Mastering Meta Advertising with Manol Georgiev

In This Episode

• [06:20] – Manol Georgiev specialized in Meta advertising because it’s more interesting and fun than generalist advertising. He shares how he learned Facebook ads and started providing the service to others.
• [16:50] – Manol emphasizes the importance of creative strategies, including basics that worked in the past and will work in the future.
• [21:38] – Manol discusses the effectiveness of UGC (User Generated Content) in advertising, mentioning its current decline due to oversaturation.
• [25:41] – Manol suggests optimizing video content for different Facebook placements to reach more customers.
• [36:46] – Manol shares examples of successful ad testing, resulting in higher click-through rates.
• [40:51] – Stephan and Manol discuss unboxing videos as a marketing strategy, highlighting their popularity and creative potential.
• [45:16] – Manol offers nuggets of wisdom to the audience.

Jump to Links and Resources

Manol, it’s so great to have you on the show.

Thanks so much for having me. I’m excited about that.

We met at a Maverick event. That’s Yanik Silver‘s Mastermind, which I love, and I know you do, too. Yanik’s been a guest on the podcast, and we spoke a lot about metaphysical stuff—not about Meta, the platform, but about metaphysical stuff. What is it about Maverick that really drew you in and kept you going to events and being a member?

It’s the people. That’s the first thing. The feeling of all of a sudden, you end up amongst people who you feel like you’ve been friends with for a long time. Nowadays, it’s just hard to make new, strong relationships and friends. It’s not that easy. Then, you just end up amongst all these people. There’s no drama. Everybody is fun.

There’s no pressure from nothing. It’s a very good feeling when you get there the first time, and then when you realize it, you want to stick around. For me, it’s the people. Before Yanik, I met Sophia, who runs the show there. She’s great. So, my wife and I met Sophia, and she invited us a couple of times before we officially became Mavericks, too. Yeah, we just met amazing people.

We met them during the Maverick trips and events and also outside. So, I would say I built very strong friendships and relationships through Maverick. It’s invaluable.

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You’re also speaking at events and participating in other masterminds. We were just talking before recording that you just spoke at Flight Club.

I was there, but I did not speak at the Flight Club.

Okay, but you do speak at events. What’s an example of an event that you’ve spoken to?

Mainly marketing events. The audiences are entrepreneurs, startups, Amazon sellers, eCom brands, and anyone who’s running digital marketing, specifically. For example, I could speak to an audience interested in scaling and growing their business and brand with meta-advertising. This is where you see me speak. But, I did not speak at Flight Club. I tend to speak to a slightly larger audience, where I can provide more value to people looking to learn how to scale with Meta. 

I’ve spoken to Mavericks, very small groups of people, as well. That’s how I met Sophia. I’ve also met other people who invited me to bigger stages. Everything’s word of mouth, and it’s great to provide value off-stage. That’s what I enjoy.

Speaking of word of mouth, by the way, you know Mike Zeller, apparently. Mike has been a guest on the podcast, and he’s like, “I got this great guy I want you to introduce you to. His name is Manol.” There’s only one Manol that I know of, and I bet it’s the same man.

Oh, Mike is amazing. Yeah, I met him at the Flight Club. And you see, this is another example of why these masterminds and small communities are so great: because you get there, and then you don’t look too. You don’t have any expectations, like the way I met you. Right? Like, we were just at dinner. I said hi to your son, and then he was playing with something. We exchanged a few words, and here I am. So that’s how it happens. 

Mike is amazing. I just wanted to say something about Mike. I met him there. We were both going to our rooms and then we just said, ” Hey, why don’t we stop at that Mexican place here and grab some tacos?” Then, we had an amazing conversation for an hour and a half. I like him a lot. He’s a great guy. 

Facebook ads are a different experience than paid search.

Yeah, yeah, he’s great. I’ve known him probably for a decade, I think. We’re both connected through the Tony Robbins community, so it’s a Platinum Partnership. I’m not an active platinum partner with Tony Robbins anymore, but he’s been active in that community, and so have I. Anyway, let’s talk about meta-advertising and how you ended up specializing in that. Why not Google? Why not? More of a generalist advertising agency covering all platforms? What is it about Meta?

