Top 10 Proven Ways to Avoid Facebook Ad Fatigue

Also, NO ad fatigue isn't any secret algorithm trick to make you spend more money on ads. It happens organically when your audience sees the same ads over and over again.

Understanding what creative fatigue is and how to treat it is critical for any marketer embarking on a digital advertising journey. Don't worry we’ve got you covered. Go on and read this mini-guide and learn everything about ad fatigue.

How to identify ad fatigue

The good news is that your campaign is working otherwise you wouldn't have made it to the point where your ads are experiencing Facebook ad fatigue.

Creative fatigue indicates that your ad has been played too many times, people are becoming bored with it, and now it needs to be refreshed to keep the campaign on track.

One of the key indicators of ad fatigue is ‘frequency’. Calculated based on the number of ad impressions and reach, frequency displays the average number of times a user saw your ad over a given period.

If your cold audience campaigns have a frequency number of more than 2 to 2.5, especially more than 2.5, you're probably experiencing Facebook ad fatigue.

With warm audiences, on the other hand, you can get away with much higher frequency numbers. So, if your ad frequency hasn't decreased, but your impressions have, you may be dealing with creative fatigue.

The simplest way to tell if your ad is suffering from creative fatigue is to observe your audience and see what they're trying to say. If one person reports it, it's guaranteed there will be more.

Facebook Ad fatigue should be addressed as soon as possible before it turns into severe audience fatigue.

Signs your ad is experiencing ad fatigue

Here are some metrics that you can monitor to catch the fatigue even before it sets in.

• Decreasing ROAS/less engagement

The return on investment (ROI) is a metric that determines the success or failure of advertising campaigns as well as the outcomes of your marketing strategy. One of the first signs of a performance drop of an ad is a drop in ROAS.
When you notice a decrease in ROAS, double-check your frequency and use the Inspect Tool to check for audience saturation. These results will assist you in determining whether or not you are experiencing ad fatigue.

• Increasing cost per result

The cost per result is a metric that shows how well your ad campaign is performing in terms of the goals you’ve set. It's used to compare campaign results and identify specific areas for growth and improvement.

When you start paying more per result, it means your campaign's performance is declining and your ads are becoming less effective in moving people down the sales funnel. In addition, an increase in your cost per result affects your conversion rates.

• CTR drop/Lower Click-Through Rates (CTRs)

CTR is a Facebook Ads metric that calculates the percentage of clicks to impressions for each ad. As your audience grows tired of seeing the same ad, they will be less likely to click on it resulting in a gradual drop in your CTR.

This gradual drop is self-explanatory of your ad experiencing creative fatigue. However, if your ad has a low CTR from the start, it could be due to a factor other than ad fatigue.

Top 10 ways to avoid ad creative fatigue

So now that we've established that it's a major issue, how can we avoid and treat it?

1. Get creative with your creatives

Therefore you should always use 3 to 4 creatives in every ad set. You can replace the existing ads with new images or try out new ad formats such as carousel ads, slideshow and what better than using a video.

Changing your creatives doesn't mean that you need to get all fancy; it can be as simple as changing the colour of your creative background. You can also test new angles and messages on your creatives to avoid creative fatigue.

Refreshing your creatives regularly eliminates the possibility of your customers becoming bored with your ads. You can make your ads more relatable by using current events or trends in your ad copy.

2. Copy and call-to-action

Due to a lack of resources and time crunch, some advertisers may find it difficult to refresh their creatives that often.

Remember that changing the creative in your Facebook ad is just one part of the equation. Numerous other elements can be changed to make your ad stand out and keep ad fatigue at bay.

Making changes to your ad copy and trying out different calls to action can be an excellent substitute for creative testing. All you have to do is to play with words to pique your customers' interest and experiment with different call-to-action options from the drop-down menu.

3. Refresh your copy

You may have noticed that there are several brands gaining popularity solely through interesting ad copies. They make excellent use of current trends and talk about recent events in the ad copy in a way that makes it relatable while also highlighting their brand.

Most of the time, advertisers are so focused on the design of new creatives that they overlook the ad copy. An excellent ad copy can prove to be a game-changer of your marketing strategy.

