Facebook and Instagram ads, tested properly
Ads are the accelerator, not the engine. They go on last, once the profile is right, the site converts and the follow-up catches everything. Then $50 a day starts being worth spending.
Why ads go last
If you are invisible on the map, your site does not convert and nobody answers enquiries for four hours, ads just make you lose money faster. That is not a slogan, it is arithmetic. I have watched shops spend three thousand pounds proving it.
So the ads switch on in week three, after the rest is standing up.
Why tint is a good fit for Meta
Tint is a visual, impulsive, relatively cheap purchase that people want mostly in warm months. That is close to ideal for Facebook and Instagram. A before-and-after of a car going from glary factory glass to a clean dark finish stops a thumb better than almost any other trade's work.
It is also a purchase people did not know they wanted that morning. Search catches people already looking. Meta creates the want. You need both, which is why this sits alongside the Google work rather than replacing it.
Creative, weekly
Every week, new angles. Before and afters, a peel-and-apply time-lapse, heat rejection demonstrated with a lamp and a thermometer, a customer walkaround, a price-anchored offer, a “here is what cheap tint looks like after two summers” comparison. Some will flop. That is the point of testing several.
Kill losers fast
The single biggest difference between ads that work and ads that do not is not creative genius, it is discipline. Most shops run one ad for six months because turning it off feels like admitting defeat. I turn things off constantly, and shift the budget to whatever is actually producing booked jobs.
Targeting that is not clever for its own sake
A tight radius around your shop, sensible age range, and then let Meta's algorithm do what it is genuinely good at. Over-engineered interest stacking mostly starves the algorithm of data and costs you money.
Seasonality handled on purpose
Tint has a summer. Rather than pretending it does not, we lean into spring and summer hard and shift the winter angles towards ceramic coating, PPF, interior work and gift cards, depending on what you actually sell.
Three numbers that matter. Not impressions, not reach, not engagement rate.
Your money stays yours
The ad account is in your name. Your card is on it. Meta bills you directly, I never take a percentage of spend, and you can log in at any time and see every dollar. I would rather not have a model that rewards me for spending more of your money.
The first fortnight will look bad and that is normal. Meta needs data before it knows who your buyers are. Cost per lead starts high and settles. Judging ads after four days is how people quit right before it starts working.
$50 a day
Paid straight to Meta on your own card. About $1,500 a month, and never marked up.
Read the free playbookThe other three pieces
All four for $2,000/month plus $50/day ad spend. Full breakdown.
Meta Ads, straight answers
Why not Google Ads?
Because for most tint shops the Google Business Profile captures search intent for free, and paying for those same clicks is expensive. Meta reaches the much larger group of people who have not started looking yet. If a market genuinely justifies search ads, I will tell you, but it is not in the standard package.
What if I do not have good photos or video?
Then that is the first job, and it is the one thing I cannot do from Illinois. Your phone is enough. Thirty seconds of a peel and apply, a walkaround of a finished car, a genuine customer reaction. Real footage beats anything polished and stock.
Can I see the ads before they run?
Yes. You approve creative, and if something does not represent your shop properly it does not go out.
How soon do leads come in?
Usually the first week or two, though the early ones are the most expensive while the algorithm learns. The honest answer is that the first month is largely buying information.