Seeking Advice: Meta Ads Performance Issues

[Rubymace]

I've recently invested a significant budget (several hundred thousand) in Meta advertising, with half allocated to Advantage+.While our CTR (click-through rate) metrics are normal, we're seeing very low conversion rates.

The campaign setup process is also unnecessarily complex.

My questions:

Has anyone else experienced similar issues with Meta ads—specifically high CTR but poor CVR (conversion rate) and what strategies have improved your conversion rates?

[K_Br4]

It is better to start slow, figure out where the conversions come from, and then put in the thousands of $$$.

The lack of conversions may be due to on-page issues or the fact that you are not targeting the right audience (which explains the high CTR).

[Rubymace]

Do you use A+ or BAU more often on Meta?

[BenoitDomingue]

Disconnect between traffic and actual conversions, is not uncommon with Meta ads. High CTR but low CVR often signals a misalignment between the traffic you're attracting and your landing page's ability to convert. Here are a few suggestions that can help:

1. Analyze Audience Targeting: Double-check that your target audiences align with the intent needed for conversions. For example, ensure that you're focusing on audiences most likely to take actions beyond just clicking. Broad targeting can bring in a lot of clicks but may result in lower-quality traffic. Advantage+ is often a gimmick and doesn't work that well. 

2. Review Landing Page Experience: Ensure your landing page corresponds directly to your ad's message. Any disconnect can confuse users and lead to drop-offs. Analyze your bounce rate and page speed, and consider A/B testing headlines, CTAs, and visuals.

3. Check the Sales Funnel: Optimize every step of the buyer journey. For example, is there a lack of trust signals, pricing transparency, or urgency? Offering incentives like limited-time discounts might jumpstart conversions.

With that being said, this is where an app like Kuma could make a real difference. Kuma uses AI and Shopify data to create predictive customer segments and syncs those audiences directly with Meta Ads. This could refine your targeting to focus on high-converting audiences rather than broad, less-effective segments. By leveraging AI-driven insights, you could achieve better ROAS and optimize customer retention, which often leads to improved conversion rates over time. It even saves time by offering smart marketing strategies tailored to your store.

Best Meta ads ROAS I ever had was by using a lookalike audience based on RFM Champions. 

[Rubymace]

Is Kuma really helped？

[BenoitDomingue]

Hi Rubymace, Kuma is helping many Shopify stores increase their ad performance on Meta. The only "downside" is that it needs data to work with. It works better when you already have at least 5000 customers. 

[hashiromer]

That's a really common frustration, especially with significant spend and Advantage+ involved! High CTR but low CVR often points to issues after the click – things like landing page experience, audience mismatch (people clicking aren't really the buying audience), or friction in the user journey before conversion. Standard Meta and GA4 dashboards sometimes don't show the full picture of why people drop off.

This is where analyzing the raw clickstream data cen be really powerful. You can see detailed user paths from specific campaigns, identify exact drop-off points on your site after the click, and segment behaviors much more granularly than standard reports allow.

Actually, my agency is currently offering a completely free clickstream analysis for a few Shopify stores precisely to help diagnose issues like this. We're building our Shopify portfolio, so it's free for you, valuable experience for us. No strings attached.

If getting a deep dive into what happens after the click sounds helpful for tackling that CVR, feel free to reply or DM me or reply here. Happy to share how we could analyze your data to find those conversion roadblocks.

[Rubymace]

Could you tell the tool name?  I’ll have a try

[hashiromer]

Its quite technical to setup, thats why I was offering help (for free) but if you want to do it yourself. Here you go.

This is Google's official guide to setup clickstream export from GA4 to big query. It won't cost you much, for most websites its free.
https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/9358801?hl=en

After its setup, you can use Big Query to create any report you want. It literally allows you to answer any question about your traffic but its not point and clickm you need to know a special programming language SQL to write queries and run them. Hit me if it sounds interesting to you. Again for basic queries and analytics, no charge.

[sanjnalal]

Hi Rubymace, 

This actually more common than you think. 

The first reason could be that your ads are being triggered for queries not relevant to what you actually sell. I would recommend adding negative keywords to your campaign. 

Next, check the queries it is showing up for and see if the ad matches the landing page. There is some mismatch with the query the ads are being triggered for and what the user actually wants. 

Revisit your ad copy and headline. Add a clearer value prop or price mention in your ad headline/description.

Consider using audience signals to improve your targeting. 

If you’re spending several hundred thousand, consider using Meta Conversion Lift tests to run a statistically clean CVR experiment. These isolate real conversion impact vs. attribution noise.

Also, are you using a meta pixel to track conversions? I would highly recommend you use one.