Round 2 plan and recommendations
Ailis's six-test brief and the 26 new files, reviewed against what the live tests have told us so far.
Status, 29 October: built and paused
All six ad sets are built in the Christmas Creative Testing campaign exactly as set out in section 3: Ads 1071 to 1093, £450 a day between them, plus the Noël gift-box video as Ad 1094 in Gifting. Everything is paused, ready to switch on. One change from the original plan: the PR set runs as one ad set of the three press statics, not a with and without masthead A/B test.
Copy for every set, ready for your approvals: pott-christmas-round2-copy.pages.dev
1. What is running now, and what to do with it
21 to 28 Oct, Meta-reported, 7-day click. 28 Oct is a part day.
| Test | £/day now | Read | Call | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fir Statics campaign | £100 | 1027 £202 / 4 orders / £50 · 1029 £421 / 11 / £38 · 1030 £312 / 9 / £35 | Pause | The winners are known. 1029 is the one Fir copy main is feeding; 1027 is the weakest arm. |
| Fir Videos campaign | £50 | 1033 £766 / 18 / £43 | Keep | Its only funded home. £43 is November break-even. |
| T1 Fir proof | £250 | 1055 £42 · 1056 £37 · 1057 £45 · 1058 £37 (all fed) | Cut to £120 | Answered: the creator demo (1056) is best, all four sit at £37 to £45. Keep as the ring-fence. |
| T2 Fir message | £100 | 1060 £1,233 / 27 / £46 · 1059 and 1061 unfunded for 3 days | Pause | Meta chose the cosy-evening caption and it converts at £46. Nothing more to learn. |
| T3 Starter Pack scent | £300 | 1064 £833 / 30 / £28 (rising) · 1063 £1,443 / 24 / £60 (sliding) · 1062, 1065 unread | Keep | Waits for the Flora four-move agreed on the 28 Oct call. |
| T4 Icicle proof | £200 | 1066, 1067 paused in T4 on 28 Oct · 1069 £165 / 3 on its first fed day · 1068 £16 | Keep ~4 days | Now reading the two ads it never fed. |
2. Why the Fir winners went quiet in main
Christmas ad set spend by day. The lighter block is Ad 1000, still taking about a third of whatever the set gets.
The five Fir copies went live in this set on 27 Oct, the day after the cap. Spend on them since: 1027 £9, 1029 £126, 1030 £7, 1031 £9, 1033 £14. At £701 a day across 24 ads with Ad 1000 and three older ads ahead of them, there is no headroom. The copies are unread, not failed. The lever is the Evergreen budget, not the Fir campaigns.
3. Round 2: six sets, all at once
Every set changes one thing, with its ads competing inside it, one caption, built paused on 29 October. Budgets below total £450 a day across 23 ads, which is thin: a clean 7-day read wants about £150 per ad. Expect Meta to fund roughly half the arms in week one. An unfunded arm is unread, not a loser, and gets its turn when T3 and T4 roll their £275 into these sets. If anything has to give later in the week, it gives in this order: Ailis to camera first, then Noël and Starlight, then Refilling; the review statics and PR last, because they shape November creative.
Christmas review statics: which line sells?
Built, pausedThe question. Which customer line on a still sells: true to life, not fake, fills the room, limited edition, or the pottery?
How it reads. One format throughout, the review card that already works, so the line is the only variable. Five Fir stills and two Starlight. Scent is a known confound: read the Starlight pair against 1066 (the Starlight still already running at £33).
Copy. Ad 1000's live copy pool on every arm (it names all three scents), nothing new to approve.
Watch out. The "Smells like a fir tree, gorgeous!" still is left out: same line as 1027 on a more polished photo, and the Fir test already showed polish does not change the result. Typos fixed in Ailis's re-exports before upload.
Noël: which angle makes the scent compelling
Built, pausedThe question. Does Noël sell on a personal recommendation, the look of the Pott, or the story behind the scent?
How it reads. Same caption on all arms. All three name cinnamon and clove. Read on cost per order once each arm has £150, with 1064 (sniff plus a named scent, £28) as the benchmark.
Copy. New Noël caption, the first option (approved); the second, with Ailis's "Five Christmases on" edit, is held for the next caption test. Description: Ailis's "Noël: cinnamon, clove & mandarin".
Watch out. The Holly gift-box video names no scent and opens on the present, the frame that got clicks not buyers on 1063. It goes to Gifting instead.
Starlight: who tells the "not too Christmassy" story
Built, pausedThe question. Does the non-Christmassy winter idea land better from Ailis, from a creator concept, or from an unboxing?
How it reads. Videos only, so format is constant. The two Starlight stills moved to set 1 with the other statics. Read against 1067 (kiln video, £30) which shares the caption.
Copy. Icicle 02 caption (approved), same as T4, so the arms read against 1066 and 1067.
Watch out. Dropped the 8-second review-on-the-Grand video: the Grand photo lost in the Fir test (1028, £71) and its review line contradicts the still. Headline uses Ailis's approved "bergamot, tonka and cinnamon".
