Follow Along Just Another Dating Campaign on the FB Beast (52)
Oke, I just started out with Facebook ads and PPC in general. Joined this forum after reading the post from Glen at Viperchill.
Before I joined I messed around a little bit with the ads manager and power editor. Then after reading quite a few threads on STM I got started.
Traffic Source: Facebook. $50 account...
Offer: Dating Campaign promoting a US dating offer to men currently 45-55 YO.
Facebook targeting: males 45-55 US. With specific interests. Target is about 400k people.
Technology: Direct linking, through a (not used) GEO Redirect and iFrame as explained by this post
Day 1:
Campaign Started: 08/10/2013
Revenue: $54.00
Ad spend: $18.25
ROI: 195%
So I really like the ROI on this first try! However CTR is low at between 0.08 and 0.1, while they started at 0.3. But CTR is always higher in the beginning ive heard.
Also I guess I have too many ads in one campaign. Today I am gonna divide them over different campaigns, with a max of 2 ads per camp.
Need to get that CTR up. So am looking to change the demo a bit, try more images, change the text.
If you guys have any tips, love to hear em 
Screenshots:
Just to confirm, is iFraming allowed for this offer? It pays to check with your AM, even if the offer doesn't explicitly say 'no iFraming allowed'. Last thing you want is an advertiser not liking it and getting you kicked. If your AM says go for it then it offloads some amount of risk from you.
Definitely a good start to a campaign, at least the offer is converting! Good choice hitting a mature demo straight off the bat.
Thanks for your reply and support zeno!
My AM advised me even on using iFrame , so that should be okay I hope. I saw people mentioning using DMR (double meta refresh) through Prosper, is that a better option perhaps? Or is it totaly different, no idea what DMR means actually 
Different - iFraming the offer is a way of making it look like your website as the current site URL remains in the address bar but the full page content is that of another URL. The other reason being if you iFrame you still have control over other functionality on the page, like dropping pixels, exit pops, etc while still effectively 'direct-linking'. However, it can mess with the functionality of the internal page sometimes, some advertisers don't like it, and FB for instance will catch on quickly if you're using it to try and get a prohibited destination through.
Double meta refresh is where you refresh a page twice (using code in the meta tags of the html) before redirecting out to a destination. This is done to blank referrers. When you browse to a webpage your browser carries information about the page it just came from. If you link from your secret awesome juicy lander to your affiliate link they can see where the traffic came from. So, people try to remove this info by sending their outbound traffic to an intermediate page that refreshes twice, referrer changes to that page itself, then traffic heads out. That way the referrer an affiliate network sees is only the middleman page with no content. The other type of referrer blanking is https -> http which works on the basis of browsers never passing referrers from a secure (https protocol page) to an unsecured (http) page.
Ah I see! Thanks a lot for the detailed explanation
So it is not that wise to use iFraming in FB I guess. Do you advise I make a landing page or are there better options to direct link the offer on FB?
naesm said in his follow up post: "No cloaking only DMR (double meta refresh) through Prosper otherwise the ads are usually blocked, then sent directly to the offer page."
That's why I thought the DMR was an option to be able to direct link on FB. But it is just a way to hide your landing page (or other traffic source) for the Affiliate Network, if im correct?
iFraming on FB would be considered unwise if FB would disapprove the offer you are linking to. They are not fans of people sneaking through destinations against their advertising terms. The DMR effect naesm mentioned would be related to FB's automatic check system where it loads your destination and checks the final URL. With a DMR it might think the DMR page is the destination, i.e. get's stuck halfway. This is a poor way of controlling the destination FB sees and will only work if their system doesn't load the link in a browser environment - if they did they would actually get redirected through, whereas other systems may just get to the DMR page but not process it.
So yes, it is just a way to hide landing pages from the affiliate network or advertiser (and competitors checking traffic inflow to an offer page).
I am not sure if FB disapproves the offer, but cant seem to load it when creating a new campaign. It has an orange WOT status..
