Spending money on ads may seem daunting. Why would anyone want to blindly give Zuckerberg their hard-earned cash in the hope that it may yield a return?

I’m writing today to show you that it isn’t as scary as it seems.

It’s also the best thing you can invest in for your business, done properly. Today, I will be sharing a case study breaking down the ads that we are running for my company Adstra.

That way, you can have more clarity about running ads, whether you should do them or not, and what you can expect when you invest in your business’s marketing budget.

Before we start, I’d like to mention that my company Adstra has worked with 100+ businesses. We have generated 50,000 leads and thousands of booked calls through paid advertising.

We all know the SEO agency that grows their business through referrals. Or, even worse, the cold email agency that relies on events to get partners.

Not sure why more people aren’t talking about how flat-out idiotic that is.

If you are a marketing company, you should be using your tactics to grow your business. Additionally, you shouldn’t have a problem growing your business.

You’re in marketing for a reason, right?

I’ve always found it funny when performance marketing agencies come to us for more leads.

I always ask: “Why aren’t you growing your business the same way you grow your clients’ businesses?”

*crickets*

That’s why, sometime in August, we decided to put our product on the line and showcase exactly how it works and why we believe in it so much.

If we use the same process to grow our client base, you can trust that we believe in what we do.

And we believe in doing it for others.

Let’s get going.

Step 1: Research

Before I opened the ad manager, I completed our proprietary research process. More on that here.

To be succinct, I got insights from:

• Previous sales calls I’ve had
• Top performing content I’ve written
• Reddit posts
• Google Trends
• Quora

That way, I’m not flying blind on ad creation and targeting.

From this research, I’ve found that SaaS companies and appointment-based businesses resonated with the following: AI, cold outreach issues, lack of sales appointments on their calendar, cold calling, cold emailing, troubles with attending many events to grow, and more.

From there, I was able to identify the angles I could produce for the ads.

Step 2: Ad Creation

I created many ad variations and copy variations to start testing.

From there, I tested these angles and found that AI and the problems with cold outreach were hits.

If we take a look at our current active ads, these ring true:

So, after the first two weeks, I had a handle on what was working.

From there, 80% of the ads I create now are based on what I already know works.

Then, for the remaining 20%, I test new things.

That way, I can be sure the ads will always continue performing well while I still get to test new angles.

Positioning, once found, is the most important aspect of your ads. Therefore, you must determine a solid marketing strategy before you start putting money into it.

Conveniently enough, the ads started to work out the gate. This is not typical, I just know my customer well (and know a thing or two about ads).

Step 3: Results So Far

After nearly 10k in ad spend, here’s what we’ve been able to achieve:

If our close rate was better (working on this), we would’ve done a lot better.

I’m a marketer, not a salesperson.

However, I’m proud of these numbers. The plan now is to keep the ads where they are for now and improve our closing percentage.

From there, we can scale up phone setters and Account Executives to capitalize on the increased influx of leads.

Before running ads, I was relying on organic and some social outreach.

I am beyond glad I decided to go this route. Not only because it’s working, but because of the authenticity I now have with the marketplace.

Anyone that comes to us knows, we do what we sell for ourselves. That’s the best type of product marketing in business.

Step 4: Is This For You?

You might be thinking, yeah, but will this work for me?

I can be sure it won’t work for you if you aren’t aligned with the following points:

1. You’re patient and you invest in your business for the long term
2. You don’t believe in getting rich quick
3. You have a unique business that actually works
4. You don’t have enough leads or sales appointments
5. You have at least $3,000/mo to spend
6. You believe in advertising as a way to build brand and cash flow (irrespective of the fact you may not click on ads yourself)
7. You pay attention to detail
8. You don’t sell cannabis, biz op, or other weird industries that the FTC doesn’t like

If those things make sense for you, then read my other articles and even check me out on YouTube where you can learn how to do it yourself.

If you don’t want to do it yourself and would rather have us do it for you (and if it doesn’t work, you don’t pay..) click here to book a time with us.

As always, thanks for reading.