Refilling: which explanation converts
Built, pausedThe question. Does understanding the refill remove hesitation, and which explanation does it best: a customer question answered, a full walkthrough, or a close-up demo?
How it reads. Ailis's test as she wrote it. Speaker is a known confound (two Ailis, one creator). Read add-to-basket per landing-page view as well as cost per order, since the point is removing hesitation.
Copy. New Starter Pack caption (how-to, not ritual: the videos are practical), the first option (approved).
Watch out. The close-up is Ad 1042's video, already live to the zero-order email list; cold is new for it. All three say "about 30 seconds" (claim register). Ailis trimmed the production slate off the walkthrough (now 66.5 seconds).
PR: which press line sells
Built, pausedThe question. Which press line on a product photo sells: The Telegraph on character, or Ideal Home on owning one and on how well it is made?
How it reads. One concept three ways: a press quote and masthead over a product photo, in one ad set like the others. Read on cost per order against 1066 (£33) and the Set 1 review stills, which use customer lines instead of press.
Copy. New caption with no proof of its own, the first option (approved), so the press quote in the picture does the proving.
Watch out. Changed from the original plan: the with-and-without masthead A/B test was dropped because the no-masthead exports never came, and Casey chose not to hold the launch for them. If they arrive, they become a second ad set and the A/B tool is used then. The Telegraph video runs in set 6 with the other Ailis videos.
Ailis to camera: which topic earns more creative
Built, pausedThe question. With Ailis on camera every time, which subject sells: sizes, the MatchPott, the founder story, or the Telegraph piece?
How it reads. One speaker, one format, so the topic is the only variable. This is the set that writes next week's shoot list. An unfunded arm counts as a result.
Copy. New Starter Pack caption that sits on all four videos, the first option (approved).
Watch out. The Telegraph video sits here, not in the PR test: it is Ailis to camera like the other three, a different kind of ad from the press statics. In it she says "Diptyque uses paraffin" while the article on screen says a vegetable and paraffin blend, and says six years in business where the market video says four. Burn times in the sizes video match the website.
Outside the tests
4. Where the winners go
The five sets already split by destination. Review statics, Noël and Starlight winners go into the Christmas ad set, and they test on its settings and landing page. Refilling, PR and Ailis-to-camera winners go into Everything Else (the PR images show the Ocean Pott, and those videos are not seasonal), and they test on the Starter Pack page. The 28 Oct analysis showed the same ad can do £23 in one main ad set and £57 in another, so matching the test to its destination is worth keeping as a check, even though it does not change the structure.
5. Budget picture: testing held at 20%
| Block | £/day | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Evergreen (capped) | £2,000 | The lever if testing needs more room: every £100 here allows £25 more testing. |
| Gifting | £400 | 1063 now takes about 80% of it. |
| Cook, retention, subscription | £322 | Unchanged. |
| Round 1 ring-fences: T3 £100 (1064), T1 £75 (1056), T4 £100 (1068, 1069) | £275 | Insurance while their Christmas-set copies prove they get delivery. T4 reads in about four days. Each one pauses once its copy in main is spending, and the money rolls into round 2. |
| Round 2: statics £100, PR £80, Refilling £75, Ailis to camera £75, Noël £60, Starlight £60 | £450 | Six ad sets, 23 ads, all live at once. |
| Testing total | £725 | 21% of £3,447 for about four days, then T4's £100 comes off and it is 18.7%. Fir Videos paused. |
Round 1 ad sets have been running at £28 to £46 per order against a November break-even of about £43, so the 20% is not a drag on the account. The constraint is the read, not the money: £450 across 23 ads is about £135 per ad over a week if Meta spread it evenly, which it will not. Next week's decisions should treat anything under about £75 as unread.
6. Flags raised before the build, and where they landed
Resolved: Ailis re-exported it with the slate trimmed (66.5 seconds).
Runs as Ailis supplied it, as on Ad 1042. Our captions make no timed claim.
Resolved: the headline uses the approved "bergamot, tonka and cinnamon".
The description uses Ailis's edit, "cinnamon, clove & mandarin". The running caption says sweet orange. Casey chose to launch as approved.
Still in the Telegraph video, which Ailis re-cut to 55 seconds. Ailis is checking the line.
Not supplied, so the PR set runs without the masthead comparison (see Set 5).
Resolved in Ailis's re-exports.
Approved by Ailis with the copy.
7. What happens next
- Done 29 Oct: Ailis approved the copy; all six ad sets built paused as Ads 1071 to 1093, plus Ad 1094 in Gifting.
- Casey spot-checks one ad per set, then switches on the six ad sets and Ad 1094.
- Casey sets T3 to £100, T1 to £75, T4 to £100 and pauses Fir Videos, if not already done.
- Next week: read every arm, treat under £75 as unread, decide what to shoot next and roll T3 and T4 budget into the funded winners.
- Reads per ad at £150 (winner at or under £40 with 6 or more orders, kill over £75) and per ad set around day 7.
Related pages: Fir test results · Does testing predict main? · What we're testing