Thanks again for the great info!
Day 2:
Revenue: $47.24
Ad spend: $50
ROI: -3%
Oke Day 2 was a bit disapointing. Tried some different campaigns with different images and demo's, and they all sucked up money with no conversions.
The conversions I did get were all from my first campaign. However I splitted my daily limit equallly amongst all campaigns, instead of boosting my winner and testing the new campaings with smaller budgets. Which is why I ended up with a loss. Lesson learned.
Also I noticed that I stopped getting impressions for a few hours, so I increased the max bid and directly started seeming impressions again. However, my cpc increased quite a bit to the point that it wasnt profitable anymore. So I changed it back just over the suggested bid to see what would happen. Impressions look like they returned to "normal".
What would the increased CPC mean? Suddenly a boost in competition? Or my CTR too low?
Yesterday I verified my phone and got the $250 limit in just an hour or so. Not gonna use the whole limit though, first do more testing.
For today Im gonna put my budget to $60 for the winning campaign and $10 each for the new campaigns. The new campaigns are just duplicates of the winning campaings with slight differences in text/images/demo.
Also Im looking into using Prosper202, but Im not sure if I really need it at the moment. Tracking with FB seems to work just fine. But maybe you guys have some ideas that will change my mind
Ill keep you posted!
Here are my stats for the last 3 days..
Day 3
Revenue: $40.50
Ad spend: $72
ROI: -44%
Day 4
Revenue: $40.50
Ad spend: $40
ROI: -1%
Day 5
Revenue: $47.25
Ad spend: $51
ROI: -7%
So not much interesting things going on here. I am still doing a lot of testing and have a few campaigns that are making a slight profit, but it gets eaten by the other campaigns. I do get a better idea of what images work, but sometimes I think I have a winner and the next day it is totally shit.
Having a hard time getting images with an CTR above 0.1%, only when I put images with cleavage or big boobs I get to around 0.15% but those dont convert that well. I have a few 0.1 images though and they are doing oke.
These stats look very promising for this early in a campaign. Keep at it!
Hey,
The stats look great to me! Congrats on the success you're having so far. I am actually looking into starting FB campaigns regarding dating as well. Do you have an recommended posts or threads that helped you along to determine which affiliate to get with?
Thanks!
@caurmen, thnx for the support!
@mbario, thnx mate! But im still not sure how to get it profitable. I just read as much as I can on the forum, the follow alongs have helped me the best. One thread I can recommend is the one from naesm really inspiring and a lot of usefull tips. I also read the topics about POF since a lot of those tips you can apply to FB dating as wel. For the offer I just asked my AM what dating offers were doing well on FB and he recommended me one.
note: I have learned the most from taking action and testing testing. No BS.
Goodluck mate!
Got some new stats.
Day 4
Revenue: $40.50
Ad spend: $60
ROI: -33%
Day 5
Revenue: $40.50
Ad spend: $55.85
ROI: -27%
Day 6
Revenue: $87.75
Ad spend: $90
ROI: -3%
Im still not making any money, but Im not too far of either. Just need some more tweaking and testing. I found some images with CTR between 0.2 and 0.25, which are performing well. However I still have the problem that a campaign can run quite well on one day and horrible on the next... Is it because Im not spending enough for accurate data or is this just the way the cookie crumbles?
Is it possible that my campaigns are competing against each other?
I created 4 campaigns with the same demo but different image/copy and got the feeling that they might be competing with each other and thus increase CPC. Since when I was running just 1 campaign in the demo I had a lower CPC.
Im still direct linking the offer (only testing 1 offer) and I am thinking about to start testing with an LP. Does an LP normally increase CR on Facebook or is it best to do directlinking where you can?
Happy hunting
While I was uploading my LP and testing to see if it works I noticed that the website of the offer I was using is offline... What the hell G! So I immediately paused all my campaigns and emailed my AM but he is at the Affiliate Summit East in Philadelphia till Thursday...
