strategy in this video may change Facebook ad creation forever if you're not manually picking your thumbnails you're seriously missing out this is a strategy that I discovered when I was running ads for theud a n figure DTC brand here's what happened in one of the tests 90% of my Facebook ad span was going to the specific Creator my audience loved it Facebook loved it and most importantly my client loved it because of the great results but what actually happened I launched same three videos in B DTC but with same ad copy same headline same budget
but with two different prospecting audience after a few days I noticed that one of the creative is getting 90% of the ad spend in each Dynamic creative and it is crushing as always in Dynamic creative Facebook was favoring one creative over the other but never to this extent so I thought okay Facebook pick one video as a winner but the interesting thing was a different winner in each Dynamic created so by what criteria did Facebook choose the winner I noticed that a winning video in a test had a closeup of a product as a thumbnail
as you can see in this case product Story video 2 but on the other it was a logo of collaboration that got most of the span although it was a different video so I know thumbnail was important when never thought it was this important I told my Facebook RS about the test and they said that like assets have traction Facebook favored some of the traction and if the same asset is used in another ad it would usually get favored Again by a Facebook but this was not a good explanation for me because video should have
traction video is the asset not the thumbnail also the assets were launched at the same time and winners had a different thumbnail not the same so there could be no traction so I created another test with the fresh ads same videos but this time not in a dynamic creative but in a regular ad and here I mix different thumbnails in a videos not to resembled combinations from dyamic creative here again the winner was a video with a closeup of a product as a thumbnail no matter the video I asked my reps again about it and
they said they think the algorithm doesn't have the power to to analyze the video created that it can only read text and images to be honest not sure if it's Facebook who's favoring the thumbnail or a user considering they see a thumbnail only for a fraction of the second if the videos are on out of play and I checked the breakdown it was clearly visible that over 99% of the videos were started on outo play so it seemed like this an Alo thing so it got me thinking how many potentially good videos were basted just
because I chose a bad thumbnail so from now on I'm testing each video with two different thumbnails to increase is my chances of finding a winning thumbnail so here's my full step-by-step breakdown how am I choosing thumbnail number one I always test at least two or three different thumbnails per creative number two I always and I mean always select the thumbnail manual number three if I have a hook that's communicating the angle then I select that initial frame from the video as a thumbnail that's my first variation I want a hook and a thumbnail to
be align number four then I have one additional thumbnail from the video I always try to find some frame that I think could be a good performer closeup of a product a person face something weird something catching number five I often test one additional custom thumbnail that's usually either a winning thumbnail style from the previous winners or number two a custom made image that serves only as a thumbnail that it's not visible anywhere in the video Pro tip here is when I find some static that's working well I often try it as a thumbnail as
well and it often works pretty good as well if I see that none of the thumbnail is working with the video then I can definitely declare a video a bad considering the massive role of a thumbnail in the potential success of the creative this is so far bulletproof process now that we learned that the thumbnail can either make or break your ad I started testing thumbnails massively after testing hundreds of thumbnails I found these six winning styles that are always work and favor by both Facebook and the users so let's break down why number one
is a close-up of a phas similar to The Hook of the video a closeup of a phas works amazingly well as a thumbnail I guess people are more drawn to the ad when they see another person's face I also found that it helps when you use a person or a user's face that's actually your target Persona number two closeup of a product this works extremely well even when you zoom the product that the user can barely understand what the product actually is I saw it works extremely well with the Appel and shoe Niche I guess
because the texture material and the patterns are very important in those niches number three something weird or satisfying just think of all of those Tik toks that you watch it's in human nature to like patterns Symmetry and repetition but tip here is don't just throw a random shot make it relatable to the rest of your video number four a split screen or a collage style this is again something unexpected in the feed so it gets attention this was a style that I found out after having a winning static ad and decided to test it on
a video and it often works pretty good number five paino with an X sign using an X sign or a check mark work really great for us as a static so we started testing it on a thumbnail oh boy was that a good decision combining it with the problem of your target audience is a match made in heaven for example it asks here do you have a hump on your back and like this is an X so you immediately understand this is a problem number six a custom thumbnail if there's no frame in the video
that is from one of those five styles that I previously explained I get my designer to create me a custom thumbnail a note here is to have a format of the image that's the same as your video so for example if the video is 4x5 the thumbnail also needs to be 4x5 because if you use one by one image it would get stretched the thumbnail is a huge part of the ad creation process if you're an Ecom brand spending at least 50k a month on Facebook ads and want me to implement this process in your
ad account to scale your business book a call with me below if you're not there yet like And subscribe and check one of my previous video in which I broke down winning ads by dud cheers
