How to Set Up Your Meta Account for Black Friday Success

[00:00:00] Richard Gaffin: Hey guys, curious how you all are setting up your meta accounts to win on BFCM? Like, give me BFCM 2025 meta campaign set up 1 0 1. So, in other words, what are our best practices here heading into this season, uh, in terms of meta account app?

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[00:00:51] Speaker 4: That's F-E-R-M-A t.com/ctc.

[00:00:55] Richard Gaffin: Alright, welcome folks to the DOC hotline. This is your direct connection to [00:01:00] Hot Takes, cold Truths, and really eCom advice from the best in the biz. I'm your host Richard, the Professor Gaffin. Call or text, eight six six dtc 2 2 6 3. Get your burning eComm questions answered. That's 8 6 6 3 8 2. 2, 6 3. You can leave us a voicemail, shoot us a text, ask whatever is on your mind.

[00:01:16] Richard Gaffin: D two C wise, our operators are standing by, and speaking of which, let me introduce our operators today for you. We got Tony the chopper Chop here coming in live from beautiful Newport Beach, California. We got Luke the weatherman, Austin coming in from CTC HQ and Costa Mesa. Tony, what's going on man?

[00:01:32] Tony Chopp: Morning, Richard. Doing well, just, uh, nice recharging weekend. Ready? Ready to get going?

[00:01:37] Richard Gaffin: Yeah. Did a little surfing. I understand.

[00:01:39] Tony Chopp: Yep. First time at San Nory

[00:01:41] Richard Gaffin: Wow, that's a Santa free, a uh, spot.

[00:01:45] Tony Chopp: Chill. It's like, um, it's like a, it's like a slow, easy wave. And so for a beginner such as myself, uh, it makes for a good, good day.

[00:01:55] Richard Gaffin: All right, perfect. All right, Santa, no free. Perfect place to start surfing. It's, uh, you learn something new every day. [00:02:00] Luke, the weatherman, Austin. Of course. Uh, Luke, what's going on today? Dude did.

[00:02:05] Luke Austin: Oh, we are enjoying some overcast weather

[00:02:08] Luke Austin: in cloudy, in cloudy Southern California.

[00:02:11] Luke Austin: Uh, this morning my, my son, uh, at four 30, he decided to do daylight savings a week early.

[00:02:19] Luke Austin: So 4 30, 4 30 this morning, him and I and our dog laps around the neighborhood

[00:02:25] Luke Austin: park. Just hanging out. Just hanging

[00:02:27] Luke Austin: out, enjoying the sun coming up. Uh, so

[00:02:31] Luke Austin: that's, uh, that's, that's the energy. That's the energy that we, we are in. We are, we've, we're in the future. We've already passed daylight

[00:02:37] Luke Austin: savings.

[00:02:38] Richard Gaffin: So it's nine 30 right now, so you've already been awake for five hours. So that's kinda the energy we're bringing here

[00:02:42] Luke Austin: Exactly.

[00:02:43] Luke Austin: Exactly. There's so much of the day

[00:02:44] Luke Austin: left.

[00:02:45] Richard Gaffin: it's basically the afternoon for you. All right, cool. All right, well, let's, uh, let's jump right into it. So just like last week, we have one question that we're focusing on because there's one thing that's on everybody's mind right now, which is of course, black Friday, cyber Monday upcoming.

[00:02:56] Richard Gaffin: So we're keeping it focused here. Uh, this is a text message question I'm gonna read out [00:03:00] and we'll dive right into it. Uh, get this one answered. So, uh, the question is, Hey guys, curious how you all are setting up your meta accounts to win on BFCM? Like, give me BFCM 2025 meta campaign set up 1 0 1. So, in other words, what are our best practices here heading into this season, uh, in terms of meta account app?

[00:03:17] Richard Gaffin: So, who wants to, uh, jump into this one first?

[00:03:20] Luke Austin: Oh, okay. So when it comes to campaigns, uh, this, this may be, I, I think Tony and I are gonna be very on the same page here. We, we didn't actually talk about this leading into the conversation. I think we're gonna say a similar thing, and I think it actually might be surprising for those folks listening, uh, maybe different than what you'd expect us to say, um, which is in general campaign structure, uh, what necessitates necessitates a separate campaign. Or ad set is you need a different bid. That is the reason you need a separate campaign or ad set. So a bid is going to be related to, uh, a different efficiency starting that that came ha campaign has due to the products or offers being shown that [00:04:00] have a different marginal composition. Right. Relative to the other.

