A staggering amount of ad budgets are wasted every year, with reports suggesting that 50% of planned media channel investments were too low to achieve maximum ROI.
This waste is a financial drain and a missed opportunity to connect with your audience effectively. Let’s explore common ‘leaks’ in B2B ad campaigns and practical ways to fix them.
- Not setting clear campaign goals
- Poor audience and keyword targeting
- Not optimizing landing pages
- Not using retargeting features
Not setting clear campaign goals
Any successful ad campaign hinges on its goals. Vague or unfocused goals are like going on a journey without a map; you might end up somewhere, just not your intended destination.
To plug this leak, start by defining what you want to achieve – be it lead generation, brand awareness, or conversions.
This clarity allows you to select more relevant KPIs, like click-through rates or conversion rates. This in turn helps you gauge the success of your campaigns more accurately.
Also, focus on a few platforms that align well with your goals and audience. While experimenting is good, spreading your budget too thin across multiple platforms or campaigns can be counterproductive.
Poor audience and keyword targeting
I once worked with a brand selling men’s clothing. When I audited their ad account, I discovered they were targeting women, too.
Clicks from women were about 10x more expensive than those from men, with a correspondingly low click through rate (< 0.3%). This meant that about half the ad spend was being frittered away just by targeting the wrong gender.
With one small change, we were able to recover about 40% of their monthly ad spend.
Better targeting makes your ads more valuable and effective. To make your ad budget work better, focus on who you want to reach.
Some nuance is needed here. You want to be as specific as possible for certain platforms, but not too specific on others.
For example, on Facebook, it’s typically more effective to only narrow your cold audiences by ASL — age, sex, and location — and let your creative do the targeting. In my experience, getting too granular on Meta can raise your CPMs by a lot.
On LinkedIn, the same rule applies, but you can add an extra layer according to job title, function, seniority, or industry. This ensures you are boiling a smaller bucket instead of the whole ocean.
However, only targeting VPs and CxOs on LinkedIn might exclude managers and assistants who are often tasked with researching new solutions for their bosses.
Err just slightly broader to give the algorithm room to find your best customers. For example, if you sell men’s clothes, it makes sense to target men aged 18+ in a specific location, and not just men who like specific other men’s clothing brands. Those men might not list those interests on their profiles, but could still be lucrative buyers.
With PPC, pick your keywords carefully. Choose ones that your audience is interested in and looking for, and try to stick to exact match and phrase match keywords. This makes your ads more relevant and impactful.
Not optimizing landing pages
Your landing page is where the magic happens. A slow or poorly designed landing page can nullify your efforts, wasting your spend.
Optimize your landing pages for speed, clarity, and user experience. Ensure they have nice visuals, clear calls-to-action, and a color scheme that works. And of course, make sure they load fast.
Not using retargeting features
Retargeting, or ‘remarketing,’ can significantly lower your cost per acquisition. By targeting people who have previously interacted with your website or social media, you’re focusing on an audience already familiar with your brand.
Almost all ad platforms offer some form of retargeting. When used correctly, it can deepen user engagement and increase conversions, making your ad spend more efficient.
In fact, if you already get lots of traffic to your website, it’s better to start with a retargeting campaign and move up the funnel than the reverse.
If you’re doing at least 3,000 unique visits each month (to account for low match rates), skip the cold layer and start with retargeting. Since you already have warm prospects, convert them first.
You can retarget by previous website visitors, video views, ad clicks, and specific page views. Most platforms have minimum sizes to meet for retargeting audiences — usually at least 300 people.
Plug the leaks
Plugging leaks in your ad campaigns is about making smart, informed decisions and tending to your campaigns regularly.
From setting clear goals and targeting the right audience to optimizing your landing pages and retargeting, everything helps to maximize spend.
The goal isn’t just to spend less, but to spend smarter, ensuring every dollar contributes to your bottom line.