1 min readPaid Media
The return on the top campaign is the number to manage to
A blended return hides the spread. The campaigns at the top of the account are where the budget should go, and finding them is the job.
Vibra Urbana returned 6X+ overall and 16X+ on its top campaigns. Kappa ran at 8X+ blended with 10–11X on the top campaigns. Malbon Golf: 4X+ blended, 8–10X on the top collections. The pattern is the same in every account we run. The top is two to three times the average, and the average is mostly a measure of how much budget sat below it.
[ 01 ]The blended number is a report, not a target
Managing an account to its blended return pushes you toward safe, broad campaigns that neither fail nor win. Managing to the top campaigns means a different set of questions every week: what is the ceiling on the best cell, how much more budget will it take before the return falls, and what in the rest of the account looks like it could join it.
[ 02 ]How the budget moves
- Rank every campaign by return weekly, with spend beside it, so the spread is visible
- Scale the top cells in steps, and watch the return at each step rather than the total
- Cut the bottom quartile on a schedule; it rarely recovers
- Keep a test cell alive to find the next top campaign, because the current one has a ceiling
On Vibra Urbana that discipline turned into $750k+ of attributable ticketing revenue. The blended figure went up as a consequence of chasing the top, not the other way round.