Ad Creatives That Convert: Learn the Secrets and Sell More

Are your ad creatives not converting the way you'd like?

Often, despite a big budget and a large number of impressions, ads just don't work. If that's happening to you, the “problem” is probably in the details.

But what are those details? In this article, we'll help you understand:

• What an ad creative is
• The most common creative formats
• What to know before you create
• How to make ad creatives that convert

What an ad creative is

First, it's important to understand what an ad creative is.

In digital marketing, a creative is any piece, visual or not, designed to grab attention and get a clear message across quickly. It can be, for example, a display ad, a carousel, audio, or video.

Usually, "creative" refers to what will be used in ads, whether on Google Ads, Meta Ads, or any other platform.

So, in short, if you plan to run ads for your digital business, you'll need to make creatives for them.

The most common creative formats

For digital product creators, the most common approach is to run campaigns on Google and Meta. So there are a few standard dimensions you should follow for them to perform better.

• For horizontal images, the recommended size is 1,200 x 628 and the minimum is 600 x 314;
• For square images, the recommended size is 1,200 x 1,200 and the minimum is 300 x 300;
• For vertical images, the recommended size is 960 x 1,600 and the minimum is 600 x 1,067

For videos, the recommended length is 15 seconds, although the platforms accept videos of up to 90. And for both images and videos, the maximum file size is 30MB.

It's also important to pay attention to image quality and avoid blurry, heavily filtered, or crooked images.

What to know before you create

Before you start creating, it's crucial to understand who your target audience is. So if you don't have your persona defined yet, that's the first step. It's also important to be clear about your campaign's goal.

A successful campaign isn't always the one that generates sales or brings in leads. Sometimes you want to work on:

Brand awareness: Strengthening your brand, meaning showing up for potential customers so they get to know your business and form a positive image of it.

Generating sales: Bringing leads and sales to your business.

Loyalty: A campaign focused on people who are already your customers, to keep a close relationship.

Remarketing: Focused on people who started the buying journey and dropped off along the way, to bring them back.

How to make ad creatives that convert

If you take into account all the points covered in this article, you already have a good chance of producing creatives that convert. But it's also important to pay attention to the copy, the narrative, and your visual identity.

To start, your copy needs to grab attention and have clear, direct CTAs (calls to action). For grabbing attention, a good approach is to use hooks. These are options recommended by Cademí's specialists:

• Social proof: customer testimonials;
• Testable proof: a trial of your product or service (for example, the 7-day free trials of streaming platforms);
• Free: using lead magnets;
• Flash opportunity: limited-time offers;

As for CTAs, the most important thing is to always use verbs in the imperative, that is, giving the exact instruction of what you want people to do and making clear why that action matters.

In this article, we have practical examples of good CTAs used on big companies' websites.

Visual elements

Another important point is how you use visual elements. Besides avoiding blurry, heavily filtered, or crooked images, as we mentioned earlier in this article, these points also matter:

• Choose legible fonts and colors that are easy to read;
• If possible, use images that show your product or brand;
• Pick colors that go well together and stand out;

With that, the next step is to roll up your sleeves. Always test and optimize. Keep in mind that the metrics you should track vary depending on your campaign's goal, but they're usually:

• CTR: Click-through rate
• CPL: Cost per lead
• CPA: Cost per acquisition
• CPC: Cost per click
• CPM: Cost per thousand impressions

If you need help turning leads into customers, Cademí's team of specialists can help. Brazil's first Member Hub has features and frameworks that make that conversion happen much faster than in a traditional sales funnel. Book a strategy call and see how to take your digital business to the next level.