I stopped doing retargeting campaigns on Facebook and the results skyrocketed. Today, I want to kind of go through my discoveries and showcase a couple of things I wish I would have known before.
Why I Cut Out Retargeting Campaigns in 2024
Back in January 2024, we completely cut out retargeting campaigns. This means zero retargeting campaigns — we’re not running any retargeting ad sets, we’re not running any retargeting campaigns. You know, maybe it’s debatable if we’re running retargeting ads in general, but I’ll go a little bit deeper into that. What we do is the "one campaign per business objective" strategy, where we create one CBO campaign. Let’s say, for example, if we have one product, then we just create one campaign. If we have maybe two divisions of our company, like women’s clothing and men’s clothing, they would have a campaign for women’s clothing and a campaign for men’s clothing. That’s what I mean by business objectives. Now, in this particular case, we’ll just talk about one product.
Setting Up Broad Targeting Campaigns
So, if we have one product or maybe a collection of products that are equally similar, we’ll just do one campaign. Then, we’ll have broad targeting only. This means just age and location — no interest, no lookalikes, no custom audiences. The only thing we will do is exclude, like 30-day purchases, for example. I have a lot of videos on my YouTube channel that you may have already seen, but if you’re not familiar with how I set this up, look for how to run Facebook ads in 2025, as I have a full video going step-by-step. Don’t worry, it’s all been covered.
Retargeting Campaigns: Historical Context and Issues
Originally, retargeting campaigns were introduced around 2014, when I started getting back into Facebook ads. The goal was to retarget people because they had visited your website. You would target these people and show them specific ads that would lead to potentially making a purchase, and you would see a higher ROAS on those retargeting campaigns than your top-of-funnel campaigns.
The Problem with Retargeting Campaigns
The problem with this is that these retargeting campaigns make up a small portion of your overall revenue. Yeah, you’re getting a 10x ROAS, but that revenue generated from those campaigns is only making up 10% of your profits or 10% of your revenue, which is actually very small. Also, since iOS 14.5, it’s been difficult for Facebook to specifically target those people due to impaired traffic tracking. Because of this, the impact on performance is minimal.
Facebook Is Already Retargeting for You
Lastly, Facebook is already doing retargeting for you. If you look at your top-of-funnel campaigns and check your frequency over the last seven days, you’ll likely see a frequency above 1.0. If you have any frequency above 1.0 in your top-of-funnel campaigns, you are actively doing retargeting without having a dedicated retargeting campaign. For example, if it’s a frequency of 1.05, that means 5% of those impressions are hitting people for the second time. If it’s 0.2, that means 20% of those impressions are hitting people for a second time. So just keep an eye on that.
Why Run Retargeting Campaigns When It’s Already Being Done?
Since we know that we’re already doing retargeting with our top-of-funnel ads, why do we need a second campaign for it? The biggest argument I get is, “Well, Nick, we need to showcase people specific ads to convert them.” Yes and no — there’s no solid proof that showing people specific ads, like testimonials, will convert them. You might have a few ads that convert, but how do we know that they actually convert because of that retargeting ad?
Why Not Add Testimonials to Top-of-Funnel Ads?
Why not just add those things, like testimonials, to our product page and include them in our top-of-funnel ads? For example, we could have a 30-second ad at the top of the funnel where we incorporate testimonials.
Using Email and SMS for Retargeting
Why not use email and SMS to retarget these people? By targeting people who opt into email and SMS, we can create specific messaging based on where they are in the funnel, knowing for a fact that they’re in the product-aware stage.
Should You Focus on Retargeting Ads or Top-of-Funnel Ads?
Now, someone might ask, “If you’re just putting all these ads into the main ad set, how do you focus on retargeting ads and top-of-funnel ads?” The real question is: Why focus on retargeting ads? If you’re spending time on retargeting ads, you’re focusing on an ad that will make a 5-10% difference in your revenue, whereas a better top-of-funnel ad can improve your revenue by 100-500%. We had a top-of-funnel ad take an ad account from $1,000 a day to $5,000 a day. We just had another ad account where a new top-of-funnel ad took it from $100 a day to $400 a day.
Why Focus on High-Impact Ads?
So why focus your time on an ad that will give you maybe a 10% efficiency gain when you can focus on an ad that could improve your business by 100-400%? Why waste time on retargeting ads when there are more effective opportunities with top-of-funnel campaigns?
