I often get the question: “Micky, do you only work strategically with the companies you collaborate with?”
The short answer is no, but with some nuance. Over the past 10 years, I’ve been extremely privileged to work across various brands, businesses, large budgets, and tools.
Today, I spend up to 5 million DKK per month on Facebook advertising and work with exciting cases like Chefmade, Badmintonshoppen, Natures Collection, Stine Goya, Dialægt, Myselfie, Molly&My, and many more.
I’m very much hands-on in the execution, making sure everything from audience targeting to the actual ads you see as a consumer works perfectly.
Where I’ve become more strategic over the years is in refusing to say that there’s only one approach or that Facebook ads are the only answer.
Your business might not benefit from Facebook—maybe TikTok, Pinterest, Twitter, or something entirely different would be a better fit.
Another important aspect is that I get much better results when I have a deep understanding of the business I’m advertising for. It gives me insight into what the consumer wants and what the company wants to communicate.
Over the past five years, I’ve tried to gain more of a helicopter view, so I can manage the businesses I work with in the best possible way.
Instead of convincing a client they need ads or SEO, I often flip the business model upside down. I look at available resources, the company’s ability to execute on strategies (there’s no point launching something they can’t implement), the budgets, competitors, relevant media channels—and then we move forward with the right ones.
One channel I work a lot with is Facebook and Instagram advertising, but maybe TikTok, LinkedIn, and Pinterest will take a larger slice of the pie in the future.
When you manage the kind of budgets I do, across so many different cases, you’re constantly learning. That learning is something I bring into all the cases I work with, and in the workshops I run—ultimately helping to allocate budgets in the most efficient way.
Mindset for Facebook advertising in 2020
There are many studies that analyze how social media influences our behavior and decision-making.
Despite this, I still often encounter confusion when it comes to Facebook advertising and social media marketing in general. That’s where I come in—to bring transparency.
You can’t compare Facebook to Google in terms of traffic generation. This is true for many different channels. There’s room for all of them, but they serve different roles in the funnel.
Instead of writing a long blog post, I created a visual funnel that helps illustrate this point.
As I often say, successful online marketing is about understanding the psychology and desired behavior of the user.
Facebook attribution
The customer journey has become increasingly complex across digital channels, and the same applies to Facebook and Instagram.
You often see success stories based only on ROAS—how much was spent vs. how much was earned.
But this isn’t a reliable picture unless you include attribution models in your analysis.
In simple terms:
Each tool attributes value differently.
Facebook’s default model credits a sale to them if someone clicked on an ad within the last 28 days or viewed one in the last 24 hours.
But should they really get the credit? That depends on your industry, product price, and customer journey length.
For example, e-commerce stores often show skewed ROAS on Facebook’s dashboard because their customers interact with many touchpoints before purchasing.
This is why we often compare different attribution windows to get a more realistic picture. Facebook plays a role, yes—but don’t interpret the numbers too rigidly.
Below you can see Facebook advertising spend and revenue
The image above is from one of the accounts I run on Facebook – it’s almost too good to be true, right?
It is, because in this case we’re running with the standard attribution window, which means that as pointed out before, everyone who has seen an ad in the last 24 hours or clicked in the last 28 days will still be attributed to Facebook.
In this case, we’re talking about a webshop with a high repurchase rate, many different channels, newsletters, SMSes and much more.
This is why we often compare different attribution windows to get a more realistic picture. Facebook plays a role, yes—but don’t interpret the numbers too rigidly.
Facebook’s attribution tool helps show how different channels influence each other and allows comparison of multiple attribution models.
Another essential factor is understanding touchpoints.
We no longer rely on just a few channels—our journey spans many.
Facebook’s attribution tool offers insights into how mobile and desktop interact.
The takeaway? It’s still important to run follow-up ads on desktop.
Use unique discount codes
Facebook offers a feature where you can create offers with platform-exclusive discount codes.
This helps measure the impact of Facebook ads more accurately, as the discount code can’t be obtained elsewhere.
We recently tested this with Molly&My.
The results were decent, though not as strong as what ROAS data initially showed—because this time, we could track only the purchases made using the discount code.
Since we offer a discount, allow returns, and spend on ads, these campaigns could potentially operate at a loss—but it’s a test worth running.
Objectives and tracking
The first thing you should always define is your objective with Facebook advertising—this applies to all digital strategies.
How else will you measure success?
What are you trying to achieve? That makes it easier to choose the right strategy from the start.
Objectives vary greatly across industries. Here are some examples:
Automotive
I’ve worked with several car dealerships.
Car purchases involve many touchpoints and take time, so we measure things like inquiries, test drive bookings, and phone calls.
Brand awareness is also key—to stay top-of-mind when the customer is ready.
E-commerce
Purchases happen more frequently.
Many users can place multiple orders in the same week, especially if the products are used often (like pet food or health supplements) or if the store has a vast selection.
Apps
With apps, you often need the user to download immediately.
That’s why app marketing focuses heavily on installs, which you can track via Facebook’s ad platform.
The strategy and post-campaign analysis are therefore very different.
