The challenge
In early 2025, Meta’s enforcement of the Special Ads Category for financial services removed detailed targeting options, disrupting Ria Money Transfer’s acquisition strategy and raising concerns around Meta’s efficiency and CPA. As a top performing channel, Ria worried this shift would significantly hurt performance and require new partners to replace this performance.
The goal
The goal was to maintain Meta historical campaign performance given the new targeting restrictions.
The strategy
We anticipated that removing detailed targeting would lead to higher CPAs and lower efficiency. However, we hypothesized that leaning into broad targeting—paired with strong, relevant creative—would allow Meta’s algorithm to find the right users and maintain performance. We believed creative would become the primary lever to improve new customer acquisition.
We adapted quickly, transforming limitations into performance gains. We first restructured all campaigns to comply with the Special Ads Category, launching these new campaigns with interest-based targeting (e.g., mobile banking). Interest audiences didn’t perform, so we quickly shifted to broad targeting. The audience targeting shift, coupled with better creative, resulted in performance improvements.
The results
In only 5 months, we were able to achieve:
- CPA decreased 23% in the United States
- Reach nearly doubled
Key insights
- Broad targeting worked: Meta’s algorithm outperformed manual targeting when paired with strong creative.
- Creative became the filter: Messaging that reflected real customer needs helped attract high-intent users.
- Optimization over time: Letting campaigns learn led to lower CPAs and more efficient new customer acquisition.
What’s next
Ria is scaling broad targeting on Meta, expanding to new platforms like TikTok, and investing in a robust creative testing loop to keep performance growing.
Client Background
Ria Money Transfer, a business segment of Euronet (NASDAQ: EEFT), delivers innovative financial services, including fast, secure, and affordable global money transfers. With the world’s largest cross-border real-time money movement network, Ria moves money where it matters. Bridging the gap between digital and physical spaces, Ria’s omnichannel products and services provide unprecedented consumer choice, including real-time payments, mobile wallets, currency exchange, home delivery, and cardless ATM payouts.
