How We Helped University Musical Society Surpass Meta’s CPA Benchmark by Diversifying Content

Here at Capacity Interactive, our recent motto has been “Creative is the New Targeting.” We’ve shared this motto with our clients, our colleagues, the arts industry at large, and really anyone else who will listen! Meta cites that 56% of outcomes in the ad auction are now dependent on campaign creative and how it performs. This means our content is the biggest driver of our campaign’s success, and in order to be successful, we need to be reaching ALL of our target audiences with creative that speaks to each of them.

How do we do that? By prioritizing not only quality but quantity and variety of post types. Gone are the days of running one image ad or one video ad at a time. Now, we want to max out post types (as much as you’re able to) and run multiple ads alongside each other (Meta recommends running at least 3 ads at the same time). 

This year, our client University Musical Society (UMS) took this idea of content diversification and ran with it. By year’s end, they saw INCREDIBLE year-over-year improvements!

CREATIVE DIVERSIFICATION IN ACTION

One of UMS’ campaigns that fully embraced creative diversification was Joyce DiDonato and King’s Return. This campaign featured several different ad formats, visual types, and approaches to copy.

As a performing arts presenter, UMS is often beholden to what they can get from the artist—but they recognized the value and need here, and pushed to make this strategy work. Their willingness to ask directly and explicitly for the content they want to post (organically and in paid campaigns) enabled their success. If assets are limited, we encourage our clients to ask what’s possible for an artist to provide, even if they’ve heard their fair share of hard no’s in the past.

DIVERSIFY AD COPY TO REACH NEW AUDIENCES

Ad diversity is achieved by not only varying your ad creative, but also through incorporating an assortment of copy. With this in mind, we did not underestimate the power of strategic messaging, and used UMS’s ad copy to effectively harness Meta’s AI in a manner that facilitated our reaching different (including new!) target audiences in their campaigns. Meta’s blog post, Insights from Meta’s Q2 Earnings: Harnessing the Power of Video to Drive Performance, argues that:

“…having a robust creative diversification strategy has become the best lever to finding the most relevant audiences. By uploading…different themes and messages, businesses can leverage Meta’s AI to test and optimize at a scale that isn’t possible manually.”

How did we resonate with different audiences via copy diversification? In UMS’s video ad, they used urgency messaging—“Last chance for tickets”—which is a clever way to influence last-minute ticket buyers who have not yet secured their seats to act right away. The ad highlights, too, that the concert is for just one night only, which signals a rare and special experience that is not to be missed. This messaging can attract dedicated fans of the artist, on-the-fence attendees, and cultural enthusiasts who chase exclusive experiences. In another instance, the image ad on the right-hand side notes that the artist is Dallas-based, which can specifically excite audience members from Dallas/Texas who are craving a taste of home while in Michigan. 

In the future, we will dig even deeper by segmenting UMS’ ads by audience—acquisition, mid-funnel, and bottom-funnel—based on the perspective presented in their messaging. 

TAKEAWAY

Creative diversification is now the biggest driver of success on Meta, and can be achieved through not only creative variance, but also resonant copy. Arts organizations can leverage this strategy to surpass benchmarks and beat the competition.

READY TO LEVEL UP YOUR CONTENT GAME?

Let’s talk about how your content strategy can be refreshed to improve campaign performance across the board!