16 ways to f*ck up your ad account
The speaker outlines 16 common mistakes that can damage ad account performance, ranging from emotional decision-making and poor scaling practices to lack of creative diversity and missing technical tracking setups. The list blends strategic errors with operational oversights. It serves as a rapid-fire checklist of pitfalls for paid media managers.
Summary
In a concise, fast-paced video, the speaker rattles off 16 distinct ways advertisers commonly sabotage their own ad accounts. The mistakes span both strategic and technical categories.
On the strategic side, the speaker criticizes emotionally-driven ad decisions, treating daily budgets with the volatility of day trading, and scaling campaigns too aggressively or too quickly. They also warn against constantly shifting strategy based on social media influencers — specifically calling out '19-year-olds on Instagram' — and against taking advice from Facebook representatives.
From a creative standpoint, the speaker flags several pitfalls: only testing minor variations rather than distinct concepts, relying on the same creative angle for extended periods (citing 8 months as an example), allowing a single creative to carry the weight of an entire account, and copying competitor ads one-to-one without adaptation.
Operationally, the speaker highlights mistakes like not running enough ads, not giving ads sufficient time to spend and optimize, and failing to properly warm up a new ad account. They also caution against testing non-compliant content.
Finally, on the technical and organizational side, the speaker emphasizes the absence of naming conventions, no third-party tracking setup, and missing UTM parameters as critical oversights that undermine campaign measurement and accountability.
Key Insights
- The speaker argues that killing ads based on emotions — rather than data — is one of the primary ways advertisers destroy their own account performance.
- The speaker criticizes advertisers who change their entire strategy every time a teenage influencer on Instagram promotes a new approach, implying that reactive strategy shifts are a major account killer.
- The speaker claims that asking Facebook reps for advice is itself a mistake, implying their recommendations are unreliable or self-serving.
- The speaker argues that over-reliance on a single high-performing creative — letting one ad carry the entire account — is a structural vulnerability rather than a success.
- The speaker lists the absence of UTMs, no third-party tracking, and no naming conventions as foundational technical failures that compound all other mistakes in an ad account.
Topics
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