Maybe tomorrow it will be up and running again, however what bothers me a lot is that I don't know when the offer is offline or not since I didnt get a warning. I already spend money before I found out and normally (since Im in a different timezone) I let it run through the night, so that would cost me a lot more.
Does this happen a lot? What can you do about it?
Would love to hear your comments on this.
Originally Posted by massino
Originally Posted by pinniped
Gonna wait for a response from my AM and maybe set up an alert via Pingdom (thnx for the tip), I will be on a 4 day holiday this week anyway so had to pause them.
But I need to start looking at other offers and will join some different AM networks. Do you know which network is best for US dating? adsimilis?
Adsimilis is excellent for dating in general, yep. F5 are good too.
Got back from a 4 day holiday and have some new figures for anyone interested.
Day 7
Revenue: $33.25
Ad spend: $48.50
ROI: -30%
Day 8
Revenue: $6.50
Ad spend: $6.16
ROI: 10%
Day 9
Revenue: $60.50
Ad spend: $110
ROI: -45%
Day 10
Revenue: $87.25
Ad spend: $60.35
ROI: 45%
So as you can see Im in sort of an ROI Rollercoaster, with wild fluctuations every day, and my spending is little random since I adjust during the day. I started doing some testing with an LP and in this started out pretty good but ended up with a big loss. The problem was that CPC was way too high, while CR was quite nice. I was targetting women and cant seem to find images that have an CTR of above 0.05... Targetting men is way easier in sense of getting a good CTR, or I still have to find out what images make women click. But I paused it for now and started focussing on my winning campaign. This campaign actually had an ROI of near 100% yesterday so I hope it can stay in the green the coming days. Also I will split test with and without a lander with my male campaigns, first LP tests for male had negative ROI but I may had some problems with the GEOdirect not working properly, as I couldnt see the offer using a USA proxy but did see the offer when direct linking. Im no tech genius and kinda copy paste my way through the coding.
I am excited for today 
ill keep you posted!
PS: Im still using the same offer since it gives me good CR, the offer site was under maintenance for a few hours and this caused the offline status. However I still want to sign up at Adsimilis. Do I need a referral or should I be able to get instant access?
You're just one really good landing page away from getting it consistently profitable.
My advice is to go to the adult dating section of this forum and take one of their landing pages, or go to youporn.com and grab a page from there. Use that as a template and change the pictures / landing page copy so that it's Facebook friendly.
Massino, do I know you? If not, why not? I'm based in Amsterdam too.
Originally Posted by dr_ngo
Originally Posted by Mr Green
Im new to the game of PPC. Didnt know you were based in Adam, would be nice to meet up some time!
Day 11
Revenue: $54
Ad spend: $82.26
ROI: -35%
Day 12
Revenue: $27
Ad spend: $50.08
ROI: -46%
Day 13
Revenue: $20.25
Ad spend: $38.61
ROI: -48%
After three days of disapointment I figured I needed to restrategize, I know I have something here but need to get it profitable. On Day 13 I used an LP I found somewhere and changed it a bit but nothing drastically. Then after I read dr_ngo's reply on this thread saying:
Day 14
Revenue: $67.50
Ad spend: $60.13
ROI: 12%
Exciting day. Although overall ROI is only about 12%, the EPC and CR are much higher then before. Why is ROI only 12%? Well, with the first $5 I spend I was up 300% Roi so I figured I needed to raise my daily budget from $30 to $60. After 15 minutes my CPC skyrocketed at 0.40-0.70 destroying my ROI (before the raise, CPCs were 0.10-0.15). I had this feeling before, that when I raised my daily budget to drastically CPC would skyrocket so I searched the forum and found this article , which is about: what is the best bidding strategy for FB? There it is said that raising your budget to much at one time can cause CPC to increase a lot. Advice here is to start with a super low budget and increase budget by small amounts when CPCs are getting low and sometimes wait a day or 2 on new campaigns. After reading this I lowered my budget again. However, CPCs only declined a little. Guess it needs some more time.