Let me see because I can tell a few different stories, but I’ll tell you how I began because this story is a little more fun and interesting. And I always like to remind myself how I started. When I first started running ads on Facebook, there were just a few books on Amazon. There were no courses. I’m talking about 12 or 13 years ago.

Before I ran ads on Facebook, I had dating websites and a few dating websites. One of them was for Bulgarians. I’m originally from Bulgaria for Bulgarians who live abroad, just like me. I was not looking for a date, but I thought, “Here are no communities online for Bulgarians who live in the States.” So, I decided that was one of my first projects as an entrepreneur. 

I created a dating website for Bulgarians who live abroad. And I was running only Google Ads and SEO at that time. That’s when I learned a little bit about SEO. Now, I don’t know. I’m so rusty, to be honest. But then, I don’t remember what year was it. Google made some changes, and our traffic dropped. You probably know that very specifically when it happened. I had to make a decision. Should I keep pushing and try to make Google and organic traffic work or just learn something new? That’s when I learned about Facebook ads, and I started reading about Facebook ads. To be honest, I got addicted to running Facebook ads early on. It’s just a totally different experience than paid search. Ever since then, I love it. It’s never been something that I get tired of.

Soon after, I started learning ads and providing them as a service and not only for my website. At that time, I read a book by a guy named Chad Mureta. He created a mobile app while he was in the hospital. He was hospitalized in his hospital bed. He created a mobile app and made $800,000 with that app. I was like, “Wow, how did this guy do that?” So I read his book, followed his steps, and launched my first app in the App Store.

My app got 500,000 downloads. However, one thing that I forgot to do was to put ads within the app. So the app was getting downloads, but I was not making a single dollar out of it because I forgot to put ads. I was in such a rush to do it. Long story short, I created more apps and started using my Facebook ad skills to run traffic from Facebook to acquire users for the mobile apps.

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After this period, I was at a stage where I was running ads as a service to mobile games and apps because nobody at that time knew how to do that. There were only a few big agencies that were providing user acquisition services. From one client to another, I ended up working as a contractor and user acquisition contractor for big publishing game publishers like Glu Mobile, Gordon Ramsay, and Kim Kardashian game. They have games with millions and millions of active users. That’s how I learned about Facebook at a very high level regarding ad spend.

I was running suddenly, from spending just a day to spending millions in ads a month. That’s where I literally learned a whole new level of how businesses scaled with Facebook advertising and marketing,

Who put up all that money? What was the client that said, “I’m willing to bet big on Meta or Facebook and you?”

Yeah, I told you. I was a contractor through different agencies initially, and they’ve had these relationships with the clients. Still, the actual user acquisition and skill behind it came from people like me. Right? So, I learned that because I’ve never worked in a corporate setting, I do not come from a corporate background; I’m kind of like a street-smart guy who made his way there and learned the big game instead of working for a corporation. But working with these big clients, you learn how to and what they’re interested in, right? They’re operating on a totally different level. Suppose you talk to the CEOs of companies like Sunbasket, and Blue Apron.

In that case, that’s my 3rd and 4th phases, where I transitioned into e-commerce and started focusing on e-commerce instead of mobile apps because there are so many more levers to pull as a marketer with mobile apps right now. It’s just creatives and Meta Facebook automated and simplified everything else. You just put the budget and the spending behind it, and all you need to change is the creative. 

Being like a user acquisition manager or a media buyer for mobile apps, now you’re less valuable, whereas, with e-com, there are landing pages, offers, seasonality, Shopify stores, and many other aspects beyond just the media buying. Media buying is one part of it, but creative strategy is how to scale so many more levers to pull there. So that’s why we transitioned into e-commerce, and I’ve had the agency Capptive8 for seven or eight years already.

We’ve managed millions and millions of direct-to-consumer brands like the ones I mentioned, as well as different industries, even subscriptions like Hooked on Phonics, another client of ours, and obstacle course racing like Spartan Race. We managed it. In addition to registration for their events, they have about 4000 SKUs in their merch shop, which is their e-commerce side of the business. I think most of our clients are in the food and beverage industry.

Wow, congratulations on your success. That’s awesome.

Thank you.