Branded search traffic
Many still forget that Facebook, Instagram, and other platforms drive brand synergy.
Platforms like Facebook and YouTube are rarely channels where users buy immediately.
Marketing is about psychology.
Even if someone doesn’t buy right away after seeing your ad, they might remember your brand when they’re ready.
So keep an eye on your branded search volume.
My tip: In today’s fragmented marketing world, it’s more important than ever to be clear about your objective and remember that tracking isn’t black and white.
Campaign budget optimization
If you’ve used Facebook’s ad manager, previously known as Power Editor, you’ve probably noticed that Facebook now favors campaign budget optimization over ad set-level budgeting.
Soon, this will be mandatory.
That means when you set a campaign budget, Facebook will automatically distribute it across the ad sets based on performance.
You must ensure that the ad sets within a campaign make sense together, as they now compete for the same budget.
Source: https://newsfeed.org/
Audience and segmentation
Once your objective is clear, you can start exploring targeting.
There’s a lot happening in this space, opening up new opportunities.
You can go broad and let the algorithm optimize, or you can test more specific segments—especially “lookalike” audiences based on existing customer data.
Buying behavior via Facebook Analytics
Facebook Analytics offers interesting insights, such as the “percentiles” tab, where you can identify top-performing customers.
Say the top 5% of your customers have bought four times in the last 90 days—use that data to build a targeted audience and retarget them effectively.
Derefter går jeg ind i mine målgrupper og bruger denne viden.
For car dealerships, the focus would be different:
- Time spent on site
- Form submissions
- Phone inquiries
- Email outreach
Target audience: look-a-like ideas and possibilities
Look-a-like audiences are based on existing information or data. This means you ask Facebook’s algorithm to find a percentage of people in Denmark (or other countries) who most closely resemble a given data source. You can provide Facebook with these data yourself.
Here are the data sources I often base my look-a-like audiences on:
- Upload your email list (consider segmenting it into “inactive customers,” “best customers,” etc.)
- Those who spend the most time on your website
- Those who have spent the most money on your website
- Those who have made purchases on your website
- Those who have added items to the cart in the last 30 days
In principle, it depends on how much data flows through your website. If your site has low traffic and insufficient data, it is difficult to get the best results from these audiences. Then it might be better to broaden the scope, but you can always use visitors from the last 30, 90, or 180 days and create a look-a-like audience from those.
My tip: experiment with these audiences.
Run a campaign with 4-5 look-a-like audiences and see which one performs best. Then try adjusting the percentage. I usually use 3-5%, but if your product appeals to a broad audience, it’s okay to test 10%, knowing it might take Facebook’s algorithm longer to narrow down those likely to make a purchase.
Target audience: detailed interests
Facebook is constantly improving its algorithm, which increases the possibilities advertisers have on the platform.
In the US, for example, it is possible to target audiences based on household income, which is not yet available in Denmark.
However, Facebook has introduced a segmentation called “engaged shoppers.”
This means showing ads only to users who have clicked “shop now” or “buy now” in the last week.
These active users often purchase via Facebook ads, making this audience very interesting for businesses that want to sell online.
This audience is fun to experiment with in different contexts.
For example, my experience is that these audiences can sometimes achieve a better CPA (cost per acquisition) than campaigns targeting all of Denmark. B
ut as you might guess, it’s not black and white because creative content also matters — what users see influences results, which I will discuss later.
Target audience: re-targeting funnel
Not everyone working with Facebook ads agrees with this strategy, and that’s fine — everyone has their own way. I like to incorporate psychology into my advertising, especially for consideration purchases where building a genuine relationship with users is important.
To simplify, here is my own re-targeting funnel:
The more traffic you have, the longer and tighter your funnels can be. With less traffic, consider extending these funnel audiences so people don’t see the same ads repeatedly.
Here’s the flow:
- 0-7 days: show people a video with credibility, personality, and a small call to action — maybe they forgot to complete their purchase.
- 7-14 days: exclude the first 7 days and target only the most recent 7 days. Show social proof here, like slideshows of customers using your products or testimonials.
- 14-30 days: exclude the first 14 days since they’ve seen previous content. Focus on PR-related material if available.
- 30-45 days: now moving further from the site visit. Aim to bring people back with blog posts about your values, core competencies, or company news.
The point of this flow is:
After 45 days, if asked about your company, users will likely have some awareness of your brand name and core values — even if they don’t remember exactly where.
My tip: align this funnel with your email strategy to reach people from many angles. After some time, your company will be top of mind because you’ve done something
Target audience: winback and retention
There are countless interesting audiences to experiment with in Facebook advertising, so it’s impossible to cover them all here. There are many good guides online, and I’ve also written some elsewhere.
Another strategy is a “winback” approach, often mirrored in email marketing:
- People who visited your website in the last 180 days but haven’t purchased in the last 150 days.
- People who purchased but haven’t visited the website in the last 180 days.
- People on your email list who have never purchased.
- People who follow you on Facebook but have never bought anything.
