Welcome back to a new issue of Nice Ads. Today we're going to be talking about

You might not want to think about it, but Q4 is fast approaching. If you still haven't got your ad creative sorted, then now might be the time. Feel free to book a call here to apply to work with my agency click here.

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Podcast ads are back. This is the most recent winner that we have made for fragrance brand Shea and Blue. I'm always a little apprehensive about testing podcast ads because they take quite a long time to produce and they don't always work. However, I do always think it's worth testing at some point in your ad account. This was the first time that we tested these for this brand, and I'm so glad that we did.

But let's talk about why this is actually performed, because it's probably for a reason that you might not recognise straight away. The first one wasn't even done on purpose, and that was: in the hook of the video, we talk about rubbing your perfume. People really didn't like that because apparently you're meant to pat it. This caused a lot of controversy, and a lot of people headed to the comments to let out their rage. This means that Meta is getting signals that this ad is engaging, so it further pushes it to more customers.

The next reason is the English accent. This ad ran in the UK and in the US but has primarily been a big hit in the US. I think part of the reason for that is the very strong northern accent that the main actress has. We already know that Americans love an English accent, but I think they love even more regional accents they might not hear that often. One of our creative strategists mentioned that this could be because of the whole Love Island craze that's happening in the US at the minute. Also, Americans are absolutely in love with the way different accents sound in the UK.

I think it converted well because the perfume is naturally dropped into conversation. It doesn't feel like a forced podcast, and I think so much of that comes down to the chemistry between the actors, but also a really great script. This entire thing was scripted, but we told the actors that they could ad-lib around it wherever they felt comfortable, and that's exactly what they did.

If you are looking to try podcast ads, then it might be worth applying to work with us here.

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How can you make boring UGC more watchable and, more importantly, more scroll-stopping? It's something we ask ourselves at Fraggell fairly regularly. When I saw this ad from Chomps, I think it perfectly encapsulates something everyone should be trying: simply picking an unusual angle.

Think about every UGC that you watch on your feed. I'm guessing 90% of them are filmed in a kitchen, living room, or car. How many of them have you seen from this angle, with the camera basically on the floor and the sky moving in the background? This will stop the scroll, even if it's for a split second while someone processes what's going on. It also weirdly feels even more organic because, like, why would a brand post this? It doesn't look great, and as we all know, the uglier the ad, the better it usually performs.

I think the best advice that I can give people to take away from this ad is: don't be afraid to try something that no one has done before, and get creative and trashy with your camera angles. There's no need for something to always look great. You need to get yourself out of the brand image brain and into the performance brain. Your goal isn't to make TV ads. Your goal is to make social ads that convert.

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Talking about ugly ads, let's talk about the low-effort static. I always say static ads are a great opportunity for brands to test how low effort they can go while still making sales. I think this is a great example. Dad Gang is well known for making most of their ads on Canva and taking the images on their phone. Still being one of the fastest-growing hat brands in the US, I think this static is a great example of that because it's been duplicated and reused multiple times, so it's clearly performing for them.

All it is is an image of the cat that's eye-catching due to the reflection and then a comment from an Instagram post. It's ludicrously easy: anyone can do this, and it will take you 5 minutes inside Canva.

Statics are so easy to test because they're so fast to create that you have no excuse not to be launching 5 to 10 of these every single week if you're just starting out in DTC. and that isn't even mentioning how you can use AI to pump out a tonne of these with a well-trained Claude or ChatGPT.

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That's all for this week's Nice Ads. Appreciate you taking the time to read this one. Be sure to forward it to a friend or a colleague if you enjoyed it and think they might too. I'll see you in the next one

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