[Experiment] What happens when your Facebook ad image contains A LOT of text?

Posted on by Marie Page

What happens when your Facebook ad image contains A LOT of text?

We wrote recently about how the 20% text rule in ads has been scrapped (for now just in the UK and Ireland) and said at the time that our interpretation of it was a “relaxing” rather than an axing of the rule.

Well we’ve been experimenting with some deliberately text-heavy ads to see the impact all that text has on reach and it is indeed still a significant factor. Facebook simply does not want newsfeeds chock full of wordy images from advertisers and it continues to penalise ads that push the boundaries.

During the ads creation process you get plenty of warning if your image contains a lot of text. Here’s a pop-up that appeared whilst creating an ad (in the form of a boosted post) for Musicademy:

Boosted post text on image warning 2

As you can see, the text on this image is actually simply on the product (arguably qualifying for an exception). In the name of science we continued with the boost.

Another warning appears reminding us again that images with too much text may get lower reach:

Boosted post text on image warning

We continued with the boost and to date we have spent just under $5 and achieved paid reach of 1,286 people. Much higher than the estimate given. I’m quite happy with that result.

Buoyed by this success we decided yesterday to boost a text-heavy Digiterati post. This time there is even more text (and we even use the Facebook logo – not at all sure how we got away with the variant with the red cross in the middle of it…).

A different warning appears this time with a red triangle:

Boosted post text on image warning 3

And when we progress with the boost the text changes again with another warning on the quantity of text:

Boosted post too much text
We continued with the boost but results did indeed seem lower than normal and  we saw a very slow initial roll out of the ad. Paid reach of 45 people. We spent £10 and achieved paid reach of 843 so just over a penny per person. The original boost figures estimated reach to be between 1,200 and 3,100 for our target audience and budget. Given I would normally expect to see those numbers achieved and even exceeded we can conclude that reach is indeed throttled but perhaps not to the degree we might expect. However, expect this to change if brand start to take advantage and swamp newsfeeds with wordy images that don’t go down well with users.

Boosted post results with too much text

So lessons learnt here. Do still be very careful with the amount of text in your ads and boosts. Sure go over the 20% if you need to but don’t go too far.

If we want to get more exposure for our “Round-up” post we will need to either link to it as a Link Post ad (and change the image to one with less text) or create a new post (again with a different image) and boost that.

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Marie Page

About Marie Page

Marie Page is one of the UK’s leading Facebook marketing experts. She is a founding partner of digital marketing consultancy The Digiterati and the Digiterati Academy e-learning portal for marketers and entrepreneurs. Her award-winning Master's Dissertation was the culmination of three years' academic research into Facebook that resulted in a book (and companion online course) 'Winning at Facebook Marketing with Zero Budget' that became an Amazon bestseller. Marie's work on the Facebook News Feed algorithm was featured in The Huffington Post. A recognised thought leader on social media, Marie is often approached by journalists for comment in articles such as this Telegraph article. She was also interviewed for ITV's Tonight show on Facebook privacy issues in relation to advertising. Marie is a regular guest on digital marketing blogs and podcasts including Social Media Examiner and Smart Insights. In 2018 she is speaking at Brighton SEO, Europe's biggest search and marketing conference. Marie is also author of two Smart Insights books: 'Smarter Guide to Facebook Marketing', now in its fourth edition, and 'Facebook Ads Guide', both edited by Dr Dave Chaffey. Marie is also a part time yoga teacher.

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