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Table of Contents
- Key Takeaways
- 1. Most People Are Too Bold
- 2. Stop Boosting Posts
- 3. Offer > Creative
- 4. Test Like A Scientist
- 5. Data Over Emotion
- 6. Retargeting = ROI
- 7. Think Long-Term
- Bonus Pro Tips
Key Takeaways
- Target Strategically: Focus on narrow, intent-based targeting using single interests, leverage custom audiences and exclusions and track new vs. existing customer acquisition cost.
- Optimise for Conversions: Run actual sales campaigns in Ads Manager with manual settings, prioritise maximising conversions and avoid boosting posts.
- Prioritise a Compelling Offer: Craft a clear, irresistible offer that highlights the transformation and ROI for your service and package it effectively.
- Test and Iterate Based on Data: Rigorously A/B test your headlines, hooks and creative in fresh ad sets. Then, make decisions based on key performance metrics (CPM, CPC, CTR, CVR) over emotion. Track booked calls and conversions (not just leads),
- Retarget Engaged Audiences: Follow up with interested users using relevant messaging because retargeting offers higher ROI.
- Think Long-Term and Allow for Learning: Understand that Facebook Ads is a system that builds momentum, so allow for the initial learning phase and ensure sufficient data (50+ conversions) before making major changes.
- Implement Creative Best Practices: Use video content to address customer pain points quickly, diversify your creative formats and be mindful of audience exclusions.
Section 1: Most People Are Too Bold
Let’s start with targeting. The biggest mistake I see, even from experienced business owners, is going too broad. You don’t need to target all of Australia if your service is only for busy mums in Brisbane.
Here’s what actually works in 2025: One interest at a time. Don’t run Nike, Adidas and Reebok together. Run just Nike. If you want to test each interest, do it in individual ad sets.
Why? Because there’s going to be massive overlap, but also small differences that matter. And this isn’t about getting triple the revenue with one trick. It’s about stacking small improvements. If your Nike audience performs 3% better than your Reebok audience, that’s a win. Stack five of those 3% improvements and you’ve got a 15% better account.
For service businesses, use:
- Narrow, intent-based interests
- Custom audiences from engaged users, website visitors and customer lists
- Proper exclusions to refine your targeting
And here’s a pro tip most people miss: In your ‘Advertiser Settings’, set up audience segments so you can actually see how much you’re spending on new customers versus existing ones. This reveals hidden performance data Facebook doesn’t show you by default.
Section 2: Stop Boosting Posts
Boosting posts is like putting petrol in the wrong car. It might go, but it won’t go far.
When you boost posts, you’re just telling Facebook to get engagement. You need to be running real campaigns inside Ads Manager with conversion objectives.
Here’s what to do instead:
- Create actual lead campaigns
- Select ‘manual lead campaign’ not ‘advantage plus’
- Use ‘maximise number of conversions’ as your performance goal
- Turn off ‘dynamic creative’. It doesn’t work like it used to
This setup gives you control over what matters: getting conversions at a price that makes you profitable.
Section 3: Offer > Creative
You can have the flashiest video in the world, but if your offer sucks, you won’t get conversions. Focus on crafting an irresistible offer before worrying about how pretty your ad looks.
What makes an offer irresistible for service businesses?
- The transformation you provide needs to be crystal clear
- Package it as a 3-step process or limited-time solution
- Show the ROI so it feels like a no-brainer investment
The first thing people ask when they see your ad isn’t ‘Does this look nice?’ It’s ‘What’s in it for me?’ Answer that question immediately and your conversion rate will skyrocket.
Your conversion rate is one of the four key metrics that determine your success. If everything else is perfect but your offer doesn’t convert on your website, the whole system breaks down.
Section 4: Test Like A Scientist
One headline, one image and one audience won’t tell you the whole story. Split testing is everything.
