INDUSTRY
High-end Beauty
PUBLISHED ON
16th August 2025
WRITTEN BY
Rio Dalton
Background
Brand Background
This client is a local beauty distributor focused on bringing in curated Korean skincare and cosmetic products to the Indonesian market. Their operations are primarily marketplace-driven, relying on influencer marketing and Shopee campaigns.
Before working with Triple Orca, the brand had yet to develop their creative strategy, nor ever run a sales campaign on Meta. Their prior experience was limited to boosted posts with little to no testing strategy, creative iteration, and performance tracking.
While the product had strong potential in the influencer marketing space, they had yet to discover a message-market fit that could scale via paid media. There was no clear creative angle, emotional positioning, or high-performing product page to support consistent conversions.
Product Background
The product is a Korean-made BB cream positioned as a lightweight alternative to traditional foundation, designed for users who prefer a natural, breathable, no-makeup look.
For additional context, during the onboarding meeting, the client didn't mention this positioning explicitly, only after we went through their Shopee reviews, user reviews on TikTok & Korean social media posts, we uncovered this fact.
As we did the ingredients research through reading research papers, we discovered this product is also suitable for those who suffer from acne breakouts due to foundation usage.
Priced at a premium compared to local brands (most competitors range from Rp75.000–Rp150.000), the product requires more than just functional selling, it needs to justify its value emotionally, through the end result and aspirational appeal tied to Korean beauty trends.
Pre-launch
Pre-launch Challenge
The client had no prior experience running Meta Ads beyond basic boosted posts, meaning there was no performance data, pixel history, or ad funnel structure in place.
The product lacked a validated marketing angle. There were no positioning strategy or content themes that had proven to convert cold audiences.
Compared to similar local options, the product was priced significantly higher, requiring strong justification through messaging, creative, and offer framing.
On Shopee, the client was not the cheapest seller for this exact product, adding extra pressure to differentiate via storytelling and perceived value instead of price.
Pre-launch Strategy
Through our research process (Shopee reviews, TikTok content, Korean social media accounts, and ingredient research), we identified multiple potential marketing angles that had not been explored by the client.
Natural, no makeup look
Foundation replacement that doesn't cause any breakout
Light & breathable makeup base for a hot climate
Makeup product that is used by K-idols
The client allocated a monthly budget of IDR 10 million, but given the risk of launching a completely new ad account with no creative validation, we adopted a low-risk, high-learning approach in the first phase.
Instead of launching at the full IDR 330.000/day, we started at IDR 100.000/day and scaled based on 3-day performance windows.
Before launching any ads, we began by optimizing their Shopee product page to increase baseline conversion rate and AOV.
This included:
Upgrading product imagery
Rewriting product description copy with emotional triggers & clear value stack
Adding bundling offer
While this wasn’t part of our scope of work, we optimized the Shopee product page to ensure the best chance of conversion before ad traffic was driven.
For the first creative production batch, we provide the client with:
4 video scripts per angle
3 static ad briefs per angle
Here are some of the baseline metrics we're after:
Cost per purchase → IDR 84.500
B/E ROAS → 2.83
Week 1
Summary
Purchase → 2
Spending → IDR 352.000
Cost per purchase → 176.000
Strategy
In Week 1, we tested two high-potential messaging angles:
Natural Makeup Look Tutorial → for solution-aware audiences seeking a dewy, effortless glow
Light & breathable makeup base for a hot climate → for problem-aware audiences seeking a lighter makeup
Since Shopee CPAS ads don’t support DCT or flexible creative delivery, each angle (each angle is contained within an ad set) was paired with:
1 UGC talking-head testimonial
1 visual product demo
To maximize delivery efficiency and leverage Meta’s machine learning, we used Campaign Budget Optimization (CBO) & broad targeting (even without gender & age setting), allowing the algorithm to auto-allocate budget based on early signals.
Dashboard Preview
Challenge & Learnings
Meta Ads Delivery Issue During day one, two, six, and seven, our ad account experienced an ad delivery issue unrelated to billing or setup, which temporarily halted ad spend. This disrupted the learning phase and pacing across both ad sets.
Performance Gap The Natural Makeup angle (#124) clearly outperformed the Foundation Replacement message across all key metrics, indicating stronger alignment with audience desire and emotional appeal.
