my approach to facebook ads (and why i like it this way)
i don’t believe there’s only one way to do this. there are a million ways to skin a cat. i’m just going to show you how i do it and why i like doing it this way — then you can decide what works for you.
i started running facebook ads about 7–8 years ago. didn’t know what i was doing. by 2020, i had a few shopify stores to work on. i knew i was out of my depth, so i got help: consultations, courses, asking questions on reddit, twitter, instagram.
eventually, i learned enough to be decent.
i was running a store doing $250k–$500k/mo. we were growing 100–200% YoY. i didn’t have all the answers, but nobody cared because growth covered a lot of sins.
fast-forward to now — we’re spending ~$500k/mo on one account, plus a few more we manage in-house. i don’t pretend to be a guru, and i don’t take the biggest accounts. but i know what works for us, and we’re pretty good at this.
here’s my method.
• testing: i like ABO. 5 ads in one ad set, $100/day, exclude customers, run 1–2 weeks before touching anything. let it spend $750 before judging too hard.
• analyzing: if one ad hogs spend but produces nothing, i’ll kill it. if one ad takes off, i figure out why — sometimes i even drag screenshots into chatgpt with avatar data and ask why one beat the others.
• scaling: if an ad brings ~$5k in sales at a good CPA, i move it into a scaling campaign CBO 40-70% of the account budget.
• rehab: if ads are mediocre but not losers, i group them into a separate ad set with $200/day and let them fight it out. sometimes one turns around and becomes a winner.
• DPA campaigns: always run them. for most of my brands (mostly apparel), they work. for some digital products, too — but i test to confirm.
i also think good media buying goes beyond ads. you have to study your customer: fears, desires, frustrations, the market climate. if the category is shrinking, i’ll tell the client — maybe it’s time to launch a new product for the same customer before the curve drops.
if you need monthly management we do that here: