5 Tests to Optimize your Paid Social

By Anne Popolizio

As a marketer, you’ve done a lot of A/B testing. Think about the most insightful A/B tests you’ve run in the past. What did you test? Maybe pairs of…
💡Images vs. videos?
💡Images with vs. without text overlay?
💡Button copy?
💡Opt-in methods?

Developing your skills as a marketer means adding new strategies to your repertoire. Take a moment to think about testing ad components you haven’t tried before, like: 

• Relevancy words (are they buying a house or buying a home? It matters!)
• Lead angles (find out what they really care about)
• The lead magnet itself (if you’re offering one)

When you test these, you get a more comprehensive view of what really clicks with your audience. Now push this train of thought further…what else can you add to your A/B checklist? 

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In my blog post on SocialMediaPulse: 5 Tests to Optimize Your Paid Social, I walk you through five of the most important tests you can run with your paid social. Read it now.

The common thread with all of these tests is that as the one running the tests, you need variety. Facebook would have you believe short video is always best, but because every audience is unique, that might not be the case for your ad. In fact, if you test a wide variety of options, the results might surprise you. Next time you’re testing ad creative, instead of just testing two images, try testing all of these against each other:

• Single static image 
• Carousel 
• 15-second video
• 30-second video
• Simple video, like scrolling test against a static background

By expanding your A/B testing to be A/B/C/D/E testing, you’re able to get more accurate data on what your audience responds to. You might even be surprised at what you find—every audience is unique, so something that’s worked in the past might not necessarily be the best choice now.
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When you do this, it’s very important that you have a clear view of controls vs. variables. You’re testing a variety of ad creative, but you need to have a control ad you test it against—ideally, one that’s performed well. So for example, if you’ve already run a great ad and you want a preview of how your audience would respond to similar ads with different creative, test versions of that ad, rather than creating a whole new one to test. Ads Manager makes this super easy, since you can test multiple variables at once. 

With ads, testing is never a “one and done” process. You’re looking for trends over time so you can zero in on them and This is the mindset you need to have anytime you’re testing your paid social efforts. More options give you more data, and more data gives you a fuller, more nuanced picture. 

It might sound like a lot to test, but you can follow the same template for each test you run. In fact, you should follow the same template each time you test your paid social, because that eliminates any variables that might interfere with your data. I also share this template in the blog post. (Hint: it’s something you probably learned in high school 😉)

So read the full blog post now to learn more about five tests you should be running to optimize your paid social media strategy, how to determine which ideas to test, and how to effectively test those ideas to get valuable data you can use to build better paid social campaigns.