I just wanted to start way back when. I was refreshing the screen every 15 minutes to see how many more clicks I was getting on my ads when I was spending dollar 20 a day, and we’re at where we are now. So it’s a long journey, but it’s humble beginning to be fun. 

Humble beginnings.

I love humble beginnings, and I tend to feel that way because I think they’re the most exciting.

So what made you want to specialize in being an agency and not your kind of e-commerce company, mobile app company, etc.? Presumably, because you could make a lot of money being an e-commerce company, and with the know-how you have around Meta advertising, you could blow that up.

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That is true. I mean, the way it worked with the mobile apps is you just see what makes you more money, right? What are you better at? What is the consistent thing that brings you money and joy over the years when everything else looks like it’s kind of, you know, not your strength? First of all, I had apps in the App Store, but they were not the highest quality apps. I’ve had friends who created high-quality apps and teams around them. It was just not bringing me the same excitement as running ads and marketing and acquisition marketing as a service and performing and seeing the results from that versus focusing on just scaling one app. 

I had friends with millions and millions of downloads per month on a single app, and their business revolves around that one game or app. So they are saying, “Okay, how can we make this app monetize better? We need to add 200 more levels to the app to get the user deeper and deeper,” like the Candy Crush saga is doing. They have thousands of levels so that they can have that LTV and just spend more money for acquisition marketing that way, in simple words.

I didn’t want to build like a game; I just wanted to do what I do best and do more of it. And that’s how I ended up having an agency. So, we still focus mainly on Meta. At this point, we don’t do TikTok, Paid Search, Pinterest, or anything else. We don’t do email. We’re strictly specializing in scaling brands on Meta.

I just wanted to do what I do best and do more of it.

Are you concerned that maybe you put all your eggs in one basket in Zook’s basket? And what if things kind of go sideways with Meta?

It’s been a concern, but I’m kind of risky.

Yeah, you’re a risk-taker. I am, too. I bet it all on red. 

Also, it’s not such a risky thing to do because, at the same time, I want to provide top quality with one thing that we do best. So that makes us more exclusive, first of all. Second, I don’t want to get distracted or my team to be distracted by being experts in too many things. And then, at the end of the day, we’re not experts at all of them. So that’s why we’ve been focused on meta. I think the time comes when we are now exploring more, and we’re probably going to add TikTok as well because things are very similar there in terms of media buying and creative strategy. TikTok is completely different than Facebook, but I’m willing to make that investment now, and then, a year from now, we master that as well. But I want to do it in a way that doesn’t compromise the quality of work and service we provide to the clients.

We tend to have very strong relationships with clients. So, as long as it doesn’t hurt what we do for clients now, we’ll explore more different platforms.

Gotcha. So, what about the creative strategy you bring for e-commerce brands that you want to talk about? What’s part of the secret sauce that you bring? We also know how to press the levers and turn the dials inside the Meta platform. What else do you bring in terms of strategy?

I don’t want to get distracted or my team to be distracted by being experts in too many things. And then, at the end of the day, we’re not experts at all of them.

That’s a good question. And I think a lot of people are making the mistake of jumping on trends and trying to maximize and spend most of their time on something that is working now. That’s very important. I encourage that as well. But if you don’t know the fundamentals and things that are the basics, things that worked five years ago, they work now. Knowing what will work in the next five years, if you crack the code on these creative strategies, then you’re set for success.

I learned this from managing so many accounts and working with many businesses; we already have a lot on our plate and our arsenal of strategies. So, to say that we can pull so many winners, I call them Evergreen. They tend to be very basic and not something extraordinary that you need to create. For example, a video with a production studio will cost you a lot of money, like 20 to  60,000. We have clients with these budgets, they invest in these creatives.

We test them on Facebook, and then, they perform for a while, and then they don’t justify the budget they bring and elevate the brand because they’re super high production and high quality, but not necessarily. They don’t necessarily bring the same efficiency as something very inexpensive. For example, an image compared to a $60,000 video is a high-production video with talent, actors, acting scripts, studio, and all. So, how can you compare an image that costs you nothing? You can create it in Canva and make a video that’s $60,000. So, one could be the image. If it’s an evergreen concept, you can count on it to work in the future.

