Dynamic Product Ads for Instagram allow advertisers to use their product catalog to power and produce video, static image, and carousel ad creative at an incredible scale.
With over 500 million daily active users, Instagram is undoubtedly one of the most popular social media platforms out there. While over two and a half billion people use Instagram to share photos, upload dance videos, and stay up to date on the latest trends, it's also become a powerful shopping channel for e-commerce companies.
In this article, we'll teach you how to use Instagram's Dynamic Product Ads (DPAs) to place your products in front of the eyes of billions of potential customers in order to drive more engagement and conversions for your brand online.
Dynamic Product Ads (DPAs) are personalized ads on platforms like Meta (Facebook & Instagram) that display products to users based on their browsing behavior, interests, or past interactions, using data from a product feed.
DPAs are so effective at driving sales for retailers and DTC brands that 25% of all money spent on paid social is put towards dynamic product ads.
“DPA is bigger than anyone thinks. People are usually shocked to hear that 1/4th of all digital ads in paid social were dynamic product ads. Most major retailers and most major DTC brands are relying on DPAs as a workhorse in their ad account” - Dan Pantello, CEO of Marpipe
When it comes to using dynamic product ads on Instagram, you have a few different formats to choose from, including single, video, carousel, and collection ads. Each format has its own strengths, so let's take a closer look at the main options:
The most straightforward format of the four that Instagram offers is single-image ads. It's pretty self-explanatory; they use a single image of your product in its finest form and include some ad text with a strong call to action that pushes the potential customers onto your landing page; it's that simple.
In terms of engaging, it doesn't get better than video ads; they give you the opportunity to showcase your product in action. Instagram currently allows advertisers to display videos of lengths up to 60 seconds at a time, and they'll show up randomly as the person scrolls through their feed. One big benefit of video ads is that they tend to capture users' attention more easily, whereas with a text-heavy ad, the person needs to read it before they know what you're offering.
If you're thinking of displaying a few products in one ad, you should check out Instagram's carousel ads. They're hugely effective because they give you the power to advertise 10 products at once, which people can swipe through as they wish.
The final ad type that Instagram allows companies to use is Collection ads; they feature a large cover image or video, followed by smaller images underneath. It's like showing off a mini product catalog that users can flip through, previewing several items before they decide to click on to your store.
Here are four key strategies to get the most out of your Instagram DPAs:
No one likes clicking on an ad just to be surprised by a price that has changed once they've reached the checkout point. It's important to display your prices clearly from the get-go when using Instagram's DPA ads so you can reach the customers who have the budget to buy your products.
To give yourself an even better chance of getting people to click your ads and driving conversions, consider offering special offers to make your ad even more enticing.
Don't sell yourself short by just sticking to just one ad format. Try to mix it up a little by using a variety of single images, videos, carousels, and collections to see which gets you the best results. The more variety, the more chances you have of attracting new buyers as a marketer.
Dynamic product ads are only as good as the product feed that powers them. The richer the product feed, the more variations of ads that can be created and optimized. Imagine your product feed as a spreadsheet where each column is a piece of information that platforms like Meta can test and optimize against. Get creative with these columns, and you’ll truly unlock the power of DPAs.
Here are some examples of outside of the box thinking when it comes to data types to include in your product feed:
Most people think of traditional product on white background imagery when they think of dynamic product ads. However, there are many powerful creative solutions that can be unlocked with DPAs.
First, keep in mind that your product feed can include a variety of images, video links, 360º files, and more.
Next, unlock Jedi-level advertising skills by realizing that the product feed is a way to programmatically create new advertising assets with a single rich data file. Grasp this concept and tap into the power of dynamic creative optimization as part of your Instagram paid advertising strategy.
Marpipe allows you to enrich your existing product feed with new creative elements, including conversion tested templates, backgrounds, icons, shoutouts, imagery, and more. Each element is individually represented as additional columns in your product feed and then dynamically layered together in Instagram to create an infinite amount of possibilities in the form of static ad creative.
We’ve gone over so much already, but let’s just recap some of the key benefits of using DPAs as a key part of your Instagram ad strategy.
One in three people have an Instagram account, so when you use their dynamic product ads, you're also getting access to these people. But even better, you're automatically matching your ads with those who Instagram knows have expressed interest in your types of products in the past.
Instagram's DPA ads are programmatically generated, saving you hours of production time and effort. Your responsibility is to provide Instagram with an accurate and robust data feed belonging to your products, and let the platform take care of the rest.
Instagram has made DPAs a core feature of their platform, offering prime ad placements in some of the most valuable real estate within the app. With a well optimized product feed and a creative automation tool like Marpipe, you maximize your ability to convert eyeballs into conversions.
Take your dynamic product ads for Instagram to the next level with the help of Marpipe. We make designing DPA ads easier with generative AI tools, templates, and much more.
Simply upload your existing product feed and create your first enriched catalog ad for free today.
