Growing leads & muscle with F45.

With the end-goal of increasing sign-ups a seemingly simple task - with no historical data to build off or optimise on, and the looming COVID-19 crisis threatening to shut down gyms across the world, we needed to formulate a strategy that would garner sign-ups, fast. 

In doing so, we took the first step by analysing the company-wide buyer personas - i.e the consumer group that best respond to / interact with F45 content. The benefit of doing this is two-fold; not only did we get a firm understanding of the content requirements, as this was the first Paid Ads venture, we could establish the needs and wants of the audience that we were seeking to address with the ad. 

As another primary forestep, we audited the entirety of F45's marketing efforts across all external platforms, including social media, the website and more, to get a clear understanding of the messaging required, to ensure that the ads we eventually set up were streamlined with the creative direction of the company as a whole. 

From our research of the current state of play, we were able to deduce appropriate next steps. In diagnosing F45, we recommended professional execution of Facebook and Instagram ads that reached their young target market in a relatable, inspiring and relevant way.

Time to strategise! 

When it comes to Paid Advertising – there isn’t a cookie cutter solution … The best strategies use platforms that are tailored to your industry and business, sometimes even a mix of a few to see the best results. For F45, we didn't want to allow ourselves to be confined to any single platform, as our ultimate goal was to do whatever it takes to influence the audience at each touchpoint of their user journey, from the top to the bottom of the funnel. As such, we had four main options, Google Ads (Shopping / Display / Search), Facebook Ads, Linkedin Ads or Instagram Ads. 

In developing a strategy for F45's customer acquisition, we drew from our buyer persona research conducted in the planning phase, to establish the type of ad that would be most befitting to F45's younger audience. Coupled with our experience from previous paid ad campaigns, we landed on Facebook and Instagram as possessing the highest lucrative potential. A categorical element of F45's Ad strategy was ensuring that they were targeted to the surrounding suburbs of Ashgrove. Favourably, Facebook and Instagram ads contain geo-targeting capability - allowing us to regionally direct the ad message to boost overall ad efficacy. 

Following this, we needed to establish the format of the ad that would lead to the highest number of conversions on Facebook and Instagram. To do so, we published both image ads as well as video ads with the same targeted ad copy, by way of testing which type performed better. 

As we had expected, the video version exceedingly outperformed that of the image - which we attributed to a variety of reasons: 

• The average click-through-rate of video ads is 1.84%; the highest CTR of all digital ad formats
• Video is a more digestible form of content 
• Storytelling boosts brand awareness by connecting with emotions 
• Videos earn respect from potential customers 
• Video advertising has a high recall power than image advertising 
• Easy viewing in a shorter span of time
• Gets to the point without having to go through the entire content like in a text-based piece
• Video plays a critical role in every step of the purchase process by the consumer

Once we had our initial predictions regarding video affirmed to us, we moved into the optimisation phase. This involved conducting rigorous split testing to maximise the results of the video ads - because the only way to truly know whether your ad is performing at peak efficiency is by testing multiple iterations of the same ad! As part of this split testing, we penetrated every possible option, by testing the video thumbnail, the post text itself, the type of emoji used, the landing page copy as well as the headline - all to see whether it had an impact. As we tested, we were able to better understand what resonated with the audience, to hone the strategy moving forward.  

In terms of metrics we used to define the success or failure of the tests, we focused primarily on the number of clicks to determine true interaction with the ad as there were delays in the reporting of sign-ups.

Therefore, not only did the campaign win results in terms of getting more people through the door, F45 now possessed the information required to build ever-optimised campaigns based on the historical data we provided.