Case Study · Runway Rogue

At 10:30 on our first night, we switched off every ad we had launched for Runway Rogue. By February the account had a week of 990 purchases.

Facebook and Instagram ads, and the creative behind them, for a lip-colour brand. Results from the weekly reports, December 2018 to April 2019.

603

purchases a week on average, January to April 2019, against about 229 a week in 2018

990

purchases in our best week, about four times the 2018 weekly average

$13.20

average cost per purchase, January to April 2019, against $13.92 in 2018

01 · October 22, 2018

Day one

Runway Rogue sold lip colour online and hired us to run its Facebook and Instagram ads and make the creative. We went live on October 22.

That evening the client messaged us. The numbers were well under where they should have been, even for a first day. At 10:30 that night our media buyer switched off every ad we had launched and wrote in the account log: "I want to save their money while I evaluate and relaunch in the morning."

Two days later, after a relaunch that also underperformed, we switched our ads off again.

02 · The 2018 numbers

Who was actually buying

On October 26 we went back through everything the account had done that year, broken out by age. Buyers aged 45 to 54 had made more than half of all purchases, 53.5%, and brought in $2.73 in sales for every ad dollar. Buyers aged 18 to 24 brought in $1.08.

We pointed the running ads at 45 to 54 the same day.

03 · November and December

Testing, and switching off

The account log from those weeks records a lot of switching off: weekend ads that underperformed, ad sets with very low click-through, a cold-audience lip gloss campaign, and a set of lookalike campaigns we turned off after one day with the note "Turned off the new campaigns from yesterday, not working."

Alongside the cuts, we retargeted people who had browsed the site, added to cart or bought before, and after a conversation with the client we moved some campaigns to cost caps. From January, our creative team shot new model photos, shade by shade.

Runway Rogue lipstick smear, Casting Call shade — Casting Call

Model portrait against a red backdrop, March 2019 shoot — March 2019 shoot

04 · Callback

Back in stock

In February 2019 the Callback shade came back in stock, and we ran a campaign for it. In its first week on Facebook it brought in $4.73 in sales for every ad dollar, on 213 purchases.

Runway Rogue Pearl Glam liquid lipstick in Callback — Pearl Glam · Callback

Runway Rogue swatches on an arm, Callback among them — Swatch · Callback

05 · The weekly reports

Purchases, week by week

197

102

612

449

397

418

565

990

848

503

664

583

Nov 28 to Dec 4, 2018Dec 12 to 18, 2018Jan 2 to 8, 2019Jan 9 to 15, 2019Jan 16 to 22, 2019Jan 24 to 30, 2019Feb 6 to 12, 2019Feb 20 to 26, 2019Feb 27 to Mar 5, 2019Mar 13 to 19, 2019Mar 20 to 26, 2019Mar 27 to Apr 2, 2019

Week	Purchases
Nov 28 to Dec 4, 2018	197
Dec 12 to 18, 2018	102
Jan 2 to 8, 2019	612
Jan 9 to 15, 2019	449
Jan 16 to 22, 2019	397
Jan 24 to 30, 2019	418
Feb 6 to 12, 2019	565
Feb 20 to 26, 2019	990
Feb 27 to Mar 5, 2019	848
Mar 13 to 19, 2019	503
Mar 20 to 26, 2019	664
Mar 27 to Apr 2, 2019	583

In 2018, before us, the account averaged about 229 purchases a week at $13.92 each. Across the ten weeks we reported from January to April 2019, it averaged 603 a week at $13.20 each. The best week, February 20 to 26, brought in 990.

Later ads, May and June 2019