Here’s exactly how to think about testing:
- A/B test headlines, hooks and creative formats
- Always isolate variables. Don’t change everything at once
- Launch new creative in fresh ad sets, not existing ones
Something I see quite often is people throwing new creative into old ad sets. Don’t do that! Every time you launch a new batch of creative, put it in a brand new ad set.
Why? Because Facebook’s algorithm has already decided who to show your old ads to. New creative needs a fresh algorithm learning period to find its own audience. If you overlap the two – new creative, old audience – you won’t actually be testing the new creative as it will be restricted by the old creative’s performance.
Section 5: Data Over Emotion
Don’t kill an ad after one bad day. Look at trends. Are your leads quality? What’s your CPL over 7 days? Let the numbers tell you what’s working.
There are four metrics that control everything in your account:
- CPM – Cost per 1,000 impressions
- CPC – Cost per click
- CTR – Click-through rate
- CVR – Conversion rate
These four metrics have massive impacts on each other. If your CPMs are high, you need better CTR. If your CTR is low, your creative isn’t resonating or your targeting is off.
Set up these columns in your Ads Manager:
- Campaign, budget, amount spent
- Purchases and cost per purchase
- Conversion value (revenue)
- ROAS (return on ad spend)
- Outbound clicks and cost per outbound click
- Conversion rate
- Frequency
- Reach, impressions and CPM
A dashboard set up with this information about your ads will tell you exactly where the problem is in your funnel.
Section 6: Retargeting = ROI
Most service providers forget the fortune is in the follow-up. Retarget people who visited your page, engaged with your content or watched 75%+ of your video.
For service businesses, your retargeting strategy should be:
- Set up custom audiences for site visitors, engagement and video views
- Retarget with testimonials, case studies or direct CTAs
- Use different messages for different engagement levels
The best thing about retargeting? It’s significantly cheaper. When you look at audience segments in your account, you’ll see that existing customers and engaged audiences typically have almost double the ROAS of cold traffic.
So don’t just chase new customers. Make sure you are nurturing the people who have already shown interest. This is the lowest hanging fruit for the easiest wins.
Section 7: Think Long-Term
Facebook Ads is not a magic button for leads and conversions. Think of it as a system that builds momentum over time. The more data you feed it, the smarter it gets.
A lot of people quit their facebook ads effort right before things start working. Here’s why:
- The first 2-4 weeks are learning periods where results are inconsistent
- Month 2 is where you start finding winning combinations
- Month 3 is when scaling becomes possible
The Facebook algorithm needs consistent data to optimise and learn from. If you keep stopping and starting campaigns, you’re essentially resetting the learning phase over and over.
Give campaigns at least 50 conversions before making major decisions. That’s the minimum amount of data Facebook needs to start optimising effectively.
Bonus Pro Tips
Let me share some advanced tactics that most people miss:
- Use video – even lower quality – over static images where possible. Video engagement tells Facebook more about who’s interested in your offer.
- Speak to pain points directly in the first 3 seconds. You have a tiny window to grab attention before people scroll past.
- Don’t just track leads. Track booked calls and conversions. The quality of your leads matters more than quantity.
- Diversify your creative formats. Most people only create one type of ad, but you need assets for:
- Feed (square format)
- Stories (vertical full-screen)
- Reels (vertical video)
If you limit yourself to just one format, you’re only reaching about a third of potential eyeballs. This diversity alone can dramatically lower your CPMs.
Be careful with audience exclusions. It’s tempting to create complex funnels, but sometimes allowing some overlap between audiences actually improves performance in 2025’s algorithm.
Next Steps
Remember, none of these optimisations will double your results overnight. But stacked together? They create a system that can transform your Facebook ads from money pits to profit machines.
If you’ve read this blog and are ready to make changes to your content this year, let’s talk about how you can achieve this with the help of Campaigns You Love.
Ready to build a Facebook Ads system that delivers consistent results, not just quick wins? Book your free Discovery Call, and we’ll create a long-term strategy that builds momentum and learns over time, as we discussed in this post.