Digital advertising can feel like a minefield right now. The platforms keep changing how they work, budgets are tight and it is harder than ever to tell what is actually working.
That was the focus of our June webinar, where we looked at how arts, cultural and heritage organisations can make their ad spend go further.
Bella hosted a panel of individuals who manage or advise on paid campaigns day to day:
- Ollie Couling, Tech Champion for digital marketing and strategy at the Digital Culture Network
- Faye Rodgerson, Digital Communications Coordinator at The Bowes Museum
- Chloe Couper, Produced Marketing Manager at Birmingham Hippodrome
We covered choosing the right platforms, targeting audiences and measuring return on investment. One idea came up again and again. Good advertising now depends less on the platform you pick and more on the creative you put in front of people, the audience you choose and the data you choose to trust.
Key takeaways from the session
- Put your audience before the platform. Faye’s team advertises on Facebook and Instagram because that is where their audience already is, not because they feel they should be everywhere.
- Think full funnel. Ollie made the case for warming people up with content, rather than expecting a single ad to sell a ticket cold.
- Let the creative do the work. A specific message that stops the scroll matters more than the channel it runs on.
- Native does not mean cheap. Content that feels at home on TikTok still needs a brief, good lighting and a few takes to get right.
- Keep testing. Assumptions go stale quickly. The idea that only young people use TikTok, for example, is not what the data shows.
- Spend enough to let a campaign learn. Very small budgets often leave campaigns stuck in Meta’s learning phase.
- Measure what means something. Watch-through rates, retargeting pools and revenue tell you more than impressions ever will.
Best practice for arts organisations
Start with the audience, not the platform
Faye described audience as the heart of every spending decision. Her team uses Audience Spectrum segmentation alongside their own surveys to understand who visits, how far they travel and whether they need a car to reach an out-of-town venue. They only spend when they know an ad will land in front of the right people.
Treat native content as a craft
Chloe was clear that native-style content is not an excuse to film something quickly and hope. The pieces that perform best still start fast, feel personal and reflect your brand. They simply use the visual language people are used to seeing on the platform. That usually takes a brief and a proper production day, not a shortcut.
Protect a testing budget and write down what you learn
Birmingham Hippodrome plans its tests across the year and reviews them in a monthly meeting. Chloe keeps a record of what worked on which show, and at which time of year, so the team is not trying to remember a campaign from six months ago. Faye evaluates every campaign and feeds the lessons into the next one.
Spend enough to make it work
A recurring tension in the sector is the temptation to keep budgets low and leave a campaign ticking along. As Chloe put it, if you do not spend enough, it will never work. Part of her job is making the case to producers and finance colleagues that digital marketing is worth investing in properly.
Do not trust a single dashboard
Chloe takes anything a platform tells her with a pinch of salt, especially when each one claims to be the channel driving the most conversions. She checks what the pixel reports against real booking patterns, turning campaigns on and off to see the genuine effect.
Build relationships, not just transactions
With third-party cookies fading and data rules tightening, Ollie’s first step with any organisation is to check that its terms and conditions allow the targeting it wants to do. He argued that metrics which build long-term relationships are a more sustainable bet than chasing one-off sales.
Topics from the live chat box
How can we collect first-party data if we only use Meta and our sales reports?
Ollie suggested adding a step you control into the process. Running ads towards newsletter sign-ups, for example, gathers first-party data even when you are not selling a ticket directly. It is a longer-tail tactic, but it builds something you own.
He also flagged the soft opt-in for charities. Recent changes mean eligible charities can add people to their database by default, with the option to opt out, rather than asking them to opt in. It is a quick win for building first-party data. The Digital Culture Network can help you get the consent side right.
How do you track who is actually booking from Meta, such as couples or groups?
Chloe uses two methods together. Pixels fire on purchases, so bookings can be traced back to specific campaigns, and she builds ad groups aimed at particular audiences, say couples or groups, to test who converts.
Because she does not fully trust pixel data, she also runs campaigns on and off over set periods and watches how group booking patterns shift in the ticketing system. The two sources together build a more reliable picture over time.
Do you track analytics monthly or quarterly, and do you track campaigns or content?
Faye tracks monthly, with paid and organic metrics split out and fed into wider dashboards. Every campaign is also evaluated at the end, and those learnings shape the next one.
We advertise on Meta with limited budgets and our campaigns keep getting stuck in the learning phase. How do we escape it?
The panel agreed budget is usually the issue. Chloe suggested either increasing spend or narrowing your audience, though she noted Meta is steering advertisers towards broader targeting and its own algorithm, so geography is one of the few levers you still fully control.
For very small budgets, under around £50, Ollie and Faye both recommended a boosted post rather than a full campaign. There is no learning phase to escape with a boosted post, so your money starts working straight away.
How do you make content look native when it is not cheaply produced?
Chloe gave the example of a single performer filmed close-up in a warehouse, getting into the song quickly, with several short edits posted in quick succession. It felt native to the platform and performed well, but it was still made by a team.
The lesson is to study what works on each platform and brief that into your content, while keeping the lighting and brand quality high. Ollie added that a clear, specific message cuts through. Aiming it at a defined audience also filters out the clicks you do not want to pay for.
A recent ad had 836 landing page views but zero sales. Where are we losing people?
Faye starts with the landing page rather than the ad, since the clicks suggest the ad is doing its job. She checks that the page answers the basics quickly: when the event is, how much it costs and how to book, with an obvious booking link. Then she works through the technical funnel and external factors like timing.
Chloe spends time in GA4 looking at where people drop out of the journey, and recommended trying the chat feature in GA4 for help with the trickier questions. Sometimes the honest answer is capacity: if there are few seats left at the right price, the cost per sale will simply be higher.
What tools would you recommend for digital ads?
Chloe pointed to GA4 and Google Search Console for understanding what people search for and where they get stuck, plus the in-platform insight tools on TikTok, Spotify and Acast.
Ollie recommended Looker Studio for reporting, and a simple human check he calls the ‘mum and dad test’. If someone outside marketing can complete the journey, it probably works. Faye does the same, showing ads to colleagues who are not especially arts-engaged.
For seeing what other organisations are running, the panel mentioned the Meta Ad Library and the Google Ads Transparency Center.
Google Search Console | Meta Ad Library | Google Ads Transparency Centre
Resources
- Digital Culture Network: free one-to-one support from Tech Champions
- The Space: short-form video webinar with Amrit Singh, shared by an attendee during the session
- Google Analytics (GA4)
- Google Search Console
- TikTok Creative Centre
- Meta Ad Library
- Google Ads Transparency Centre
After each webinar we also offer a small number of free one-to-one action planning sessions, where you can talk through your own goals with us and leave with an audit and a plan you can act on.
If you would like to explore your digital advertising with us, get in touch.
Bella RichardsDigital Marketing
