Audience Campaigns: why is my Goal Campaign not performing?
Please note that there is a 2-4 hour delay for metrics to appear within the Dashboard.
You have set up your Goal Campaign successfully but it is not performing as expected? Check out the below tips to ensure your campaign is set up to reach its maximum potential:
1. Content validation
URL – Your URLs must be accessible by Outbrain crawlers. Please check the ad’s status in the “Campaign Details” page.
Image size/ ratio – We recommend to use images that accurately represent the content. Make sure images are in high quality and use the same image ratio used in your site’s widgets. The recommended image size is 1200×800.
Headlines – Add at least 4-5 headlines/ image variations per URL if the campaign is running just a few URLs. Please also make sure the headlines aren’t too long so that they don’t get truncated. We don’t allow titles to be longer than 150 characters, however, whether or not the headline is truncated depends on the settings of the widgets displaying your campaign.
2. Content / campaign CTR
A successful campaign starts with good content. Goal Campaigns are competing with other live Goal Campaigns and/or with the regular organic content of your site. When the campaign CTR is too low (<0.1% CTR) our system might not be able to help the campaign meet its goal. On such cases, we suggest adding more content and try using alternative headlines and images. This will allow our system to optimize towards the best performing ad variation.
3. Targeted audience
Campaigns can target different sections/widgets. Ensure that there is enough organic traffic running for the targeted audience. If not consider expanding your campaign reach.
E.g: the campaign was set up targeting widget ID AR_1. In the meantime, the tag AR_1 was replaced by AR_2 by the publisher. Hence AR_1 is no longer receiving traffic. In such cases please go to the “Campaign Details” page and modify the targeted widget from AR_1 to AR_2.
4. Competing campaigns
Other running Goal Campaigns, targeting the same audience may slow down your campaign. Our system was designed to handle multiple campaigns, however, when we are dealing with underperforming campaigns (low CTR) we might reach the glass ceiling of how much we can push.
E.g: a campaign with an aggressive goal was launched a few days after your campaign started. Our system will try to push this new campaign which might slow down the traffic going to the initial campaign.
5. Publisher’s constraints: Slot Limitation and Excluded Widgets
Under “Audience Campaigns”, in “Settings”, you can set up constraints such as slot limits or exclude specific ID from your campaign. Make sure that the widget IDs you are targeting are not excluded in “Settings”. Please also consider relaxing or removing slot limitation if applied. Important: these settings apply on Publisher’s level and not for a specific campaign.
If none of the above potential solutions apply to your campaign, or if you experience this behavior on a regular basis, please reach out to your Outbrain representative to further investigate the issue.