerance research business. They simply sell test bookings to people with suspected allergies and other intolerances. The first question Allergenics asked was what should our Facebook social media marketing strategy be? And we said, in the first instance: testing.
They didn’t know what sells their product. Was it negative selling around their audiences’ key pain points like a sore stomach after having dairy? Was it aspirational health and wellbeing messaging with a positive spin? Or was it parents motivated by the wellbeing of their kids? There was no clear answer.
So, we used the easiest, cheapest and most accurate method to answer all the above. We conducted Facebook testing with a range of ad angles, copy, creative and formats against a range of different audiences. Those variants overlapped across several audiences sets as well. In the end, we came out with the most profitable creative and audience and knew exactly where to get the biggest bang for our buck. From there, we went on to spend 99% of our advertising budget on what we knew for sure would sell. Such luxury should be used by every smart brand on social out there.
Facebook Expands its Testing Capabilities
Last week, Facebook announced a major expansion in its self-serve testing capabilities. Brands can now:
Test displaying their ads against controlled and exposed groups, and measure ad recall and brand lift against both groups to understand what impact the advertising had on one audience vs the other.
Conduct brand surveys and poll their audiences about what they think and how they feel about their brand based on seeing a certain ad.
While this is advertised as a new edition to the Facebook advertising inventory, it is in fact more than eight years old. The only difference is that before a week ago, advertisers needed to apply for the functionality and back their campaigns with minimum spends that run in the tens of thousands of dollars in order to qualify.
What does this mean for a social media strategy for a business in Australasia?
This is great news for many SMEs out there who for many years could not access such tools and can now use these new techniques to understand their customers better, make better strategic decisions about their messaging and creative, and most importantly ensure maximum return on investment.
The other bit of good news is that these tools finally put a more traditional, widely acceptable measure of advertising success against social media. Previously, unless it was direct response and measured in conversions and transactions, we relied on likes, shares, comments and other “soft” metrics of engagement to measure success on social media for top of the funnel activity. Now, brands can use these tools to look at far more meaningful outcomes for their business.
At Social Sugar, we can help your brand:
Test various messages in market against different sets of target audiences and understand where you can get the best return on investment from your direct response social advertising.
Quantify the value of top of the funnel activity on Facebook and Instagram and achieves success levels beyond likes and followers
