Welcome to Cultivative’s weekly roundup for all things PPC from around the web—everything you need to know right now about PPC!
At Cultivative, we’re all about making your life easier. We’ve gathered the top PPC news and innovations from around the web and getting it into your hands. Check out what we found this past week.
11 Expert Facebook Ad Design Secrets to Increase Conversions (+ Examples)
By Animalz | Mar 18, 2021

It is essential to design ads that visually communicate and present your brands to the public. You may offer a great product with a great offer, but you will not get traction if they are not visually appealing, confusing, or boring. Stop wasting your money on ads that readers scroll past and that fail to convert your target audience and start implementing these expert ad design tips:
- Consider your ad format in the design process
- Ad placement should inform design
- Make your value proposition and call to action clear
- Keep the landing page consistent with your ad
- Get your image sizes right
- Use the right images
- Anyone can make powerful images
- Consider the psychology of color
- Use location-specific imagery
- Design for mobile
- Use split testing to find the right Facebook ad design
7 Formulas for Landing Page Headlines that Practically Write Themselves (With Examples)
By Emily Bauer | Mar 23, 2021

There isn’t a single right way to write a landing page headline. But you can rely on tried and true headline formulas to connect with your target audience. General rules to keep in mind: always prioritize message match, it’s better to be clear than clever, and you don’t need to reinvent the wheel. Emily Bauer recommends these seven formulas, with examples, for writing your next landing page headline:
- The How-to Headline
- The Agitator
- The Value Prop (AKA the Promise)
- The Superlative
- The Call to Action
- The Special Offer
- The Playful Headline
Facebook Custom Audiences 101: The Complete Guide for Marketers
By Animalz | Mar 23, 2021

Ads won’t work if they don’t target the right audience. Facebook Custom Audiences makes it easy to reach the right people on Facebook each time you’re advertising. Facebook Custom Audiences help you improve your Facebook advertising campaigns by putting the power of ad placement directly in your hands. Animalz goes through everything you need to know about Custom Audiences, from basic setup to advanced implementation, covering:
- How to Make a Custom Audience on Facebook
- How to Create a Customer List Custom Audience
- How to Create a Website Custom Audience
- How to Create an App Activity Custom Audience
- How to Create an Engagement Custom Audience
- How to Create a Lookalike Audience
- Top Tips for Using Facebook Custom Audiences
Google’s current FLoC tests aren’t GDPR compliant
By Carolyn Lyden | Mar 24, 2021

FLoC will not be tested in Europe, according to a report by AdExchanger. Questions about whether a browser assigning users into cohorts count as a use of personal data, without consent, and may be a privacy violation. FLoC is set to open to advertiser testing beginning in Q2 of this year, but countries that fall under GDPR and the ePrivacy Directive will not participate. This may leave European advertisers in limbo as to what will replace third-party cookies.
Facebook Ad Testing on a Budget: A Proven Method
By Tara Zirker | Mar 23, 2021

You don’t need a big budget to test Facebook ads. With a budget of $250-$500, this testing method will help you identify successful ad components that result in a winning ad. While there are other elements you could test, testing your ad copy, creative, and headlines will give you the bulk of your results and help ensure you don’t leave any money on the table. Tara Zirker reviews a proven Facebook ad testing method designed for small budgets and discover which metrics will help you identify successful ad components.
What Media Trends Can Advertisers Expect for Q2?
By Melissa Reilly | Mar 24, 2021

After a tumultuous 2020, consumers are feeling more hopeful in 2021. Merkle’s Media Insights Report predicts what media trends will be and provides actionable steps that advertisers can take to be prepared. Here are their five high-level trends for Q2:
- Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL): driven by tough financial times and the necessity for e-commerce.
- Planning for Recovery: uncertainty around the true “end” of the pandemic.
- Short-Form Video
- What’s Next for Social Media: adoption of alternative social apps.
- iOS14 and Cookies
Microsoft Ads Ad Quality Year in Review: Increases in Ad Fraud
By Amy Bishop | Mar 24, 2021

In Microsoft Ads’ ad quality review, they identified an increase in policy-breaking behavior in 2020. As a result, they suspended almost 300,000 accounts from the Microsoft Advertising platform in 2020, which was a 30% increase from the year prior. Microsoft noted that they have also removed 1.6 billion bad ads and an additional 270,000 sites from their system in 2020 alone. The pandemic created a unique situation in which there was a massive spike in new demand for new and hard-to-find products such as Covid testing kits and vaccines. At the same time, Microsoft noted that there was also a rise in the online presence of businesses of all kinds and an increase in consumer interaction, including those consumers that may not have previously interacted with businesses online. In 2021, Microsoft plans to continue to leverage its two-pronged system of automated reviews powered by machine learning paired with manual reviewers to continue to improve the search experience for businesses and searchers using their platforms.
We hope you learned something new you can apply to your PPC business strategy. Let us know in the comments below what you want to start implementing. As always, we are happy to be a resource for your paid advertising needs. If you have any questions, feel free to contact us.
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