My point again is: only your imagination sets the limits. Facebook’s algorithm will help you. Make sure to adapt these strategies to fit your business and industry.
Advertising – lead ads
Everyone wants sales, but what is the next best thing if you don’t get a sale? For Facebook advertising, it’s contact details from someone who has shown interest in your product.
Facebook has offered “lead generation ads” for years — ads specifically designed to collect emails or phone numbers into a user database. When creating campaigns, choose this format.
You can use some of the audience segments described above. Beyond audience segmentation, you need a plan for collecting leads. Here are a few ideas:
- E-books: If you are a personal trainer, B2B company, or marketing agency, offering a free e-book in exchange for signing up for a newsletter can work well. Facebook lead generation ads make this easy.
- Contests: Still a good strategy, but keep prizes relevant to your business. Avoid prizes like iPads that attract participants with no interest in your product.
- Access to pre-sale: If you’re a fashion company, offer exclusive early access to sales or new collections. Leads may cost more but tend to be higher quality.
The sky is the limit for what you offer.
Tip: use tools like Zapier to automatically transfer leads into your CRM or Excel, but consider creating a new list in your email system so you can measure performance against existing leads and avoid hurting your email results.
Here is an example of a video ad in lead format:
The video went viral for Molly & My with 31,000 views and over 4,000 email sign-ups. Not a bad investment if these leads convert to sales.
Use participant behavior as an audience in your advertising
After running a Facebook lead ad, you can create new audiences based on user interaction with the lead ad. For example, all users who opened the lead form can receive a follow-up ad.
It looks like this within “audiences”
This is useful, for example, if you collected leads for a new collection launch. When the collection hits stores, target those who signed up with emails on Facebook and Instagram.
As you can see, the possibilities for building flows around your advertising are endless. And this is just Facebook and Instagram — zoom out to see how different channels affect your overall marketing picture.
Google ads & LinkedIn ads – lead generations ads
Facebook is not the only platform focusing on lead ads. Google and LinkedIn also offer this. Google Lead ads are now available in search results (currently beta).
It’s good to test if you have the chance.
Similarly, LinkedIn has “Lead Gen Forms” working like Facebook and Google ads. These work very well for B2B marketing.
B2B sales- Lead generation tips
I’ve worked with several B2B companies recently, which sparks good ideas. One trick is:
Set up lead ads on Facebook and LinkedIn, connect them to Zapier to capture leads into a system with info like phone, email, number of employees, etc.
Run an ad offering your products or a free consultation via Zoom or send a free product package (e.g., coffee). Make sure the terms allow contacting leads about product demos.
Example case:
- Leads: 754
- Cost per lead: 2.45 DKK
- Closed deals: 20 worth 10,000 DKK annually
As long as you stay product-specific and avoid sounding too salesy, this works well. Cases include office supplies, coffee, IT equipment, snacks, decor, and printer paper.
Advertising – the creative angle
Creativity is becoming a bigger part of online advertising. Previously, technical setup took most focus, but platforms like Facebook and Instagram have made technical tools easier.
Now the focus is on creating content that is interesting and engaging for users — videos, blog posts, personality. It’s about finding a unique edge your company has that others can’t copy.
We’ve seen the classic ads reminding us to buy shoes we looked at, but we want more depth.
Instead of explaining more, here are some cases I admire for their digital creativity:
- Shaping New Tomorrow: Possibly one of Denmark’s best at video content with diverse messages and audiences. Their content never gets boring and feels very polished.
- Molly & My: I love their personality. When launching roller skates, one owner showed herself skating at the office. In a tough industry like women’s fashion, their authenticity stands out.
- Douchebags: A top example of influencer marketing carrying a brand. Created by Swedish influencers, they produce high-quality content, from helicopter adventures to cool collaborations. A brand many can learn from.
A small sample of Douchebag’s Instagram
It shows content of the highest quality
As a side note, LinkedIn and Twitter are launching their own “stories” feature soon, which will be a great way to showcase company culture and influence sales and recruitment.
Facebook advertising – tools
You can’t talk marketing without mentioning the “toolbox.” Here are some tools I use for Facebook and Instagram ads:
- Facebook pixel event tool: Now easier than before, use the Event Setup Tool in the Facebook pixel section to tag conversion events directly on your website.
- Facebook ads library: Facebook’s public archive of all active ads is great for inspiration to see offers, formats, and competitor tactics.
- Promo: Video tool for quick, simple videos. Paid premium version available.
- Canva: User-friendly alternative to Photoshop for creating consistent graphic templates.
- Confect.io: For advanced dynamic product ads (DPA) that stand out, worth the extra cost.
- Manychat: Best for messenger bots, powerful yet easy to navigate.
- Instapage / Unbounce: Landing page builders; Instapage is my favorite, but Unbounce is a simpler alternative.
Conclusion
I hope this was insightful. I didn’t expect to write over 5,000 words, but working so much with Facebook ads gave me more to share than I thought.
If you have input, criticism, comments, or ideas, feel free to use the comment section. I’d enjoy discussing Facebook and the platform’s possibilities with you.
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