🌟 Editor’s Note
This week, we’ll unpack:
what Meta actually means by “creative diversity” (straight from their internal frameworks)
why acquisition slows when creative isn’t built for different customer stages
how segmentation is the missing link between paid, email, and retention performance
I’ll also walk through how we’re building a brand-new Meta account from zero to $100K.
Before diving in, here’s a quick look at how Meta performance closed out the last week of January:
Inside Meta: What Creative Diversity Actually Means
This past week, I spent time at Meta’s office reviewing internal frameworks and performance insights with their team.
One of the biggest takeaways: many advertisers misunderstand what Meta optimization is really driven by.
Most teams assume better performance comes from:
launching more creatives
testing more formats
increasing experimentation volume
While those things matter, they’re not the core of how Meta evaluates and distributes ads.
What Meta walked us through was a less visible layer of the system, specifically how creative diversity is assessed behind the scenes.
This includes:
how Meta scores creative diversity across an ad account
why ads that look very different to a human can still be considered “similar” by the system
how creative similarity influences internal competition between ads
how incrementality is increasingly used to evaluate true performance impact
A key challenge is that much of this data isn’t surfaced inside the ad account. Advertisers can’t directly see these scores, and often don’t realize they’re influencing delivery and performance at all.
Understanding this explains a lot of common frustrations.
These insights came directly from Meta’s team and I’m still synthesizing everything we covered, but in next week’s newsletter I’ll share a deeper breakdown of what this means in practice - and how it should change the way we think about creative strategy, testing, and scaling on Meta.
More to come.
How Retention + Acquisition Work Together
Speaking about creative diversity… one thing that came up in our weekly Media Buying convo (and this is where a lot of 7-figure brands get stuck) is that growth slows when everything is treated like a conversion problem.
We kept coming back to the same issue: the creative all starts to look the same.
When that happens, acquisition struggles and retention quietly drops.
Not because the product is bad, but because customers at different stages are seeing the same message over and over.
Some people are brand new.
Some have seen you five times.
Some already bought and just need a reminder (or a reason) to come back.
That’s why the focus shifted to adding more creative differences: more videos, more social proof, more UGC, more variety. Not for the sake of “testing,” but so the account can actually support a funnel.
When your ads look identical, you’re forcing every touchpoint to do the same job. But when acquisition creative educates, builds trust, and shows outcomes, your retention channels work better without trying harder.
That’s the connection most brands miss.
Retention doesn’t fix weak acquisition.
And acquisition doesn’t scale without retention backing it up.
Segmentation Is How Email and Paid Stop Fighting Each Other
One thing that becomes very clear once you’re past early scale: paid media and email don’t have the same job, and they shouldn’t.
Paid channels are often excluding existing customers. That’s normal.
You already paid to acquire them once, so it doesn’t make sense to keep spending aggressively on the same people.
But that creates a gap.
If paid media is focused on new demand, then email and SMS become the only channels responsible for monetizing existing demand. That’s where repeat purchases, second orders, upgrades, and cross-sells actually happen.
This is why segmentation matters so much.
If you send the same email to:
non-buyers
first-time buyers
repeat customers
you’re forcing one message to do three different jobs, and it usually does none of them well.
When segmentation is clear:
paid media brings people in
email captures and educates
retention messaging deepens value and increases LTV
That’s how acquisition stays efficient without constantly needing higher budgets or heavier promos.
How to Win With a New Meta Ad Account (From $0 to $100K)
In Episode 2 of my live case study series, I show exactly how I built an ad account from scratch:
→ campaign structure and media plan setup
→ ABO vs. CBO — what I chose and why
→ targeting, exclusions, and budget logic
→ ad group and placement structure
→ landing page + format testing framework
→ how we use Klaviyo and Shopify data to build segments that actually convert
I recorded everything inside the actual ad account: decisions, logic, setup, structure. Real execution.
We’re on track to turn a TikTok brand with no Meta wins into a $100K success story, and show you every step along the way.
Want to see how I built it? Watch now on YouTube.
PS: We’re testing sending the weekly newsletter on Monday instead of Friday.
We’d love your input: when do you prefer to receive it? Just reply to this email.
Til next time,
Uri & The Growth Collective Team