Social Media Advertising Case Studies & Practical Application 4 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: A fintech startup launches LinkedIn ads targeting CFOs at companies with 500+ employees. After 30 days, impressions are very low despite a $5,000 budget. What is the most likely cause?
- LinkedIn does not allow fintech advertisers
- The audience is too narrow; LinkedIn's minimum recommended audience is 50,000 members for scaled delivery (Correct answer)
- The creative format is incompatible with LinkedIn
- The budget is too high for a small audience
Correct answer: The audience is too narrow; LinkedIn's minimum recommended audience is 50,000 members for scaled delivery
Hyper-narrow B2B audiences on LinkedIn fall below the threshold needed for consistent delivery, causing underdelivery even with adequate budget.
Question 2: A media company runs Facebook video ads and tracks 3-second vs. 15-second video views. The 3-second view rate is 60%, but 15-second view rate is 8%. What does this gap most likely indicate?
- The video length is optimal and no changes are needed
- The content loses viewer interest quickly after the opening; the hook is not sustained through the video body (Correct answer)
- Facebook's algorithm is limiting video distribution
- The 15-second view metric is not reliable
Correct answer: The content loses viewer interest quickly after the opening; the hook is not sustained through the video body
A large drop from 3-second to 15-second views means the creative hooks viewers but fails to maintain engagement beyond the opening.
Question 3: A software company's Google Display campaigns are cannibalizing their social retargeting by targeting the same users. What is the best structural fix?
- Pause all Google Display campaigns permanently
- Apply customer match exclusions or audience exclusions on social campaigns to deduplicate overlap (Correct answer)
- Increase social budgets to outbid Google Display
- Combine all retargeting into a single channel
Correct answer: Apply customer match exclusions or audience exclusions on social campaigns to deduplicate overlap
Cross-channel audience exclusions prevent the same users from being retargeted by both channels, reducing wasted spend and attribution overlap.
Question 4: A restaurant chain runs geo-targeted Facebook ads within a 5-mile radius of each location. One location in a dense urban area has CPMs 3x higher than suburban locations. What explains this?
- Facebook charges more for restaurant advertising in cities
- Urban areas have more advertisers competing for the same dense zip codes, driving up auction CPMs (Correct answer)
- The urban ad creative is lower quality
- Geo-targeting within 5 miles is not allowed in urban areas
Correct answer: Urban areas have more advertisers competing for the same dense zip codes, driving up auction CPMs
Dense urban areas concentrate many advertisers targeting the same geography, intensifying auction competition and raising CPMs.
Question 5: An apparel brand runs an influencer campaign on Instagram. The influencer has 500K followers, but the branded posts generate only 200 link clicks. What metric should the brand have prioritized during influencer selection?
- Follower growth rate over the past 90 days
- Engagement rate and past campaign conversion performance (swipe-up or link click rates) (Correct answer)
- The influencer's verified status
- Total number of posts per week
Correct answer: Engagement rate and past campaign conversion performance (swipe-up or link click rates)
Follower count alone does not predict conversion; past engagement rate and proven link-click history are far stronger predictors of campaign ROI.
Question 6: A healthcare company wants to run Facebook ads promoting telemedicine services. Meta flags several ads for policy violations. What is the most likely reason?
- Healthcare advertising is banned on Meta
- The ads likely reference health conditions or imply awareness of user health status, violating Meta's health and wellness ad policies (Correct answer)
- The landing page was not approved by Meta
- Telemedicine is classified as a financial product on Meta
Correct answer: The ads likely reference health conditions or imply awareness of user health status, violating Meta's health and wellness ad policies
Meta prohibits ad copy that implies knowledge of a user's personal health status or targets users based on health conditions.
Question 7: A mobile game studio runs App Install ads on Meta, TikTok, and Google UAC simultaneously. Attribution shows 3x installs in Meta's dashboard vs. actual installs in the MMP. What does this indicate?
- The MMP is misconfigured and should be ignored
- Multi-channel overlap is causing view-through and click-through attribution double-counting across platforms (Correct answer)
- The game has a 3x organic multiplier driven by social sharing
- Meta's conversion API is overstating installs intentionally
Correct answer: Multi-channel overlap is causing view-through and click-through attribution double-counting across platforms
Each ad platform claims credit for the same install, causing reported installs to far exceed actual ones; an MMP provides deduplicated source-of-truth data.
Social Media Advertising Case Studies & Practical Application 4
A fintech startup launches LinkedIn ads targeting CFOs at companies with 500+ employees.
After 30 days, impressions are very low despite a $5,000 budget.
What is the most likely cause?