Testing new feed designs is a lot different from testing regular ad creatives.
Before diving into the testing strategies, there's one main concept you need to understand:
Catalogs collect audience data over time, that's why your current catalog has a huge advantage over brand-new catalogs.
When you add your current catalog to a test, it will always win.
To get a fair test, it is super important to follow our best practices!
Two strategies for testing DPA Creatives
There are two ways to test your DPA Creatives.
Option 1: Enhance your current catalog
How It Works: Improve your existing catalog by replacing standard product images with custom designs created in Adflow.
You can do this by adding a supplementary feed to your existing catalog in Meta.
Once you add the supplementary feed, all connected campaigns are updated instantly.
For a robust comparison, run your new design for 1–2 months, comparing it against a similar period prior (e.g., performance in the last 30 days vs. 30 days prior).
The longer you test, the less seasonal changes impact your test results.
Advantages
✅ No budget waste on non-optimal catalogs.
✅ Flexibility to remove or change the supplementary feed if your first design didn't improve the results.
Disadvantages
❌ Potential impact of seasonal trends on test accuracy.
❌ Limitation to testing one design at a time.
Option 2: Create a new Testing Environment
How It Works: Create a separate catalog for each new design, alongside a control catalog for baseline comparison.
⚠️ Important:
To get a fair test, you have to create a new control catalog (without design).
Don't compare your DPA testing campaigns with running ads. Performance will be lower in testing campaigns because you're using new catalogs.
After adding your new catalogs, create a new campaign and run it for at least one or two months to see which design performed best.
Once you have found a winning design, you can add it as a supplementary feed to your existing catalog. Now you have the best of both worlds: a catalog with years of learning + your winning catalog design.
Advantages
✅ Test multiple designs at the same time
✅ No seasonality impact
Disadvantages
❌ You need more budget because catalogs need time to optimize
❌ Each catalog optimizes in its own way. It's difficult to tell if your improvements are because you changed the design or because other products are being promoted.
If you choose option 2, please follow the steps in the guide below.
How to Create a new testing environment (Option 2)
1. Create feed designs
Begin by creating various feed designs to identify which layout optimizes performance.
Aim for at least three distinct designs for a comprehensive test. Here's an example:
Tips for your first test
👉 Try using diverse designs. Use different angles and layouts (eg. promo vs social proof vs authority)
2. Catalog Preparation
Create a new catalog on Meta for each design.
⚠️ Include a Control Catalog (without design), to ensure all tested catalogs start with zero data collected.
First add a new control catalog
You can copy the URL from your Adflow account:
Add the testing catalogs
Setting up 3 testing catalogs is easier than you think. Create the catalog, add your design, start it, and then click 'Add catalog to Meta.'
3. Campaign Setup
With your catalogs ready, set up your test campaign in Ads Manager. We recommend using Advantage+ Shopping Campaigns for simplicity and effectiveness.
Create an Advantage+ Shopping Campaign in the ads manager.
Then, create an ad for each new Adflow catalog and also add the control catalog.
All settings should be the same in each ad. The easiest way to set this up is to duplicate one ad three times.
Don't add your current catalog to the Advantage+ testing campaign. The algorithm will favor this catalog and eat all the budget.
Run the campaigns for 14-30 days. Make sure you have a sufficient budget (at least 50 conversions).
4. Scaling the winner
Found a winner? Great! Now, take the top-performing feed design and assign it to the dynamic product ads used in your regular campaigns.
Avoid comparing the performance of your testing campaigns to your other campaigns. Use the scaled performance to determine the ROI of using enriched catalogs.
By adding a supplementary feed, you can take advantage of the years of learning from your original catalog.
Here's how:
Go to your original catalog and click 'Add Supplementary feed'.
This will override the plain product images with the winning design.
You now have best of both worlds: Years of learning in the original catalog + Your improved design.
Once applied, it will automatically add your new design to all running campaigns. Now keep track of your campaigns performance to see the lift in results.
Didn't find a clear winner?
Try something very different. For example, test an entirely new template and all new variants.
Or just schedule a meeting here and we will help you to create a new test.