We know that evergreen concepts and strategies will work across different industries for e-commerce. So that’s what we do. We have an arsenal of these strategies and creative concepts that work for one client, and we perfect them to the point where we can apply them to different businesses and still see the results. We don’t have to reinvent the wheel every time. This is one of our secret sauces, so to say, and what we do best. But that also comes with a lot of testing that comes with experience, but knowing some of these basics. For example, I’ll give you one. We’re not on a screen share or anything, but it’s the us versus them concept. That is, anyone running ads on Facebook knows that the us versus them; I see it all over the place.

Every business is running the us versus them, especially for e-commerce, because they want to compare their products to everybody else and discuss how they’re better. Right? What are the differentiators? With that same concept, we have a way to make it ten times more efficient than anyone, unlike our competitors. There’s a strategy behind that. So the secret is taking something that is the us versus them. Basically, it’s a before and after. And before and after existed since day one of marketing in the world, right? So, this is an ancient concept. Then, so it’s evergreen.

It worked all these years. It’s going to work until we’re alive, and we take it. But we master the game to know how to make this concept work. The best way for that platform to work is on Facebook. And this is where the secret sauce comes into place, where everybody can use it. But a lot of people, like probably 90% of the market, are not using it to the optimal form, so they’re not achieving the same results.

I’ll tell you another thing that is going to be interesting for the listeners: UGC, the so-called user-generated content. So three or four years ago, UGC became a thing. It was very effective in the beginning because very few people were using it. I mean, not people, but advertisers were using it. So it was very effective. 

Now, it’s trending down because it got oversaturated. So, as soon as it becomes a commodity, it’s not as effective anymore because everybody is doing it. Even though marketers and advertisers are becoming smart in how to conceptualize their videos, how to use different hooks, angles, and openers of the videos to increase their metrics, like the click-through rate, the engagement, how long the video is being watched, it’s still the same UGC, like if you see that as a consumer now, people’s bullsh*t meter is very advanced.

Now, they know an ad, and when they see it, they know that the person in the video is a creator. He’s not a real customer of the brand. They’re paid creators, right? So they’re not real customers. Even if you give them a script, they don’t sound authentic. Now what happens is a lot of advertisers and brands are paying money to constantly get these UGC creatives that are edited videos that are supposed to work. Here comes one video—we do that all the time—that was from a real customer. We did not give them a script and asked them to just genuinely record a video and talk about how they felt about using the product for the last six months. We are not even adding any edits, no text on the video, nothing raw and real.

We launched that video, which crushes any paid actor or creator videos. Because it’s so genuine, people know they want it back, but they won’t. It’s about the trust. The trust in the UGC goes down. Authentic, unedited videos are on the trend because that’s not a commodity now. Again, to the basic stuff, right? This is always gonna work. You cannot beat authenticity.

I call this raw and real because this also is part of our strategy. You have to test many different contents in its raw and real form. A lot of people don’t want to do that because they’re assuming, “Oh, this is off-brand or it doesn’t look good. We need to polish it up. Have to make it more pretty.” But Facebook works oppositely. The more real, raw, authentic, and unedited content you paste there, the less it looks like an ad, and then click-through rates increase. You learn more, and you learn faster.

Then you get to these winning concepts fast. Once you tested like 20-30 of these unedited pieces of content, one of these will completely crush everything else. Now, you focus on making it into a more polished version. So, it’s aggressive testing without prejudice and without assuming too much. You have to test absolutely everything and fast.

You cannot beat authenticity.

How are you testing and finessing? For example, the hook. Let’s say you have this raw, real, and authentic user or customer testimonial that is good storytelling but could be better. It could have started with a punchier hook. Are you taking bits from the end of the interview and putting them at the beginning and testing which hooks the viewer better, or how are you improving the hooks?

Yeah, actually, you described it, right? If it’s a 1-minute video, we can chop it into ten different videos. It really depends on what the material is like. But if you can just chop that video into mini pieces and reorder them, if you cut it into five, then start putting different openings of the video because people have about two seconds, not even three seconds, to catch their attention on Facebook. The first 2 seconds will determine whether they will stay and watch more of the video. Only about five to 10% watch the video until the end. I would say not even 10%. So imagine that, from all these videos you produce, if you spend so much time producing and assuming that someone will stay and watch everything you did until the end, only 5% will.