Anyway Im pretty happy with the results from the new LP so far, as this is the first profitable weekday with overall record EPC and CR. Im confident CPCs will be getting low again like before, CTRs are between 0.2-0.3. What about my Landing Page? Im getting 65% CTR on my LP so I guess this is not too bad (Rules LP = win). Need to wait for a few hours before the next day begins (different time zone). It gives me time to do some more tweaking.
Happy Hunting!
Day 15
Revenue: $87.50
Ad spend: $60.00
ROI: 46%
Another positive ROI day Mostly from 1 campaign, won/lost little on 2 others. Nothing much else to add. I have good hopes for the weekend as this is always my best time of the week.
I'll keep you posted!
P.S. I would like to scale this mother like crazy, but know that I have to take small steps so that the CPC wont freak out.
Looking good massino.
awesome follow-along
Thanks for the support guys! Just wrote a indept post about the last 3 days but hit the wrong button and poof its gone.....
Anyways here is another update:
Day 16
Revenue: $75
Ad spend: $80
ROI: -7%
Day 17
Revenue: $67.50
Ad spend: $97.74
ROI: -31%
Day 18
Revenue: $115
Ad spend: $80
ROI: 43%
As u can see im still riding the ROI rollercoaster as a wild dingo. Although I think I am slowely but slowely getting there. Day 17 was a bad day, CTRs dropped like crazy so figured images must be worn out. Was thinking if I am ever gonna get this thing profitable. Took a breath and know it is possible, but have to test more. Started thinking about what I could do better, next to getting new images. Looked at my stats from my past campaigns to see if I could find something there. Figured there was a lot to be gained in Demo. On Day 18 I tested a new Demo and a bunch of new images. These both worked out and got a positive ROI again with record sales. The campaign with the new demo got an ROI of over 200% even, so this looks promising. However, I will see how this goes since Im used to the rollercoaster effect.
Found out, LP CTR increases 15-25% if the image u use for the ad is also on the LP. (Sounds obvious though). LP CTR is arround 60-75%.
Question: Can I already ask for a bump in pay? Im close to $1200 in sales for this offer so far. What kind of bump can I expect?
Happy Hunting!
Thinking about investing in SocialAdNinja.
I just cant seem to get it to work...
Day 19
Revenue: $54
Ad spend: $34.13
ROI: 58%
Day 20
Revenue: $20.25
Ad spend: $29.85
ROI: -32%
Day 21
Revenue: $21.25
Ad spend: $40
ROI: -47%
Day 22
Revenue: $46.50
Ad spend: $37.69
ROI: 24%
Day 23
Revenue: $23.25
Ad spend: $53.76
ROI: -57%
On Day 21 I started using a (totally) new offer with a new demo and 2 new LPs. I looked promising so on Day 22 I ran only this new offer. +ROI nice. However the next day the same campaigns were -ROI, giving me a total of -57% ROI..
It feels when I move 1 step forward im moving 2 backwards.
I have a few nice images that are giving me between 0.175 - 0.350 CTR with CPC between 0.07 - 0.15. LP CTR is 42% and 70%. These numbers are not bad right? Still I am getting unstable (mostly bad) conversions. So you would say the offer sucks, although the networks numbers suggests otherwise.
Not sure what to do here.. Should I try more offers, more images, more text, more demo's?
I guess the offer is the bottleneck here..
I read about using the same offer but from different networks helps sometimes?
Maybe move to other Countries? Im targetting only US now, but maybe this is too saturated.
Any advice is Welcome
Need to get this mother to work!
Sounds like you're circling success right now. Keep testing, keep trying stuff, don't get spooked by small sample size results, and you'll get there.
Also, it may be worth looking over your campaigns to see if there's anything you do the same every time. Targeting US is one obvious possibility. Do you target the same way, use the same LP styles, use the same headline styles, even use the same sorts of images?