[00:04:03] Luke Austin: So if you have. Product A and product B, but they have the exact same margin composition, un unlikely to be exact, but exact same margin, composition, cogs, delivery costs, et cetera. Uh, have them in the same campaign. You don't need a different, you don't need a different campaign because they, they can operate off the same bid, they have the same marginal composition. Um, and so when you enter into marketing moments, specifically sale periods that have discounts, you're going to, you're going to need a different budget, uh, a different bid, uh, than you would in other times because. There's, uh, a different marginal composition due to the discount on that, the, that set of products. Now, um, if, uh, there is little to no complexity in the marginal differences and the products and the sale that you're running for the time of Black Friday, cyber Monday, the, you wanna start in the simplest account structure possible, which is going to be one campaign. [00:05:00] Consolidated with everything in it and ideally, uh, in a cost controlled ROAS or inflated budget bid cap set up, that's sort of like, would be my most ideals, like go into the account. It is the simplest version, as long as the marginal complexity allows for it. A campaign, um, with, uh, with, uh, either set at minero or bid caps with inflated budgets, sort of like the, the perfect time period to, to be able to, um, have that set up because the variable demand, um, is so wide, uh, during, during these days that you want to be able to catch the upside, upside limit of it. Um, and then the complexity, the layer of complexity you're gonna build off is related to, again, you need a different, uh, bid, uh, against, against that, um, which will come into play if you're running, uh, campaigns towards retention customers or lapsed customers, right? So you'd have an acquisition campaign and then like a lapsed or retention campaign, maybe separate out on that level.

[00:05:55] Luke Austin: Um, if you sell internationally and you have different delivery costs associated with international, then you [00:06:00] probably have a US campaign, an international campaign. Then you start to segment. Based on, uh, needs for different bits, but only after you started the simplest point possible, which is load as many creative as possible into this consolidated campaign for Black Friday, Saturday, Monday with a, uh, with a cost control set up and then inflated budget against it, and then duplicate that campaign.

[00:06:23] Luke Austin: Set it to highest volume or value.

[00:06:25] Luke Austin: Have it in your back. Have it in your back pocket. Already through META'S review and approval. And if for some reason you need more delivery, uh, and that you're not gonna go to accelerated delivery on that cost control campaign, no. You're gonna flip on your highest volume or value campaign that's already through approval and review and get through budget additionally that way. Um, alright. Tony, what, what do you got? What do you, what, what, what did I miss? And what else would you add?

[00:06:52] Tony Chopp: I was just waiting for that last, that last shoe to drop, so like 300. In 63 days of the year, [00:07:00] you, you're, you're really thinking about the way that CTC thinks about Mead's account structure and really media structure across the board is protecting, like, controlling for downside risk, right? So, um, cost, cost controls, uh, how, however you wanna think about it.

[00:07:15] Tony Chopp: So the bidding that, that favors the, the cost protection. 363 days a year. Two days a year, your risk is actually on the, on the other side, your risk is actually potentially under investing, and that's Black Friday and Cyber Monday. And you could maybe throw in the two days in between into that mix as well.

[00:07:33] Tony Chopp: Um, so, so the point of having the, the, the backup campaign, the duplicate of the normal setup that you have that's on Monroe or cost cap or bid cap into a highest volume. Um. Highest volume setup is, is to. Is to protect against the actual risk on Black Friday Cyber Monday, which is, which is under investing at this really, really unique moment in time where consumers, [00:08:00] um, potentially more so than any other time of year, have their credit cards out.

[00:08:05] Tony Chopp: They're ready to buy the, the buying behaviors just, just totally outside of the, the normal 363 day of the year pattern. So. Yes, just doubling down on everything that Luke said. We want cdc c's like premise for account setup is as simple as possible. You can think about the necessity for when you want separation at the campaign or ad set level as a function of when you need a setting that's at a campaign or ad set level.

[00:08:31] Tony Chopp: Typically for us, we think about that as as a different bid. Uh, and then, um, have those, have that simple setup, duplicated into a. Highest volume type bidding, ready to go.

[00:08:46] Richard Gaffin: Yeah. Yeah. Well, I mean, so that feels like that's the, uh, that's the big reveal here. This idea that there's the whole time there's been this highest volume campaign in the background that's ready to go on at any given moment. the idea there is like, you're not getting enough spend through, let's say in the main [00:09:00] one, or you feel like there's just more opportunity.

[00:09:01] Richard Gaffin: You flip that one on, let it go, and that picks up more of the volume. Um. Any, so any other sort of like unexpected tricks or anything like that? Or is it basically just like, Hey, build it out this way, have this thing on the background?

[00:09:17] Tony Chopp: There's a couple little small point nuances. You wanna get your daily budget set the day before, so the night before, you want all that stuff set correctly so it hits the, the, uh, pay attention to the time zone your account is in. That's actually a little, little trick that, that little trap that, that catches people to not know the actual time zone, to get the daily budget set the day before.

[00:09:36] Tony Chopp: Um. In, in the Black Friday, cyber Monday period, there's uh, a little bit more sort of budget surfing that is necessary. So get the daily budget set where you want them to be the day before. Um, we, we usually advise for a little pullback and tightening at the end of the day on Friday. And then opening and then repeating that process on Sunday.

