We recently ran a webinar with Meta looking at how partnership ads are performing relative to standard paid social.
As more brands invest in creator-led media, much of the conversation still centres on the creative itself. The content matters, but the real opportunity lies in something deeper.
Partnership ads are not simply another paid social format. They change the way the algorithm interprets signals, identifies audiences, and ultimately delivers performance.
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Partnership ads change how the algorithm works
Most paid social campaigns rely entirely on a brand’s own data to guide delivery. Partnership ads work differently because the platform can use both the brand’s signals and the creator’s audience signals when deciding who is most likely to respond. That creates a fundamentally different delivery mechanic. Instead of only reaching people the algorithm already associates with your business, partnership ads can introduce your brand to audiences that would otherwise remain outside your usual targeting pool.
Meta studies show that 66% of users reached by partnership ads were not reached by standard campaigns, even when budgets, targeting and optimisation remained the same. That is not simply a creative improvement. It is a change in how the platform finds people.
One of the biggest mistakes brands make is judging partnership ads only through platform reporting. Ads Manager can show attribution, but it does not always show true incrementality. When we looked at performance through marketing mix modelling, the difference became much clearer.
Across 94 studies, partnership ads delivered:
- 30% more incremental conversions per pound spent
- 2.6x more incremental orders per impression
- A higher share of new customer acquisition
Even after creator fees and production costs were included, partnership ads consistently outperformed standard paid social activity. The strongest value often sits in the conversions that would not have happened without them.
One of the most interesting findings was that partnership ads do not only improve results inside Meta. They also influence what happens across the wider customer journey. People do not move through channels in isolation. They may discover a brand through a creator, then later return through search, direct traffic or another channel.
That wider influence can be difficult to see inside platform dashboards, but the modelling showed that partnership ads generated 125% stronger search synergy than standard paid social campaigns. That means stronger paid social performance can also lead to stronger performance elsewhere. For brands focused on total business growth, that is where partnership ads become especially valuable.
Many brands still think about partnership ads as a creative variation. The creator matters, but not simply because they produce good content. The real value comes from the audience signals they unlock and the way those signals help the algorithm work harder for your brand. Smaller creators can often outperform larger ones because highly engaged audiences can be more valuable than scale alone.
The brands seeing the strongest results are not just creating better ads. They are feeding better signals into the platform. And in an increasingly competitive paid social landscape, that can make all the difference.
If you want to see more on the data, you can download our white paper here.
It’s structured to be applied, particularly around how to balance incrementality, reach expansion, and cross-channel impact in live campaigns.