Creative Format Insight On both ad sets, the visual product demo format significantly outperformed the UGC talking-head format, especially in the outbound CTR metric. This validated our hypothesis that product-first, benefit-visual content resonates better during early-stage prospecting
Week 2 (New Campaign)
Summary
Purchase → 32
Spending → 1.841.000
Cost per purchase → 57.000
Strategy
Due to unresolved delivery issues in the Week 1 campaign, we decided to start fresh by creating a new campaign from scratch, as we couldn’t pinpoint the root cause within the original setup.
Since Week 1 creatives showed positive early signals (slightly positive ROAS), we decided to:
Significantly increase the budget to make up for the underdelivery in week 1
Ramp up creative testing volume to accelerate learning and surface stronger angles
We introduced three new marketing angles early in the week:
#129 – Makeup product used by popular Korean idols (product demo format)
#130 – Makeup base for acne-prone skin (static format)
#122 – Makeup base for acne-prone skin (video format)
After observing performance over the next 3 days, we followed up with:
#131 – Same core message as winning ad #129, but with a different creator to confirm whether this can be our winning angle
Dashboard Preview
Challenge & Learnings
The new angle “used by Korean idols” (creatives #129) delivered outstanding performance, outpacing all previous messaging angles. This angle resonated strongly due to aspirational appeal, authority hijacking, and cultural trend alignment.
If we didn't use CBO (and used ABO instead), there is no way we could get a winning angle this early due to the spending constraint of each ad set.
Week 3
Summary
Purchase → 74
Spending → 3.995.000
Cost per purchase → 54.000
Strategy
We held off from introducing any new ad sets this week to determine whether week 2’s performance was a fluke or if #129 and #131 had genuine scale potential.
The focus was on scaling the budget aggressively while implementing strict daily monitoring to validate performance growth and avoid ad fatigue.
Dashboard Preview
Challenge & Learnings
Our hypothesis is confirmed in this week:
Creative #129 scaled exceptionally, maintaining positive CPR & ROAS while the spending is significantly raised throughout the week.
Creative #131 began receiving spend and conversions, showing a promising lift and suggesting that this angle can be considered our current winner, and #129 isn't just winning due to an undetermined factor.
Interestingly, our problem-driven static ad (#130), which didn't get any spend in week 2, became the second-best performer of the week.
This reinforced a key learning:
Not all ads that start slowly are losers. As long as a creative doesn’t drag down overall performance, there’s no reason to kill it prematurely.
Week 4
Summary
Purchase → 109
Spending → 6.989.000
Cost per purchase → 64.000
Strategy
Following the continued strong performance of our winning creatives, we chose to aggressively scale the budget, ensuring we didn’t leave any revenue potential untapped during this profitable window.
With a firm grasp on our ICP audience and messaging that converts, we began exploring horizontal scaling. Instead of expanding via broad interest targeting, we engineered new creatives tailored for adjacent audience segments, including:
#132 → Product recommendation from a makeup artist, designed to appeal to makeup artists
#134 → Acne-prone friendly positioning (conviction from our previous winner, #130), but targeting a different age bracket by adjusting creator persona and delivery style
Dashboard Preview
Challenge & Learnings
As seen in the attached screenshot, both #132 and #134 flopped, becoming our first clearly failed creative tests of the campaign.
This reinforced the importance of having a clear kill strategy for creative testing:
If a creative fails to get purchases after spending 3–4x our target cost per purchase, we kill it immediately.
If a creative only gets a single purchase (after spending 3-4x target cost per purchase) but shows high outbound CTR relative to winners, we allow it to run for another 1–2 days. If no performance improvement is seen, we will also kill it.
Performance Recap
Purchase
= 2 (Old Campaign) + 215 (New Campaign)
= 217
Spending
= 352.000 (Old Campaign) + 12.827.000 (New Campaign)
= 13.209.000
Revenue Generated
= 1.000.000 (Old Campaign) + 79.239.000 (New Campaign)
= 80.239.000
Cost per purchase
= 13.209.000 / 217
= 60.000
Old Campaign
New Campaign
Summary & Insight
Positive Performance is the Result of Deep Research
Instead of guessing, we uncovered what the audience truly wants through Shopee reviews, TikTok user content, Korean sources, and ingredient studies. From there, we built message angles that matched mass desires, not just product features.
Test Aggressively, Yet Mindfully
Instead of dumping dozens of random creatives, we isolated variables by format, message, and creator. That gave us clarity on what worked, so we could scale intentionally and replicate winning patterns.
Never Try to Outsmart Meta
Follow the algorithm, and the cash will follow:
Use CBO
Avoid interest targeting at all costs for a mass appealing product
Focus on the biggest leverage → creative