[00:09:57] Tony Chopp: So opening up into Cyber Monday. [00:10:00] Uh, and then on Monday for sure, the biggest, the biggest mistake you could make is leave your Black Friday, cyber Monday weekend budgets in that account,

[00:10:10] Tony Chopp: uh, going into, going into Tuesday morning. So, uh, just, just some conscientiousness around the, uh, the, the pacing of how the, how the sales happens throughout the weekend.

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[00:11:08] Richard Gaffin: Yeah. Luke, any uh uh, any other sort of BFCM tips and tricks we should know about?

[00:11:14] Luke Austin: I think we should talk about the landing page for a second. Um, there's a lot of different places you can send customers on Black Friday, cyber Monday on, on your website. And in most cases, you're gonna have the, the sale communicated on your top, your on homepage, your main homepage banner. It's gonna be on the top bar of your website likely, and then, um, potentially doing some sort of strike through pricing on the product. Level as well. Um, and so the sale is gonna be showing up and should be showing up on your homepage and your collection pages and your product pages, right? Um, and then maybe you have a specific landing page built out for it. Um, but that could probably just be the home homepage, um, if it's a, if it's a sitewide sale especially. Um, so landing page destination, uh, is, [00:12:00] is an interesting conversation. Um, the, the main reason, um, is for many brands. If you look at Google Analytics historical data or do analysis, you'll see like, oh, our homepage is one of our top performing websites. From a conversion rate standpoint, I've been in a number of these conversations, and typically the reason for that is you only really send your homepage when you're running a sale or a promo.

[00:12:23] Luke Austin: Um, and the rest of the time you're sending to collection pages, product pages, or landing pages. And so relative to those, it does look like the higher converting, um, place. So, um, this is all mostly an admonition too. Look at the data, uh, look at what the historical sort of, uh, performance has been on, on a landing page, destination, oral structure. Um, and likely homepage is gonna be the way to go, but there's no reason to not have additional landing page destinations built in to additional ad units, right? So you have. The same ad, drive it to your homepage, same ad, drive it to a collection page that's holiday oriented, or a landing page [00:13:00] that's the sale, sale oriented. Um, or if it's a specific individual product or bundle, potentially less likely. But if it, but if it is then driving people, um, right there. Um, so that you can remove the amount of, uh, friction points, uh, as much as possible. Uh, within that, um, connect connected to this. This is sort of just like rapid fire.

[00:13:20] Luke Austin: Just other things to, to look for in this, in this time period, uh, frames on your daba and DPA carousels with highlighting the sale. Um, get, get those, get those in just a big call out of what the promo is, um, and the links out directly to those, those products. Um, uh, uh, another thing in addition to the account structure and the landing page URLs that you are. Sending to. Um, and then outside of that, a couple other call outs on the site, you probably have, uh, email flows or popups set for sort of evergreen offers. So $20 off your first order, that's like a popup that, you know, once you visit two pages, it come, it pops in after 20 seconds, or [00:14:00] you have a welcome flow that's automated, that has that offer.

[00:14:02] Luke Austin: People sign up for SMS, get all of that consistent to be what your offer is during that time period. So people aren't getting to the website, seeing the offer. For your main sale. Then seeing the $20 off your first order, evergreen, sort of when you click in and do the SMS, get all that consistent, um, to orient around your offer.

[00:14:20] Luke Austin: And then focus on the landing page, destination u all, it gets them closest to, um, the product, uh, that where there's an offer associated. Simple account structure, daba, DPA frames, just get everything tight and clear and screaming, uh, what the offer is and getting the customer as close to it as possible.

[00:14:39] Richard Gaffin: Love it. yeah, I, to your point, by the way, about DBA frames, like, that's another like creative piece of advice that we have, which is like throwing frames of various kinds on your evergreen best performers, which is to say like instead of relying on, oh, brand new net new holiday creative, which is something you can't create obviously, but like putting the messaging on stuff that's already working. [00:15:00] Um, just another quick. Fast and dirty trick to get something out there that's, uh, gonna actually be pretty effective. So, um, okay, cool. Well I feel like we've gotten a, a lot of hot takes out of this already, so I don't necessarily need another hot take corner. I think building an entire phantom highest volume campaign that's lying in the wings, I think is a pretty good one.

[00:15:17] Richard Gaffin: So, uh, we'll leave it at that. But alright folks, I think that's gonna do it for us, uh, today. So remember again, if you have any questions, uh, e-comm questions like this one that you want answered on this pod, you can call, you can leave us a voicemail. 8, 6, 6 dtc, 2, 2, 6 3. Or you can shoot us a text there. Uh, we might read your question on a subsequent episode.

[00:15:35] Richard Gaffin: So for Tony, the chopper, chop for Luke, the weatherman. Austin, I'm Richard, the Professor Gaff, and signing off. And we'll see you next time.