Roganstown Meta Ads: The importance of trialing different audiences in Meta ads
Overview
Roganstown Hotel & Country Club, a 4-star country club hotel located in Swords, Dublin, offers the perfect escape from the city. Whether you are planning a family getaway, a trip with friends, a golf retreat, or simply seeking relaxation, this resort has something for everyone.
The property is home to two prestigious 18-hole championship golf courses: the Swords Open Golf Course and the Roganstown Championship Course, expertly designed by the legendary Christy O’Connor. Guests can also enjoy 52 elegantly appointed rooms, offering stunning views of the golf courses and a haven of comfort. Dining at Roganstown is a treat in itself, with McLoughlin’s, an AA Rosette award-winning restaurant, serving modern Irish dishes crafted from the finest locally sourced ingredients. After a day of activities, O’Callaghan’s Bar provides the perfect spot to unwind and relax.
With Meta ads constantly changing, introducing new targeting options, campaign types, and objectives, Roganstown Hotel recognised the need to refresh their advertising strategy. In this case study, we will explore the changes made to their Meta ad setup, the importance of testing different audience segments, and the impressive results these adjustments delivered.
Our Objective
Our primary goal was to restructure the campaign by creating a new ad group with updated targeting. Previously, our targeting strategy focused on specific locations, namely Ireland, with the age range set to 25–64. For detailed targeting, we selected individuals who matched the behaviour of frequent travellers and also showed an interest in Dublin. This approach aimed to capture an audience of frequent travellers who were likely to be visiting or interested in Dublin.
For the new targeting strategy, we opted to use a lookalike audience. A lookalike audience allows your ads to reach new people who are likely to be interested in your business because they share similar characteristics with your existing customers. This approach enables you to attract new customers who align with the traits and interests of your current audience, helping to bring in fresh prospects with similar intentions or preferences.
The Challenge
The biggest challenge we faced was working with a limited budget. Meta ads are designed to encourage higher spending, and when your budget needs to be shared between Meta ads and Google ads, it can be difficult to achieve the best results for your campaign.
To address this, it is essential to allocate your budget strategically across the platforms that deliver the best performance for your business. By assigning a set budget to each platform, you can focus on optimising your Meta campaigns to make the most of the resources available. This approach helps ensure you are maximising results while staying within your budget constraints.
Process
We created a new ad group using the lookalike audience and designed ads similar to those in the previous ad group with the old targeting style. This ensured consistency in the ads themselves, with the only difference being the targeting approach, allowing us to focus on capturing a different audience.
The campaign was monitored on a weekly basis, and any notable insights were reported. However, when running these two ad groups simultaneously, we discovered that their targeting, while different in approach, was similar enough to cause conflicts. After running both ad groups side by side for a month, we analysed the results and turned off the lower-performing ad group. This allowed the better-performing ad group to run independently, enabling us to gather more focused insights and optimise performance further.
Results
Conversions:
Over a three-month period, the results from our new lookalike audience strategy were clear:
- Purchases: The lookalike audience generated 24 purchases, compared to just 11 from the old targeting approach.
- Purchase Value: The total value of purchases from the lookalike audience was double that of the old targeting audience.
- Reach and Impressions: The lookalike audience achieved double the reach and impressions compared to the old targeting audience.
These results highlight the effectiveness of the lookalike audience in driving both higher engagement and greater value for the campaign.
Conclusion
In conclusion, this highlighted the importance of adapting and refining your Meta ad strategy to achieve better results. By introducing a lookalike audience, Roganstown Hotel & Country Club was able to significantly improve campaign performance, generating more purchases, higher purchase values, and greater reach compared to traditional targeting methods. This approach demonstrates the value of testing new strategies and closely monitoring performance to identify what works best for your business. For those looking to maximise the potential of their Meta ads, exploring lookalike audiences could be a game-changing step towards reaching a more engaged and relevant audience.
Whether you’re looking to optimise your current campaigns or explore new targeting options like lookalike audiences, our team is here to help you achieve your goals. Let’s work together to unlock the full potential of your Meta ads. Get in touch with Sprint Digital today!