So, you need to test the beginnings and see what will give you a higher video view rate. Again, that comes with a volume of creatives being tested. I would say not a volume of the same concept but a volume of different concepts like diversity, whether it’s image or video. You have that on Meta. That’s the thing: it’s not like TikTok; it’s vertical, real-format videos only. On Facebook, you have images; then, you have two platforms: Facebook and Instagram. 

So you have videos and images, and then you have many different placements there. You have a newsfeed, a desktop, square videos on the right-hand side, tall videos, landscape videos, and Messenger; you have WhatsApp. So, if you know how to optimize your creative to fit into all these placements, you can tap into net new customers. That way, I could just switch the format of a video performing as a landscape. If you make it a square video, you tap into the highest volume of inventory and reach on Facebook, which is the Facebook newsfeed. This is the top. You can get the most scalable one.

If it’s a 1-minute video, we can chop it into ten different videos, test the beginnings, and see what will give you a higher video view rate.

So another suggestion to whoever is listening is to try to make square videos or images, work with your acquisition marketing on Facebook, and try to make that convert only on Facebook newsfeed. If you crack the code on that, everything else becomes easy for you. You have a scalable business, campaign, and creative because that’s where the money is. It’s in the highest volume of inventory, the Facebook newsfeeds.

So, you would recommend focusing on Facebook first rather than Instagram. And that might actually run counterintuitive to our listener, who might be thinking, “Well, I don’t spend time on Facebook anymore. I’m always on Instagram. Why wouldn’t I focus almost exclusively on Instagram?”

That would depend on where their customers are, not where the listeners are, but where their customers spend more time. So I’ll give you two examples. If it’s a skincare brand or beauty brand that targets more, the younger demographic, 18 to 35, your platform would be Instagram. You want to focus more on making reels, and Instagram stories, and those ads work. But if you’re selling organic chicken, and I’m giving you these examples because I have clients like that, if you’re selling pasture-raised organic chicken, then you’re into the health-conscious people doing shopping. But you also want to see what demographic converts best on social media for that. That’s not the 18 to 35; that’s the 45 plus, and it’s even going like 65 plus. Right? So these are the people we are targeting with this type of client, this type of product.

We don’t even target 18 to 35. We exclude them from targeting sometimes. So, the older demographic hangs out more on Facebook because it’s different. Facebook has groups, and news feeds with more likes, and the comments section is more of a discussion. And it’s better, to me, on Facebook than Instagram. Instagram is more like, visually, to see better things. Facebook is just for you to want to see, like, what people are doing, but also to learn something in a way. So, Facebook works better for the older demographic. Instagram works naturally for the younger demographic.

Right. And is there a particular style of the reel, story, carousel, still image, or something that really grabs attention and is very effective these days?

There are so many. I can’t just pick one. However, one strategy the listeners can test is starting with a different opener. The opener, what we do is the first 3 seconds of the video. Suppose you know that one; you’ve had a video that worked for years and years. We just have a client like that. I cannot tell you the name, but in their ad account, they’ve spent nearly $2 million on a video the founder recorded back in 2020. That video took off.

They never made any changes to the video. So now the video is not performing. It’s not as effective anymore. What you need to do is just take different pieces of different videos that are a little bit more mesmerizing. We call these mesmerizing openers. And you put the 3 seconds in front of that video, you change the format from landscape to square, for example, that taps into completely different placements now. With that new opener, that’s a fresh video. It’s a little bit clickbaity and a different hook. 

If you make it a square video, you tap into the highest volume of inventory and reach on Facebook, the Facebook newsfeed.

For instance, we showed this purple blob in someone’s hand, but it looks mesmerizing. Immediately, you want to see and understand what that is, that purple blob. I don’t even know what that is, but we put it for a skincare brand. And then, in the first 3 seconds, there was a little headline that said, I am 63 years of age, and that erased my wrinkles or something in that line that got rid of my wrinkles. Then the click-through rate goes through the roof because everybody thinks the purple blob erases the wrinkles, right? Then, after the first second of the video, it goes into this authentic customer testimonial. People are hooked into listening, assuming, “Okay, maybe the purple blob will appear somewhere in that woman is going to say something about it.” The video is for two minutes. Because it’s just an authentic video, the more they listen, the more they see it’s a legit company.