I stopped doing retargeting campaigns on Facebook and the results skyrocketed. Today, I want to kind of go through my discoveries and showcase a couple of things I wish I would have known before.
Why I Cut Out Retargeting Campaigns in 2024
Back in January 2024, we completely cut out retargeting campaigns. This means zero retargeting campaigns — we’re not running any retargeting ad sets, we’re not running any retargeting campaigns. You know, maybe it’s debatable if we’re running retargeting ads in general, but I’ll go a little bit deeper into that. What we do is the "one campaign per business objective" strategy, where we create one CBO campaign. Let’s say, for example, if we have one product, then we just create one campaign. If we have maybe two divisions of our company, like women’s clothing and men’s clothing, they would have a campaign for women’s clothing and a campaign for men’s clothing. That’s what I mean by business objectives. Now, in this particular case, we’ll just talk about one product.
Setting Up Broad Targeting Campaigns
So, if we have one product or maybe a collection of products that are equally similar, we’ll just do one campaign. Then, we’ll have broad targeting only. This means just age and location — no interest, no lookalikes, no custom audiences. The only thing we will do is exclude, like 30-day purchases, for example. I have a lot of videos on my YouTube channel that you may have already seen, but if you’re not familiar with how I set this up, look for how to run Facebook ads in 2025, as I have a full video going step-by-step. Don’t worry, it’s all been covered.
Retargeting Campaigns: Historical Context and Issues
Originally, retargeting campaigns were introduced around 2014, when I started getting back into Facebook ads. The goal was to retarget people because they had visited your website. You would target these people and show them specific ads that would lead to potentially making a purchase, and you would see a higher ROAS on those retargeting campaigns than your top-of-funnel campaigns.
The Problem with Retargeting Campaigns
The problem with this is that these retargeting campaigns make up a small portion of your overall revenue. Yeah, you’re getting a 10x ROAS, but that revenue generated from those campaigns is only making up 10% of your profits or 10% of your revenue, which is actually very small. Also, since iOS 14.5, it’s been difficult for Facebook to specifically target those people due to impaired traffic tracking. Because of this, the impact on performance is minimal.
Facebook Is Already Retargeting for You
Lastly, Facebook is already doing retargeting for you. If you look at your top-of-funnel campaigns and check your frequency over the last seven days, you’ll likely see a frequency above 1.0. If you have any frequency above 1.0 in your top-of-funnel campaigns, you are actively doing retargeting without having a dedicated retargeting campaign. For example, if it’s a frequency of 1.05, that means 5% of those impressions are hitting people for the second time. If it’s 0.2, that means 20% of those impressions are hitting people for a second time. So just keep an eye on that.
Why Run Retargeting Campaigns When It’s Already Being Done?
Since we know that we’re already doing retargeting with our top-of-funnel ads, why do we need a second campaign for it? The biggest argument I get is, “Well, Nick, we need to showcase people specific ads to convert them.” Yes and no — there’s no solid proof that showing people specific ads, like testimonials, will convert them. You might have a few ads that convert, but how do we know that they actually convert because of that retargeting ad?
Why Not Add Testimonials to Top-of-Funnel Ads?
Why not just add those things, like testimonials, to our product page and include them in our top-of-funnel ads? For example, we could have a 30-second ad at the top of the funnel where we incorporate testimonials.
Using Email and SMS for Retargeting
Why not use email and SMS to retarget these people? By targeting people who opt into email and SMS, we can create specific messaging based on where they are in the funnel, knowing for a fact that they’re in the product-aware stage.
Should You Focus on Retargeting Ads or Top-of-Funnel Ads?
Now, someone might ask, “If you’re just putting all these ads into the main ad set, how do you focus on retargeting ads and top-of-funnel ads?” The real question is: Why focus on retargeting ads? If you’re spending time on retargeting ads, you’re focusing on an ad that will make a 5-10% difference in your revenue, whereas a better top-of-funnel ad can improve your revenue by 100-500%. We had a top-of-funnel ad take an ad account from $1,000 a day to $5,000 a day. We just had another ad account where a new top-of-funnel ad took it from $100 a day to $400 a day.
Why Focus on High-Impact Ads?
So why focus your time on an ad that will give you maybe a 10% efficiency gain when you can focus on an ad that could improve your business by 100-400%? Why waste time on retargeting ads when there are more effective opportunities with top-of-funnel campaigns?