A clear, concise, and compelling ad copy is the key. With Facebook, you can always refresh your ad copy and avoid ad fatigue. You might be surprised at how much of a difference changing the call-to-action or ad copy can make.

Keep in mind that when you make significant changes to an existing ad, it goes through the learning process all over again. Your ad's performance is unstable during this phase as Facebook's algorithm explores the best people and places to show your ad.

4. Expand your audience

If your audience is constantly flooded with the same ad, they begin to ignore, hide, and report it. When an ad receives this kind of response, Facebook records it as "negative feedback" for that specific ad.

Negative audience feedback is the last thing an advertiser wants as it makes future ad approvals more difficult. In such cases, expanding your audience can be an excellent way to re-energize a tired audience.

Facebook’s ad targeting allows you to choose the exact audience you want to target. You can use custom audiences, interest targeting, add relevant locations, or use your Facebook pixel and create a lookalike audience.

These options will not only help you deliver your ads to new and relevant viewers, but they will also reduce your frequency and ad costs, allowing you to increase the effectiveness of your ad campaigns.

5. Decrease your budget

Lowering your ad bid or budget is a good way to avoid wasting money on that fatigued ad.

After you lower the budget, that specific ad will receive fewer impressions, lowering your frequency and relieving the fatigue it is experiencing.

You can set up different campaigns with different budgets for your creative-targeted ad combinations. This will force you to spend money on the combinations you want to experiment with.

6. Manage your placements

When you're experiencing signs of Facebook ad fatigue, try experimenting with new placements. It is a good option when you want to reduce the chance of your audience being bombarded with your ads.

You can try to manually place your ads on other platforms such as messenger Instagram or audience network to reach new audiences to fight ad fatigue.

Creating different ad sets for different placements can speed up and optimize your campaign, especially when it comes to Facebook and Instagram targeting.

It's best to avoid using 'Automatic Placements,' especially if your campaign is aimed at a larger audience.

7. Set a custom frequency cap

One of the ways in which you can avoid and relieve ad fatigue is by giving your campaigns a custom frequency cap. A frequency cap specifies the maximum number of times your ad can be shown to a single user in a given amount of time.

Even when the campaign is running, you can set a frequency cap or change the existing one if your ad set is experiencing ad fatigue.

If you don't set a custom frequency cap, Facebook's algorithm will choose your frequency for you based on the lowest cost per result. You can fine-tune the parameters in advance to reduce the risk of ad fatigue based on the historical data.

Lowering your frequency may also help you reach new people in your audience and revive this fatiguing ad set.

8. Dynamic ads

With a new update in Facebook's dynamic ads feature you can now target your prospective audience, people who are searching for a product you sell on other websites. Previously you could only target customer audiences who have already visited your website.

They use pixel data from a wide range of websites to figure out which product a user might want to buy.

For example, if someone has been browsing Laptops on other websites and they fall into your prospecting audience, you can dynamically serve them and include a selection of your company's Laptops for them.

With the use of dynamic ads, you can easily create a personalised experience for each user who is seeing your ad. This personalization allows you to reach out to the right audience who are looking for your product.

So, now that your ads are not generic and the customer is interested in what you have to offer this is the best treatment for ad fatigue.

Without a doubt, video advertising will dominate the next decade. It's the best time for advertisers to inculcate videos in their marketing strategies.

Videos are effective in raising brand awareness, increasing click-through rates, and engaging customers.

They help customers develop trust in the brand and keep them engaged, whereas static images with too much text become boring and cause people to lose interest, resulting in creative fatigue.

10. Monitor your campaigns

No matter how many steps you follow or ad copies you create, it will all go in vain if you do not monitor your ads.

You should continuously track your ads to ensure that ad fatigue doesn't set in with your updated campaigns. When you are monitoring your ad performance you can take the necessary steps once you notice that the audience is losing interest in them.

Keeping a close eye on frequency and CTR will allow you to spot signs of creative fatigue early on and adjust your strategy accordingly.
This way you’ll be on top of your ad’s performance.