As automation continues to simplify various aspects of Meta advertising, such as bidding, placements, and targeting, creative has become the most crucial lever for performance. As we look ahead to FY26, it’s clear that scaling success will rely heavily on a refined media strategy and a much deeper understanding of how to connect with your audience through the right creative.
Here are 4 key ways to scale your Meta ads in FY26.
4 Key Strategies for Scaling Meta Ads
1. Prioritise Reach and Advantage+ Campaigns
Meta’s core recommendation for growth is simple but powerful: prioritise reaching new audiences, not just retargeting the ones already familiar with your brand. Too often, brands over-invest in lower-funnel audiences and miss the opportunity to expand their customer base.
To counter this, Meta suggests allocating at least 10% of your total media budget to Reach campaigns. These campaigns are designed to expose your brand to new people, helping to avoid audience saturation and maintain consistent growth. Advantage+ Conversion Campaigns should also be a key part of your media mix. These campaigns use Meta’s AI to automate targeting and delivery, unlocking scale while requiring minimal manual setup.
By combining Reach with Advantage+ campaigns, you create a full-funnel approach that not only captures existing demand but actively builds future intent.
2. Understand Potential Intent vs Existing Intent
Another important mindset shift is understanding that potential intent is far greater than existing intent. In other words, the audiences you haven’t reached yet hold the largest opportunity for growth. Existing customers and website visitors are easier to convert, but they’re also limited in scale. If you’re not continually feeding the funnel with new prospects, long-term growth will stall.
Leaning into upper-funnel activity with Reach campaigns ensures your pipeline is constantly being replenished. To support this, request a Reach Saturation Analysis from your Meta rep. This tool helps you identify untapped audience segments and reveals how much incremental reach is available to you.
3. Crafting Persona-Led Creatives
One of the most impactful parts of Meta’s FY26 recommendations is the focus on psychology-led creative strategy. Instead of building assets based solely on aesthetics or demographics, Meta encourages brands to create content aligned with users’ psychological profiles.
Meta draws on the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) as a framework to better understand what motivates different audience types. The MBTI categorises people based on four key areas, leading to 16 personality types. In Australia, approximately 45% of users fall under the ‘Diplomats’ category, which includes people who are Intuitive and Feeling.
- Intuitive users are driven by imagination and possibilities. They resonate with aspirational content that helps them envision a better version of themselves. For example, campaigns that say, “Chase your next PB in tights designed to move with you” speak directly to this mindset.
- Feeling types are emotionally driven. They connect with storytelling, relationships, and personal values. Creative that focuses on shared experiences, empathy, or community (such as Converse’s “Love, Chuck” campaign) can foster strong emotional resonance.
Meta suggests integrating multiple personality types into your creative approach to broaden appeal, for example:
- Sensing: Detail-oriented; highlight product USPs, materials, and functionality.
- Thinking: Logic-driven; use data, product comparisons, and benefit-focused messaging (e.g., “100% cotton sweater, made to last”).
- Judging: Prefers structure; responds well to sale ads with clear information (e.g., “Sign up now for 10% off,” or “40% off ends Sunday”).
To maximise performance, include 2–3 of these creative styles within each campaign. This ensures you’re resonating with multiple mindsets and increasing your chances of conversion across audience segments.
4. Measurement & Pacing: Prepare for Peak Moments
When planning for moments like EOFY and Cyber weekend, it’s crucial to pace your spend strategically by gradually ramping up spend in the lead-up to peak sales events. This prevents last-minute bidding spikes and helps maintain efficiency.
Before any seasonal push, make sure you’re building high-intent audiences through Reach and mid-funnel activity. This way, when conversion-focused campaigns go live, they’re targeting an audience already primed to purchase.
Moving Forward: Action Plan for FY26
To scale Meta ads successfully in FY26, consider this checklist:
- Revisit your creative mix: Are you appealing to different psychological profiles?
- Allocate budget to Reach campaigns: Aim for a minimum of 10% to drive growth.
- Leverage AI-driven Advantage+ Campaigns: Let the algorithm optimise at scale.
- Run a Reach Saturation Analysis: Uncover untapped audiences.
- Strategically pace spend around major sales events to improve cost-efficiency.
As Meta continues to lean into automation, your competitive advantage lies in how well you understand and engage your audience. Success in FY26 won’t be defined by budget size, but by strategic thinking and creative that truly connects.
Partner with Pattern
Pattern is a leading global brand accelerator, so if you require more support on your FY26 Meta Strategy or want to know how we can transform your brand’s social media, contact our team now.
