How to Spend Smarter on Paid Ads

How to Spend Smarter on Paid Ads

In this episode of Torch Talk, Lindsey Chupp breaks down what’s happening in the world of paid digital advertising and what businesses need to understand about PPC moving into 2026.

As platforms like Google and Facebook continue to evolve, Lindsey explains how AI is changing the way ads are created, delivered, and optimized—and why many traditional strategies no longer work the same way they used to.

The conversation focuses on how to approach paid advertising with clarity, from setting the right budget to understanding what success actually looks like. Lindsey also addresses common frustrations business owners have with PPC and how to measure whether it’s truly working.

In this episode, you’ll hear about:

• What PPC (pay-per-click) actually is and how it works

• How AI is changing ad platforms like Google and Facebook

• Why creative assets and campaign structure matter more than ever

• How to determine the right budget based on your business goals

• What metrics to track, including cost per lead and conversions

• Why some industries require higher investment to compete

• Common mistakes businesses make when running paid ads

This episode offers a straightforward look at paid digital advertising, especially for business owners who want to better understand where their money is going and how to get real results from their campaigns.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

In a nutshell for both of these platforms, what it's doing is it might say, Lindsay, you love to watch videos, and so you're gonna get served a video ad, but your husband Jimmy really likes to have single image pictures, and so it's gonna take the exact same campaign. Maybe we're both the target client for that, but it's gonna serve the ad in a different way, a different format, so that it matches with the person who's interacting, who's going to interact with that content format the most. Welcome back to Torch Talk, the show where we spotlight bold leaders growing their businesses and communities with grit and purpose. Today, though, I am just here to talk to you about PPC. What is PPC? PPC is pay-per-click or digital advertising. It's called a lot of different types of things. For us, that really includes paid digital media across any platform. So our primary platforms are Facebook and Google. However, we do also sometimes run ads if it matches a client strategy on other platforms such as LinkedIn, Twitter, Pinterest. Really, we've done every single platform at this point that you can think of. So what's happening in 2026 on the PPC frontier? Right now, with the introduction of AI, there's a lot of things going on from a creative perspective. So for both Google and Facebook, because they're the biggest players right now, they want everything put into one big bucket. Let's talk about Facebook first. Facebook has introduced a new AI into their paid ads platform, and it's called Andromeda. So Ash, who runs our paid ads here, was referencing this in a client strategy, and I said, Ash, what is Andromeda? And she said, that is the AI that is taking all of the different types of creatives on the Facebook platform and it's putting parts and pieces together so it can best match up the creative with the person that is actually using the social media platforms. So it wants you to set up campaigns differently, set up budgets differently. So the Facebook platform and strategies are really not the same as they were even last year, let alone five years ago. So if you are running paid ads on Facebook and you're struggling to create leads or sales, you definitely need to land into and do a little bit of research on how to set up your campaigns properly and make sure that you're putting your creatives in the right groups so that the algorithm can put them out the correct way for the best conversion. On the Google side, it's very similar. So you want to be able to basically put a bunch of assets together. So your headlines, text, videos, landing pages, pictures, and Google wants everything to be in a pot, and then it wants to mix it up and match it to the person that is going to interact with it the best way. In a nutshell for both of these platforms, what it's doing is it might say, Lindsay, you love to watch videos, and so you're gonna get served a video ad, but your husband Jay really likes to have single image pictures, and so it's gonna take the exact same campaign. Maybe we're both the target client for that, but it's gonna serve the ad in a different way, a different format, so that it matches with the person who's interacting, who's going to interact with that content format the most. It's in the platform's best interest to actually drive conversions and sales for you because if they do that, then they're gonna get more money. They want to drive that pay per click because they get paid when they drive people to your website. And so they want the power and control from a creative perspective to make sure that they're putting their best foot forward with your content. We get tons of questions from our service-based businesses about what type of budget that they should have on both Google and on Facebook and any of the other platforms that we might recommend. And the question is usually it depends on you. So we want to match our digital budgets with our clients' goals. So, for example, I might talk to, I talked last week with a home builder who is pretty busy, but they need to uh begin building some brand awareness so they know that the business that they've gotten, they've used um, they've gotten mostly through word of mouth and referrals, but they think that that is a wave that they will eventually run out of. And so they want to set themselves up for down the road when they want to grow or when they want to expand areas. And so our strategy for them would be to begin with a branding campaign. So let's just get your name out there. The goal is not leads or conversions, the goal is visibility and impressions. And so we want to always match our clients' paid digital strategy with what they actually need. If you're already too swamped and you can't handle the business, but you know you need to increase your brand awareness, then we're gonna recommend that type of campaign, even if that doesn't make us the most money. So that is, you know, one of our lower packages on the paid digital advertising side. It's not going to be the biggest budget on the actual ad spend. And but if that's going to meet the client's need the best, then that's definitely gonna be what we recommend. Now we have other clients who might be in a very competitive industry like roofing, and roofing is super hard to rank for on specifically with Google Ads. And it's like Google is like an auction still. Uh we don't have as much control as we used to have, but it is like an auction. And so whoever's willing to pay the most, who has the biggest daily budget, you kind of have a minimum threshold to get in the game. And if you're not willing to hit that threshold, then it's almost worth you not doing that and to do some other type of strategy. So the reality is that doesn't always fit with a butt business's financial capability. And so we always tell our clients, we want to meet you where you're at, we want to develop the best strategy, and we will baby step you through it. You never do we really bring a client in and expect them to stay where they're at forever. We work best with a service-based business who does have goals to establish a good foundation, but then eventually grow. When we talk to clients who have worked with other agencies, usually what we are hearing is they have frustration around how much they're spending, they don't understand where their budget is going to, they don't understand if it's working or not working. And that is usually one of the number one problems. PPC is the most measurable and black and white of all of the services that we offer here at Fierce. And so you should definitely know how many leads you're bringing in, how much is your cost per lead, and is this profitable for you or not? We cover all of those metrics at our clients' meetings on a monthly basis, and then we do this also annually when we do our budgeting. So we actually will sit down with a client and go over what their annual sales goals are, how many salespeople do they have, what is their current closing rate, and we actually will break down how many leads they need per month in the seasons that they're working, and we'll we'll match that up with Google and Facebook and see what type of ad spend budget do we need to actually hit their goals. We don't expect Google and Facebook to generate 100% of the leads that you need. There's still other channels and avenues, there's still your referrals and word of mouth, there's still branding channels out there, but it can be a 40 to 50 percent portion of the leads that are generated each month. And that's a huge amount. Like imagine if you could get double the amount of leads that you're getting right now. How much would you be willing to pay for that? That is usually the question that clients are asking themselves, and their dissatisfaction and confusion about their service with another uh agency partner is the reason that they come find us here at Fierce. In a summary, we are always open to doing a marketing audit on your current PPC campaigns. If that is something you would like us to take a look at, feel free to message us. You can call me 330-466-5118. I would be happy to go over our marketing audit with you so that we can dig in and see what's working, what's not working, and we can make some recommendations. Thank you for tuning in to Torch Talk. If today's story inspired something in you, share it with a colleague, community leader, or future change maker. Until next time, stay inspired, stay intentional, and keep your fire burn.