food supplements and health
Supplement advertising is rejected before it reaches the buyer.
Copy written to the platforms' rules from the very first version, without losing the specifics that persuade. Targeting that does not rely on a health marker. A budget set by the customer's value across the whole intake course. I manage paid advertising for brands in supplements, health and pharma, including Vitapharm. I work by a mechanism I call “Second bottle”.
Request a quotewhat breaks here
Three places where this category differs from every other
01
Rejections pile up on the account
A rejected ad stops not only itself. Repeated rejections go as a signal to the ad account, the page and the profile, and the restriction spreads to campaigns that have nothing to do with the text that started it. The test stops exactly when it has begun to produce data, and the next one starts from zero.
02
Some of the targeting tools are closed
Personalised advertising by health status is not permitted. Interests linked to conditions and illnesses drop out. So do audiences made up of visitors to a page about a specific problem. The targeting that does the job for clothing and electronics is simply missing here as an option.
03
The calculation is made on the first order
The intake course lasts months, while the budget is judged on the sales of the first days. The first order describes the customer's entry, not their value to the end of the course. The decision to stop is taken on a number that covers only part of the period.
the mechanism
Second bottle
Everything in this mechanism is subordinated to one thing: the customer ordering a second time. The copy is written for moderation from the first version, targeting is carried by the creative, acquisition and retention are run separately, and the budget is set by the customer's value across the whole course.
- Rewriting the claims Every ad starts from the composition, the weight, the form of intake, the origin of the raw material and the production standard. The effect on health is dropped from the text; what remains are the specifics the buyer in this category compares anyway. The advertising does not address the person's condition and does not describe a symptom in which they would recognise themselves.
- Targeting without a health marker The signal of who the product is for is carried by the creative itself: scene, visual, wording, offer. Campaigns start broad and the recognition of the audience is left to the content of the ad. Segments built on behaviour that reveals a health problem are dropped from the plan already on paper.
- Separate streams Acquisition and retention run in separate campaigns, with separate budgets and separate measures. The new customer is judged by cost per first order. The existing one is judged by cost per repeat order and by subscription retention. The two numbers are not merged into one report, because they are managed by different decisions.
- Calculation at customer level Customer value over time, the share of repeat orders and subscription churn are tracked by cohort. Orders in the shop are reconciled against what the ad platform reports. The acquisition budget moves by these numbers.
proof
What exactly I do in this category
I manage paid advertising for brands in supplements, health and pharma, including Vitapharm. The category is restricted on advertising platforms, so the work starts from the policies and reaches the repeat-order cohorts.
Reading every rejection against the specific policy
A rejection is traced to the element that caused it: a promised effect, addressing the person's condition, a before-and-after image of a body, an implied diagnosis. The variant is rewritten so that the cause is removed, and resubmitted for review.
A library of approved wordings
Every ad that passes remains as a building block. The following copy is written on already approved language, so that tests do not stop at moderation and the budget goes into creative and offer.
Separate campaigns for new and existing customers
Acquisition is kept apart from repeat purchase and from the subscription. This way the cost of a new customer is seen clean and is not flattered by the orders of people who would have come back without advertising.
Reconciling orders in the shop
The platform's numbers are matched against the real orders in the shop's system. The difference is described and decisions are made on the shop's data, including when judging whether the subscription retains enough to justify a higher acquisition cost.
the first step
A second opinion on your ad account
Before any change to the campaigns, I review the account in its current state: the history of rejections, the structure, the targeting, the tracking and the repeat orders.
- Reply within one working day The request is reviewed and you receive a reply within one working day of submitting it.
- A written analysis and a personal meeting You receive a written document with the findings and priorities, after which I present them to you in person at a meeting, so that it is clear what each one means for your case.
- The value is deducted in full With a contract of a minimum term of three months, signed within 30 days of the analysis, the value of the analysis is deducted in full.
- Read access is enough No rights to make changes are needed. Read access to the ad accounts and to the order data is enough for the entire analysis.
distribution
Which channel is responsible for what
| Meta | It brings the new customer. The category is restricted, so targeting is transferred onto the creative and broad campaigns, and the copy is written for moderation already in the first version. Demonstrating the product, the packaging and the way it is used lasts longest before the audience tires. |
|---|---|
| It catches intent that has already taken shape: brand, ingredient, form, weight, a search for a specific product by name. This also includes people who reorder outside the subscription, as well as those comparing prices between shops. Health claims are kept out of the listings and out of the landing pages the advertising leads to. | |
| Remarketing | It works for the second order. It is built at shop, category and basket level, without segments that reveal a health condition. The strongest moment is the window towards the end of the course, when the pack runs out and the decision to renew is made by hand. |
an honest warning
When I am not the right choice
- The product is sold with a promise of a cure and the expectation is that the copy will be slipped past the rules.
- Campaign decisions are made on sales from the first days, and there is no readiness to follow repeat orders by cohort.
- There is no access to the order data in the shop and reconciliation would have to rest only on the numbers of the ad platform.
questions