Thnx caurmen!
Originally Posted by caurmen
But like you said, most of them are small samples. However my budget is not that big that I can test many different campaigns with high volume. What I do now is make a campaign with 1 ad and set the budget to 7, when I get at least 1 coversion ill keep it and set the budget to 15 and so on. However, it happens that the first day I get 2/3 conversions on the 7$ budget and then the next day I get 1 conversion on the 15$ budget. Do I keep with this ad/campaign or not..
I target 5 campaigns with 1 ad, to the same demo and with same headline but with different images. Then I run the winning image with different demo's and different headlines.
Day 24
Revenue: $59
Ad spend: $62
ROI: -5%
Not a bad day. Tested different ads and some were performing pretty well and others not so much. I need to start rotating my landers. I saw a thread somewhere on this forum where there is a script for rotating landers with Prosper. Will look into that today. I was rotating landers but just use different ads, this is not really optimal.
Goals for today:
- start rotating landers (3)
- start rotating offers (2 of the same but different network, 1 other)
- make my first $xx,xxx day (just kdding)
Just now, 3 of my good performing ads are suddenly "disaproved" because of:
Anyways, the rotating landers (4 actually) are set up and am splittesting 2 offers (same offers on different networks), 1 offer still waiting for approval.
This is the useful post by caurmen that helped me setup the rotating landers in Prosper.
I'm currently using Unbounce so rotating ads is easy. It is definitely worth testing 2 different variations.
Originally Posted by massino
Originally Posted by cyberdelicstudio
Originally Posted by bstrd
Day 25
Revenue: $29.50
Ad spend: $53
ROI: -44%
After this day I paused a few campaigns that werent performing and decided to stick with rotating 2 landers (although there is not enough data to make any real conclusion I , also 2 different offers (got approved).
Day 26
Revenue: $62
Ad spend: $40
ROI: 55%
I ran 2 campaigns with both 1 ad, rotating 2 landers and 2 offers. 1 campaign was just over break even and the other 100% ROI. For the landers it is of course too soon to say anything. But they performed the same, also the offers performed the same, although 1 has a slightly higher payoff. However I need more data to make any conclusion.
Will test more images today.
This day I replaced the breakeven ad with an image which was doing well in my previous campaigns. Turned out it did even better in the new demo/offer.
Day 27
Revenue: $142
Ad spend: $50
ROI: 184%
So this turned out to be my best day yet, and the first time I got 2 decent +ROI days in a row. Lets see if we can keep it stable. I am rotating 2 offers and 2 landers. Get CTR between 0.2 and 0.25 and CPC between 0.08 and 0.12. Offers are performing exactly the same. One landers is doing a little better but too early to say.
Today I will add some new images I know work well and will increase the budget.
Nice one! Definitely moving in the right direction.
Nice Return on investment man... Keep up the good work! You also managed to get some pretty high CTRs... how big is your demo? still > 400K? Any advice on what kind of images do work at the moment for you? Seems that high CTR images can make the difference!
Revenue: $142
Ad spend: $50
ROI: 184%
Take the techniques you're using for these demos and convert it to other countries and see how it goes, hopefully you can get volume and still keep roi above 100% watching this one its a good one buddy keep up the great stuff
@caurmen: thanks for the support from the beginning
@alpacino: im currently targetting a demo of 280k, the images that are working the best for me now are a little vague and show skin. True that images give you the CTR but the ad copy im using right now increased CR.
@maynzie: thanks dude! I just spoke to my AM to see which similar offers are working in other Countries right now.
The Stats for yesterday:
Day 28
Revenue: $160
Ad spend: $70
ROI: 128%
So again not a bad day!
