Are you ready for Facebook's big change to the way you set up ads?

Facebook is changing how you set up ads. At the end of February, Campaign Budget Optimisation will be compulsory. This change is BIG and it will have a huge effect on the results of lots of charity's ad campaigns. Don't get left behind - we want every charity to be ready for this change. Book a free call with us to look at how you can prepare. 

How is Facebook changing the way we set up ads?

The first of many changes that Facebook will make to its advertising platform in 2020 is CBO (Campaign Budget Optimisation). And it’s coming this month.

This isn’t one of those small changes in the background that you can avoid. This one is BIG.

CBO has been around for a while as an option, but as of the end of February, this will be the only way you can buy your ads. You will no longer be able to set your budget at ad set level.

This is a massive change, as it will require you to structure your campaigns in a different way in order to achieve the same results, or better results, than you’ve seen in the past.

Previously, we've been able to set budgets at the ad set level and Facebook optimised each ad set individually. This meant that you could have one ad set spending £50 per day, and another spending £75, and so on. This gave you complete control over each ad set independently, but CBO works in a different way.

The clue is in the name - Campaign Budget Optimisation. Your budgets will now be optimised at the campaign level, with Facebook deciding which ad sets within that campaign deserve the most of your budget. 

What does this mean in practice?

Here’s a practical example of how this will work. Consider a campaign with three ad sets and you want to spend £75 per day. 

OLD WAY

• Ad set 1 - Budget £25 per day
• Ad set 2 - Budget £25 per day
• Ad set 3 - Budget £25 per day

NEW WAY - CBO

• Campaign 1 - Budget £75 per day. 

With CBO, your budget of £75 per day will automatically be spread across the three ad sets in order to get the most value, similar to the way it is currently automatically spread across multiple ads within an ad set. So if one ad set is performing better than the others, Facebook will spend more on it but you will still stay within your range of £75 per day across the campaign.

Some organisations have been testing CBO for quite a while but many haven’t made the switch yet. If you’re one of the latter, then you need to get up to speed very quickly because CBO works in a different way and you may see very different results unless you know what you’re doing.

How we can make sure we're ready?

We’re currently working with organisations around the world, running campaigns with CBO and we’ve developed best practices for how to structure your campaigns and optimise them over time, based on what works and delivers results. 

You can book a free chat with us to look at how you can use our best practices in your campaigns to avoid getting stung by this big change.

Book one of our free strategy sessions here. 

(Yep, totally free. We want every charity to be ready for this.)