This is a legit person who speaks to us. Most probably, the products she reviews are also very legitimate. That increases the conversion rate a lot. That blob, in the beginning, increased the click-through rate. So this is how we revive old videos from a couple of years ago, and now they are fatigued, and we just revive them. So that’s another strategy they can do for reels. It doesn’t matter whether it’s reels or stories. We care about concepts, not too much like what placements we’re going to type.

What’s typical for a return on ad spend, like a ROAS? What are you seeing these days in eCom and in other verticals?

There’s no average for ROAS, but it evolves around 2X ROAS. The actual number would depend on many things like COGS, Margins, AOV, and so on. But I’ll tell you more specifically what everyone wants to achieve now: break even on the first customer acquired through the platform, through Meta. So that is the breakeven point, which is the scaling point. If you can achieve that, they will not lose any money. They want to be a little bit profitable if possible. If not, if you’re breaking even at 2X ROAS, then that’s the point at where you want to scale.

We scaled a coffee brand from 17k in revenue to 3.5 M. Their breakeven ROAS was 2.15. That means with 2.15 ROAS, the ads are paid for, and therefore, you’re just acquiring and capturing the market, and you’re profiting from the return on people coming back and buying more. We scaled that brand with this ROAS target from 17 K to 3.5M. Then, we worked with them for the last four years.

That’s called a self-liquidating offer, right? A product or service that pays for its own advertising cost that is.

The majority of clients we work with want to achieve this. But there’s also another side to it. If you’re getting into e-commerce or if you’re already into e-commerce, you definitely need to implement a subscription model into your business because, at the end of the day, it’s the LTV that dictates how much you can spend upfront to acquire a customer.

Yeah, LTV is the customer’s lifetime value.

It doesn’t matter what video drives them to the page as long as the sales page and the offer are relevant to your target audience.

Yeah, the lifetime value of the customer. One of our brands, the coffee brand that we scaled, if they stop advertising and running ads, they’re still bringing in 1.5 million in recurring revenue just from the subscriptions from the acquisition marketing we did for them. Now, that is the business. You have a business if you stop running ads and still get revenue. But if you constantly have to fight for a new customer, then it’s pretty tough. All the food in the box, subscription businesses, Blue Apron, Sunbasket, and HelloFresh. Now it is just one big player, like, HelloFresh.

They’re about 80%, and then everyone, including all the other ones, is 20%. However, these businesses paid way above the breakeven point to acquire new customers. So basically, they’re losing money upfront, knowing they’ll break even in a year from now. That’s where the capital comes in, and you capture markets assuming you will make money down the road. This doesn’t always happen because you might not get there if you don’t know your retention well. Some of these companies went bankrupt, etcetera. So, the ideal scenario is to break even on the first customer.

Got it. So what would be a huge success? Like, just you crushed it for a client, what would be an example that you haven’t already spoken of and something counterintuitive or surprising that you found by testing or just intuition and just regale us with the amazing results?

Counterintuitive would be that I have so many of these examples, which are the most fun. However, I am being aggressive with testing and pushing my team to test aggressively, like when I was starting. This is part of why I got so successful on Facebook regarding driving results: I’m testing aggressively things that really, like anyone who runs ads, would be like, “This is never gonna perform.” So you have to get out of the box and test things that make no sense. For instance, for the coffee brand, we initially tested a video of someone eating a cake, but it was not like you could only see a fork cutting through a chocolate cake. Different layers. But it was recorded with an iPhone, so the quality was not good.

It’s not like a stock video. It was with an iPhone. It’s a close-up, and all you see is this close-up of a fork cutting through the cake. And the video was only that for 5 seconds. So it was 5 seconds video with no text on it, nothing. The ad copy on the creative was talking about coffee. Imagine how weird that is because you see it on Facebook, and the first thing you see is the video. You don’t stop on the ad because you see text.

If you’re stuck with an idea or something that doesn’t work, it makes you think from a different angle and lens, and then you come up with many ideas you want to test.

