7 tips to help your beverage marketing creative stand out

3 people conversing with cups on their tables

From sparkling water to sodas to energy drinks and beyond—customers have a lot of beverage options to choose from. Beverage brands can use advertising to help showcase their products to customers. And opportunities are increasing for food and beverage marketing. A recent Statista report showed that online revenue for the food and beverage industry in the US had a 32% increase to $34.2 billion from 2020 to 2021.1 To help brands improve their ad creative across their website and beyond, we’ve compiled seven tips for creating engaging ads for drinks and beverage products, from the ad’s image to colors to word count.

Based on insights from Amazon DSP static ads and design elements from 26,000 creative images run in the US, Amazon Ads developed tips to help marketers craft ads to reach buyers of beverages and drink products. To check which product categories these recommendations are relevant for, refer to the list of audience segments at the bottom of the page. The key performance indicators (KPIs) for these tips include average click-through rate (CTR), detail page view rate (DPVR), purchase rate (PR), and return on ad spend (ROAS), which are important metrics for measuring how ad creative resonates with audiences. Here’s how using insights to select imagery and text could help brands create more impactful ads for brand marketing campaigns featuring beverages.

1.
Showcase the product

Every KPI helps prove this point: Showing the product rather than a human can help show customers what’s relevant to them. Creatives without a human increased the average CTR by 15%, DPVR by 19%, and PR and ROAS by 21%2. So instead of drawing attention with a photo of a person, try putting your product front and center in ad creative.

The optimal word count for ad creative depends on the KPI you want to improve. If your brand’s priority is PR and ROAS, you might consider a higher word count. When looking at average PR and ROAS, creatives with a high word count of 18 words or more were 15% higher than those with the low word count of less than 10 words3. Regardless, ad creative should always have text that is at least the minimum font size from Ad Policy guidelines. And if the text isn’t relevant, it’s unlikely it will help audiences, so remember to put thought into your marketing messaging.

2.
The word count matters

3.
Choose your words wisely

Using the word “new” in the ad’s text saw an increase in average CTR by 25% and DPVR by 16%4. So, if your brand is promoting “new coffee flavors,” for example, say so in the ad. Sharing relevant product features with customers can assist them with finding the goods that suit their wants and needs. Additionally, having the word “taste” in ad creative may not be the best idea. Creatives without the word "taste" had an increased average DPVR by 73% and PR and ROAS by 68%.5

When using a call-to-action (CTA), such as “Shop now,” consider keeping the height low when possible. It’s more beneficial to customers to see the products and information itself, rather than a gigantic CTA that overwhelms the ad. Try to use a CTA that is no more than 3 to 10% of the ad height in rectangle and tall formats. In ads with a CTA that was less than 3% of the ad height, the average CTR was 12% higher than for ads with a high CTA height.6

4.
Be careful with the CTA sizing

5.
Consider using discount messaging

To help draw in customers, discount messaging such as “Sale” or “Save up to XX%” can improve ad performance. Creatives with a discount message saw an increase in average DPVR by 37% and PR/ROAS by 31%.7 Just remember that static ads can only have discount messaging if no dynamic ad format is available for the given ad size, or if it links to an external destination or an Amazon destination with multiple ASINs (including Stores).

In ad creative for beverage products, more can be better. Creatives with a high number of objects (nine or more) had a 16% higher average DPVR and 12% higher average PR and ROAS than those with a low number of objects (five or fewer).8 As long as the multiple objects can be clearly identified based on their color or outlines, they can help improve the look of the ad. For example, show several cups of tea alongside a teabag and teapot, rather than a solo glass. Different objects can also go in the ad image’s background or logo⁠—that counts too.

6.
More objects can help

7.
Colors and lighting are important

Keeping the lighting in ad creatives lighter rather than darker can lead to a better performance. Ads with both a bright background and foreground increased average DPVR by 61%, compared to ads with a dark background and foreground (the foreground includes both images and text). The brightly lit ads also had an average PR 32% above the darker ads.9

See these tips in action

Here are what display ads examples could look like after following Amazon Ads’ tips. There’s more information and tips on display advertising available, too.

Beverages ad example showcasing how recommendations for CTR might be implemented

Tips in action for CTR driven campaigns

Beverages ad example showcasing how recommendations for DPVR might be implemented

Tips in action for DPVR driven campaigns

Beverages ad example showcasing how recommendations for PR/ROAS might be implemented

Tips in action for PR/ROAS driven campaigns

How Amazon Ads sourced these insights

The category insights used here were generated by capturing design elements from 26,000 creative image files from within the US from 2018 to 2020. Creatives were separated into verticals according to their audiences. Statistical and machine learning models then looked at the impact of design elements on awareness, consideration, and purchase KPIs. Creative performance was adjusted to remove the contribution of confounding effects such as placement and serving frequency.

Audience segments included in the analysis: soft drinks, juices, hot beverages, bottled water, sparkling/flavored/coconut water, iced tea, energy/sports drinks, drink mixes.

Learn more

Want to find out more about optimizing your advertising creative? Explore other ways to improve ad campaigns for a variety of other types of categories, including computer products and supermarket creative.

1 Statista Research Department, Jan 2022, US
2-9 Amazon internal, July 2021, US