Had a brutal week of ad spend that taught me more than any course

Last Tuesday I burned through $1,200 on Facebook ads in three days with zero conversions, and I finally realized my targeting was way too broad. I narrowed it down to people who actually follow competing brands and suddenly the cost per lead dropped from $40 to $6. Anyone else ever have a week that humbled them into actually looking at the data?

3 comments

3 Comments

miles_sanchez1mo ago

Yeah I learned that lesson the hard way too. Spent a solid week targeting "homeowners" thinking I was smart about it, turns out I was just showing ads to people who really really like looking at houses on Zillow but have zero intention of buying anything. Felt like a real genius.

king.derek1mo ago

You ever have a buddy who thinks he's got it all figured out? My friend Jake spent like $800 on Instagram ads targeting "people interested in fitness" and got zero sales. He was all pissed off blaming the platform. Then he finally looked at his audience insights and saw he was mostly reaching grandmas who liked a single yoga video once. He narrowed it down to people who actually bought from his direct competitor in the last 30 days and his cost per click dropped by like 80 percent. He told me it was the most humbling week of his business life. Made me rethink my whole approach just watching him.

robert_anderson691mo ago

Feel that one, man. I had a similar wakeup call last year when my targeting was way too broad and I was burning cash on clicks from people who would never buy. It's brutal realizing you're basically paying Facebook to show your stuff to the wrong crowd, but Jake's story about the competitor targeting is genius. Sometimes you gotta just slap yourself in the face with the data.