So, the ad copy doesn’t matter. What matters is first, are you gonna stop and watch that video? And then, is that video or image gonna trigger you to want to learn more? What did I just see? Why am I seeing and what is it? So people saw that cake, and then they read the ad copy, and the ad copy talked about no cake. It’s about the coffee, that the coffee is low acid, it’s organic, and how it’s better for you. People are like, “Okay, what does this cake have to do with the coffee?” Then, they comment in the comment section. It becomes a huge discussion. Most people do not even ask why they show cake. A lot of people do. This is a good thing about Facebook: more people are starting to comment. And it’s not negative, right? They’re not degrading the brand.

As long as they’re not negative, you’re fine because Facebook loves that there’s discussion. That means more people spend more time on their platform, and this becomes and gets the viral effect of the ad, right? But if you think about it, it’s like, “Who would think of testing a cake for 5 seconds and then not even talk about the coffee?” But what I knew at this time when we wanted to test was that people who like to eat cakes would eat that cake with coffee. So it’s not that far. You’re not targeting a completely different audience. It’s pretty much the same people who would drink that; the coffee would also engage with that video. As long as you achieve that and you get more efficient with the ad.

So, just to tell you the results, the click-through rate was two, three, and x on that video compared to what we ever saw in the account before. Then, the cost per click dropped significantly. So, we drove the same traffic and audience to the offer page for a fraction of what we used to pay with other ads. So, it doesn’t matter what video drives them to the page as long as the sales page and the offer are relevant to your target audience. So that was one example. We have many of these funny creatives.

Yeah, that’s fun.

Awesome. Well, I’m curious if you’ve done any unboxing videos because when you’re talking about somebody experiencing the cake by watching getting cut, that reminds me that it’s a whole thing, this whole unboxing of, “wow, look at the brand new iPhone” or whatever getting opened up and all the packaging and everything. That’s a dopamine hit in the brain that people are experiencing vicariously through the person on video. Have you tried unboxing videos, too?

Yeah, we do unboxing videos. They’re a must. They’re part of the strategy. You always want to have an unboxing video if the conditions allow it. Not all brands can do unboxing, or they don’t have a good unboxing experience, so you can’t show it. But most of the brands they do. And then unboxing videos work. There’s something about unboxing that people want to see. This is similar to why people watch other people play games on YouTube, you want to see someone else unboxing it—unboxing works. 

You just have to try and test totally different angles. And until you hit something like the cake video, which is what nobody else would have tried, or at least not like everyone who now uses the UGC concepts, right? That is a commodity. You test something like this; it didn’t cost you anything, and suddenly, you’re beating everybody else. You’re outspending them.

That’s really cool. I like the outside-the-box or unboxing approach that you come up with.

You have a business if you stop running ads and still get revenue.

Can I show you something I have that may be interesting to the listeners? There’s this book I really recommend. I don’t read that much, but I constantly reread it. It’s called Thinkertoys. Thinkertoys opens up your creativity and gives you principles and strategies to think outside the box. You can apply these principles to different ideas you have. Business and life don’t matter. It just makes you think differently.

Once you start applying these principles, you follow them. If you’re stuck with an idea or something that doesn’t work, it makes you think from a different angle and lens, and then you come up with so many ideas that you want to test. It always helps me a lot with the creative part of running ads, and we come up with these. Look at that example I gave you with the cake. A lot of people might pass through it and not notice it. Why did I think this might work? This is in the book. It will teach you and guide you on noticing things you might pass by and learning to use them in life. So this was just an example. 

But if you start a new business, for example, and you want to differentiate yourself, that’s in the book. My wife is starting a beverage brand, and I’m getting so many ideas on how to differentiate in a market that’s already pretty saturated but huge by coming up with new products, for example.

That’s awesome. 

Thank you for the book recommendation. And I’ll make a book recommendation, too. I actually got it from a previous guest; I think it might have been Debbie Millman. The book is about 100 years old or 80-something years old.  It’s by James Webb Young, and it’s called A Technique For Producing Ideas. It’s a very short book. It’s like 50 pages. James Webb Young, a very successful advertising guy back in the day and one of the advertising legends of 100 years ago, read and applied his book. It’s really a cool way of playing out the process of coming up with outside-the-box ideas in 50 pages.

Thank you. I appreciate that. I haven’t heard about it, but I’ll get that now.

Awesome. So, I know we’re out of time. If you wanted to share one last call to action or wisdom nugget for our listeners, what would it be?