Yesterday one offer I was running I had to pause because they are changing things, will be back on Monday. Added a new ad which gave a over 300% ROI, however this was on a $10 budget, so will increase the budget see if it sticks. The other 2 campaigns gave both little over 100% ROI. But I can see the CTRs are dropping and the frequency is starting to get high. Also I saw that one LP has a 50% higher conversion rate although CTR is a lot less. I will stick with that one.
Goals for today:
- test new images
- convert the winning campaigns to different countries
- increase overall budget (not really a goal^^)
Yesterday was again a PR and hit my first $100 day (almost $200). I didnt test anything else, I had some trouble getting ads approved and then ROIs started skyrocketing. The first half of the day i was $40 in and earned $170. I increased budgets, but since I more than doubled them my CPCs doubled which decreased ROI again.
Day 29
Revenue: $352
Spend: $160
Profit: $192
ROI: 120%
Looks like im gonna hit my daily budget limit ($250) very soon now.
About converting the campaigns to different countries, I am trying this but cant seem to get my ads approved. Got this message, anyone know why I get this?
Another ad im trying to get approved is exactly the same as the ones im running but a different age group, already waiting more then 12 hours to get approved..
Since Im on a 250 account and I dont see it getting upgraded anytime soon (or get banned even), I will be looking to convert the campaign to POF. This is ofcourse a whole different ball game and I dont expect to make money from it right from the bat. However, it is needed if I want to keep scaling.
How easy is it to convert a FB campaign to POF? Since you cant use the same interests you are using on FB.
You must be using interest targeting that they aren't fond of. And I wouldn't say it's easy to port campaigns from FB to PoF, especially considering how much less volume PoF has compared to FB. But if you have a certain niche you want to hit, PoF may be ideal.
Cant be it, since I tried getting them approved without interests and still they get denied.. Its only for the UK though, no problems anymore getting US ads approved. Will be looking at different countries.
That is odd, can never tell exactly what is good or not when it comes to dating on Facebook. Getting denied without any interest targeting at all must mean something with your landing pages, maybe too sexual, or the offer, I guess. But then again, who really knows? Could just be a reviewer who wants to deny you
Oke, the last day of my 30 day follow along is here.
What a month it has been! Before I started I was thinking I would be very happy to hit $100 days in the first month. There were a lot of times I felt like it is not going to work, but luckily these were temporary and I knew (thnx to this forum and the support) I could make it. I told myself I was prepared to lose $1000 to make this thing profitable. I definitely got lucky here, but that's what you need sometimes isnt it. But when youre always trying to improve your campaigns and thinking of new ways to target, you will eventually get "lucky" I believe.
My turnaround came when I started to rotate different offers and different landers, besides testing new images everyday and creating a portfolio of images that work. I read about it alot on this forum and this is really key (refering to the rotating). I also found that the ad copy has a more influence then I first thought.
Thanks a lot for this forum.
Here are the stats for Day 30:
Day 30
Revenue: $698
Spend: $235
Profit: $463
ROI: 197%
So this was an amazing day. My CPCs decreased since the day before and this increased ROI, with CR more or less the same. Tested new images and demo's that work. Will make a spreadsheet of all ads and their realised CPC and realised EPC, to pick the winners and test more. I have 2 campaigns per demo max, since when I add a third, its CPCs are double.
I havent tested other countries yet, since I got problems getting (i guess the offer) approved. However I found new demo's within U.S that are big enough and profitable, and since im still on a 250 account so there is no need to go international at this point. I am not sure whether to be spending the daily limit, I am afraid of the bump/ban that everyone seems to be getting thats into dating. Although I think I follow Facebooks guidelines, you are never sure.
I have asked for weekly payments to keep the cashflow healthy and asked for a bump, which I am waiting for confirmation.
Good luck everyone!
Nice work Massino. Great to see you hit such a nice ROI for the day. Keep it up.
Woohoo! Great conclusion to a month of very hard work. Inspirational stuff - thanks for sharing, and congrats on how it's going so far!
Thnx caurmen! and thnx from supporting me from the beginning, it kept me going!
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