I stopped doing retargeting campaigns on Facebook and the results skyrocketed. Today, I want to kind of go through my discoveries and showcase a couple of things I wish I would have known before.
Why I Cut Out Retargeting Campaigns in 2024
Back in January 2024, we completely cut out retargeting campaigns. This means zero retargeting campaigns — we’re not running any retargeting ad sets, we’re not running any retargeting campaigns. You know, maybe it’s debatable if we’re running retargeting ads in general, but I’ll go a little bit deeper into that. What we do is the "one campaign per business objective" strategy, where we create one CBO campaign. Let’s say, for example, if we have one product, then we just create one campaign. If we have maybe two divisions of our company, like women’s clothing and men’s clothing, they would have a campaign for women’s clothing and a campaign for men’s clothing. That’s what I mean by business objectives. Now, in this particular case, we’ll just talk about one product.
Setting Up Broad Targeting Campaigns
So, if we have one product or maybe a collection of products that are equally similar, we’ll just do one campaign. Then, we’ll have broad targeting only. This means just age and location — no interest, no lookalikes, no custom audiences. The only thing we will do is exclude, like 30-day purchases, for example. I have a lot of videos on my YouTube channel that you may have already seen, but if you’re not familiar with how I set this up, look for how to run Facebook ads in 2025, as I have a full video going step-by-step. Don’t worry, it’s all been covered.
Retargeting Campaigns: Historical Context and Issues
Originally, retargeting campaigns were introduced around 2014, when I started getting back into Facebook ads. The goal was to retarget people because they had visited your website. You would target these people and show them specific ads that would lead to potentially making a purchase, and you would see a higher ROAS on those retargeting campaigns than your top-of-funnel campaigns.
The Problem with Retargeting Campaigns
The problem with this is that these retargeting campaigns make up a small portion of your overall revenue. Yeah, you’re getting a 10x ROAS, but that revenue generated from those campaigns is only making up 10% of your profits or 10% of your revenue, which is actually very small. Also, since iOS 14.5, it’s been difficult for Facebook to specifically target those people due to impaired traffic tracking. Because of this, the impact on performance is minimal.
Facebook Is Already Retargeting for You
Lastly, Facebook is already doing retargeting for you. If you look at your top-of-funnel campaigns and check your frequency over the last seven days, you’ll likely see a frequency above 1.0. If you have any frequency above 1.0 in your top-of-funnel campaigns, you are actively doing retargeting without having a dedicated retargeting campaign. For example, if it’s a frequency of 1.05, that means 5% of those impressions are hitting people for the second time. If it’s 0.2, that means 20% of those impressions are hitting people for a second time. So just keep an eye on that.
Why Run Retargeting Campaigns When It’s Already Being Done?
Since we know that we’re already doing retargeting with our top-of-funnel ads, why do we need a second campaign for it? The biggest argument I get is, “Well, Nick, we need to showcase people specific ads to convert them.” Yes and no — there’s no solid proof that showing people specific ads, like testimonials, will convert them. You might have a few ads that convert, but how do we know that they actually convert because of that retargeting ad?
Why Not Add Testimonials to Top-of-Funnel Ads?
Why not just add those things, like testimonials, to our product page and include them in our top-of-funnel ads? For example, we could have a 30-second ad at the top of the funnel where we incorporate testimonials.
Using Email and SMS for Retargeting
Why not use email and SMS to retarget these people? By targeting people who opt into email and SMS, we can create specific messaging based on where they are in the funnel, knowing for a fact that they’re in the product-aware stage.
Should You Focus on Retargeting Ads or Top-of-Funnel Ads?
Now, someone might ask, “If you’re just putting all these ads into the main ad set, how do you focus on retargeting ads and top-of-funnel ads?” The real question is: Why focus on retargeting ads? If you’re spending time on retargeting ads, you’re focusing on an ad that will make a 5-10% difference in your revenue, whereas a better top-of-funnel ad can improve your revenue by 100-500%. We had a top-of-funnel ad take an ad account from $1,000 a day to $5,000 a day. We just had another ad account where a new top-of-funnel ad took it from $100 a day to $400 a day.
Why Focus on High-Impact Ads?
So why focus your time on an ad that will give you maybe a 10% efficiency gain when you can focus on an ad that could improve your business by 100-400%? Why waste time on retargeting ads when there are more effective opportunities with top-of-funnel campaigns?