Take action on your ideas. Don’t overthink them. I always tended to overthink, and this is probably something that’s not new. Everybody has heard it, but I think you cannot get tired of hearing it because you tend to forget it and not follow it so often that I think we have to remind ourselves to just take action. Go through the failures pretty fast. Don’t fall in love with everything you do because it might not be a success, but as long as it’s a numbers game at the end of the day, you must fail a lot. It’s something that I’ve heard a lot read in books, such as Brian Tracy and Tony Robbins, and everybody’s repeating it. And then you’re back in the same trap, caught falling in love with your idea, and you can’t move.

Action is the antidote to that. Do it, and don’t be afraid to run ads on Meta, Facebook, or Instagram. Test super authentic, raw, and real things because this will give you just its low-hanging fruits. Again, it’s not going to prevent you from taking action fast because these are content. These are content that exists. You already have it. All you need to do is launch it and test it. So this is the fastest way.

Like if you, in the next one or two hours, want to try something, gather all the content you have from your existing customers, from social media, Instagram, TikTok, and Amazon reviews, and launch them and test them as is in your ad account with very little budget. See which one performs in a couple of days, figure out why this thing worked, and then do more of it. So this is actionable advice in the next few hours if you want to do the exercise and do it.

Awesome. Do you have a favorite movie that has nothing to do with the topic of this episode but The Matrix or Avatar or something? What’s your favorite movie?

One of my favorite movies is Glengarry Glen Ross.

Coffee Is for Closers.

Take action on your ideas. Don’t overthink them.

Yes, Coffee Is for Closers only. Amazing.

Yeah, that is a good one. Awesome.

All right, well, thank you, Manol. Thank you, listener. We’ll catch you on the next episode. In the meantime, if you can make a difference in the world through your marketing and your business, please do so. If not now, then when? And if not you, then who? Manol, could you share the website address for your agency?

It’s capptive8.com. Yes, because all the other domains were taken.

With your history as an app developer, I can see where the app would be split into two pieces.

It comes from an app. Yeah, from user acquisition. That’s how we started. We were a user acquisition agency first.

Awesome.

Thank you for having me, Stephan.

Thank you for coming, and thank you, listener. We’ll catch you on the next episode. I’m your host, Stephan Spencer. I’m signing off.

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Your Checklist of Actions to Take

Test aggressively—try things that seem counterintuitive, don’t overthink it. Don’t be afraid to try weird creative ideas that defy logic.

Use raw, unedited customer testimonial videos for authenticity. Raw videos build more trust than overly-produced ones that look like ads.

Test different openings/hooks to grab attention in the first 2-3 seconds. Have a tiny window to capture interest before people keep scrolling.

Focus on creating content optimized for the Facebook Newsfeed for maximum scalability. The newsfeed has the highest ad inventory and potential reach on Facebook.

Use the “US vs Them” concept, but execute it in a unique, highly efficient way. With the right creative approach, this evergreen concept drastically outperforms.

Constantly test a large number of diverse creative concepts, including static images, video aspect ratios, graphics, UGC, etc.

Revive old videos by adding a new interactive opener sequence to increase click-through rates. Even winning videos fatigue over time and need to be refreshed.

Aim for at least a 2x ROAS (Return on Ad Spend) as the break-even point for scaling. This makes acquiring new customers profitable from the first transaction.

Implement a subscription model to increase customer lifetime value. Higher LTVs allow me to profitably spend more on customer acquisition.

Visit Manol Georgiev’s website, capptive8.com to learn more about their specialized Meta advertising services for e-commerce brands.

About Manol Georgiev

Manol Georgiev is a seasoned marketer with over 12 years in performance and creative advertising, specializing in Meta platforms. As the founder and CEO of Capptive8, he’s steered the agency to manage over $500M in ad spend for major e-commerce brands. His agency has been pivotal in scaling companies like Blue Apron, Spartan Race, Sunbasket, Lifeboost Coffee, and Hooked on Phonics. An acclaimed international speaker, Manol has shared the stage with renowned entrepreneurs such as Sarah Blakely, Robert Kiyosaki, and Dave Asprey, showcasing his expertise in driving brand growth through innovative advertising.