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Facebook for Business is continually releasing features to make it easier for brands of all sizes to advertise effectively. Today, we’re here to talk about multiple text optimization. Before we get into why this feature matters and how it helps, we’re going to discuss Facebook’s announcement on the development.
With text variation, you can choose among five text versions for not only the primary ad’s headline, but also the text and description. As long as you’re using one of three objectives, this feature will work on both video and single image ads.
Those three campaign objectives are:
With multiple text options, Facebook tells advertisers they can draw attention to various aspects of a service or product. Facebook displays a personalized combination of aspects to each individual, depending on which are most likely to yield results.
Within the announcement, Facebook provided a number of examples to demonstrate how this feature would work. Ultimately, it allows advertisers to tailor their message when appealing to different customers. While one statement could read ‘the best hotdogs in all of New York,’ the second option might display a review from a recent customer.
During the ad creation process, you need to fill in primary text, the link description and link text. Well, the page looks exactly the same except for the choice to ‘Add Another Option.’ Don’t worry if you aren’t seeing this option because it’s only available to those running campaigns with the three objectives mentioned. Also, the feature hasn’t been rolled out internationally just yet. In fact, there’s a message at the top of the reveal page—’We are gradually introducing this feature and it may not be available to you right now.’
While it isn’t available yet, you can still get to this place before the competition. When it finally does go live, you’ll be ready for the change.
Remember, the combination shown to each individual is unique. Therefore, the variations and assets need to work together regardless of the combination chosen. Make sure that any combination works so you’re confident of a positive outcome when Facebook mixes and matches for visitors.
So why should we consider using multiple text optimization? As we know, nothing is guaranteed when it comes to ad copy. As marketers, our job is to consider our audience and make decisions that will ‘most likely’ lead to a positive outcome.
In the past, we would create several different ads, each offering a different text. With each operating individually, some will work and others won’t. Now, Facebook is offering us an opportunity to combine various descriptions, headlines and text within one ad. This is infinitely easier than trying to create several ads which work separately.
We’re still very much in the early days of multiple text optimization, but one thing is for certain: if it works, it’s going to be a helpful feature for advertisers and businesses of all sizes.
After setting up, if you haven’t entered a description yet, the first thing Facebook does is review your website metadata for an appropriate description. Although, Facebook seems to be moving away from showing them, so you don’t need to worry too much about it. With dynamic description appearance, Facebook decides if the person in question would benefit from seeing your description, and acts accordingly.
It’s important to note that you will only be dealing with one ad when you employ multiple text optimization. We’ve seen some confusion regarding this feature, as people assume it runs multiple ads simultaneously. Don’t listen to this misconception; multiple text optimization uses only one ad.
Even data that generates over time will appear under one ad. You won’t get engagement data about different combinations that exist between your five variations. Instead, you will receive one set of data which covers the ad as a whole.
Is this a good or a bad thing? It depends on your viewpoint. For some, the fact that you only get one set of data is a positive because the engagement isn’t watered down between different variations. This is important for those who rely on social proof.
When this feature becomes available to everyone, we think it will be successful in part because of the testing it generates. While we don’t have statistics for individual combinations, you can see the overall results of the campaign. Because of machine learning, the testing is faster than ever and we get the insights for five variations rather than one. The ad is automatically optimized for your target audience. Throughout the process, you automatically gain information for your next ad campaign.
We believe that multiple text optimization will allow companies to remarket to older customers. If a group of people have already visited your website, you can advertise a new product to them with text variations. Since many will know and trust your brand name, you’ll have a slew of conversions from repeat customers.
You may be thinking—isn’t this just like Dynamic Creative? If you haven’t heard of this tool, the description will sound similar because it optimizes creative combinations for a given audience. There are, however, important distinctions. Firstly, advertisers need to activate Dynamic Creative at the ad set level. We don’t want to generalize, but in a world where people are trying to reduce their workload (or at least automate as much as possible), not many have the motivation to do this.
Secondly, Dynamic Creative focuses on videos, images and CTA buttons rather than just headlines, primary text and descriptions. Finally, and most important of all, there’s a difference in reporting. Dynamic Creative seems to have more in-depth reporting of individual combination performance. While this isn’t an option with Facebook just yet, it could become available once it rolls out.
Facebook’s new feature clearly has potential, especially considering it doesn’t need to be activated at the ad set level. Early adopters have complemented its easy implementation, which is a good sign. We’ll have to wait and see whether Facebook’s new tool outcompetes Dynamic Creative. For now, we recommend giving multiple text optimization a go—and feel free to report your results back to us!
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