If you’re the marketer for a small to medium size business with a tight budget, then you probably don’t have thousands to spend on ad campaigns ideas, generated by a team of microdosing agency hipsters. That’s where ad spying tools come in handy. You can use ad insights tools like BigSpy to generate ideas from businesses with much bigger budgets that you, and you can see what’s working for your competitors across various ad networks.
With ad inspiration in mind, let’s take a look at an excellent tool we came across recently, called BigSpy. In this review I’ll examine its features, usability, and value for marketers in 2024.
As part of this review, I’ll be including ad creative results from various businesses across different industries, but BigSpy can be used to research just about any advertiser who’s publishing ads to Meta (Facebook & Instagram), YouTube, TikTok, Pinterest, X (Twitter) and more.
Key Takeaways
BigSpy is a powerful ad spy tool that helps marketers analyze and gain insights from competitor ads across multiple platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Key features include an intuitive user interface, advanced search and filtering options, detailed ad insights, archived ads, and robust competitor analysis capabilities.
BigSpy offers various pricing plans including a free option, making it accessible for different users while providing significant benefits like real-time ad tracking, creative inspiration, and cost-effective advertising strategies.
Introducing BigSpy
Let’s start with the basics. BigSpy is a web-based ad spy tool that assists businesses and individuals in discovering competitors’ advertising strategies, ad creative, trends, and ultimately helps provide inspiration for creating your own campaigns.
BigSpy keeps a massive database of ad assets, with over 100M ad creatives from advertisers who publish ads across the following networks:
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram
AdMob
Yahoo
Pinterest
While BigSpy’s interface may seem a little daunting at first, it’s relatively user-friendly once you start doing a few searches.
What is BigSpy?
By providing a unified platform for viewing and analyzing ads, BigSpy helps advertisers understand what works and what doesn’t in the competitive landscape.
One of my favourite features is the Sort by Popularity feature which allows you to sort by the most popular ads virst. Here’s an example of ads being run by Ikea in Australia.
As mentioned, with over 100M ads in their ad library, BigSpy allows users to leverage a wide spectrum of data for competitive intelligence, enabling real-time viewing of competitors’ ads and their performance as part of their marketing arsenal.
How BigSpy Works
Getting started with BigSpy is straightforward. Simply visit the website, click on the ‘Search Now’ option, and choose to sign up or use Google for registration. Once registered, users can dive into the main functionalities of BigSpy, which include collecting and analyzing over 500,000 ads daily from platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Such an extensive compilation guarantees access to the most recent and pertinent ads in the industry.
BigSpy’s powerful search functionality allows users to search for ads by product or advertiser name, offering a highly targeted approach to ad research. With various filters available, including platform, country, ad format, and more, users can refine their searches to find exactly what they need. The amalgamation of comprehensive data collection and sophisticated search capabilities render BigSpy a formidable tool for marketers aiming to boost their advertising strategies.
Key Features of BigSpy
BigSpy has a variety of noteworthy features engineered to render ad analysis. Some of its key features include:
Intuitive user interface
Advanced search and filtering options
Detailed ad insights
Archived ads
Competitor analysis capabilities
These tools make BigSpy indispensable for modern marketers.
A closer examination of these features will elucidate their potential benefits to your advertising strategy.
User Interface
One of BigSpy’s distinguishing features is its user-friendly interface. Designed to be accessible for both new and experienced marketers, the interface provides a dashboard view where users can monitor their saved ads and analytics in one place.
This design guarantees effortless access to essential ad information.
Ad Search and Filters
BigSpy’s search filters and ad search options provide incredibly detailed control, enabling users to fine-tune their searches based on criteria such as:
Platform
Country
Ad format
Creative type
Target audience
Engagement metrics
With access to a comprehensive database of ads from around the world, marketers can perform advanced searches that cater to their specific needs. BigSpy has you covered.
Moreover, BigSpy supports filtering by e-commerce platform type and offers filters for site type, marketing objective, and date range. These sophisticated filtering methods and sorting options facilitate users in locating the most pertinent and high-performing ads, aiding them in optimizing their advertising strategies.
Detailed Ad Insights
Among BigSpy’s most invaluable features are its detailed ad insights. Users can access metrics such as:
Impressions
Popularity
Duration
Networks
- Operating Systems
- Country/Region
- Language
- Size
- Type
These insights provide a comprehensive view of ad performance and help marketers understand what resonates with their audience. With this information, they can make informed decisions about their ad strategies.
BigSpy offers the following features:
Demographic and geographic data to understand your audience better
Information on campaign duration, engagement data, and targeting details to gain deeper insights into ad performance
The ability to optimize campaigns accordingly
Archived Ads
The archived ads feature in BigSpy offers the following benefits:
Access to a repository of previous ads
Categorization of ads based on different metrics like engagement and duration
Analysis of historical ad performance
Inspiration from successful campaigns
This feature is particularly useful for marketers looking to improve their advertising campaigns, ensuring value for money and drawing inspiration from successful ones.
By viewing competitive ads sorted by effectiveness and engagement, users can identify winning strategies and apply them to their own campaigns.
Competitor Analysis
Competitor analysis forms a vital element of any marketing strategy, an area where BigSpy truly shines. Users can create a list of competitors to monitor their latest ad campaigns and creative strategies. By analyzing ad creatives, copywriting, targeting, and landing pages, marketers can gain valuable insights into what works and what doesn’t in their industry.
BigSpy also provides detailed breakdowns of ad spend, allowing users to see how much competitors are investing in their ads. This information is invaluable for refining your own advertising strategies and staying competitive in the market.
Benefits of Using BigSpy
Utilizing BigSpy offers a wealth of benefits such as deriving inspiration for ad creatives, improving advertising strategies, and accessing cost-effective plans. These advantages can significantly boost your marketing efforts and help you stay ahead of the competition.
Inspiration for Ad Creatives
BigSpy’s ‘Ad Ideas’ feature is a treasure trove for marketers seeking creative inspiration. By allowing users to find featured ads and ad ideas by:
Category
Language
Time period
Social engagement
BigSpy makes it easy to pinpoint effective targeting, winning creative elements, and impactful messaging from competitor ads.
This feature is especially useful for experienced advertisers who often take inspiration from successful ads of other brands.
Enhanced Advertising Strategy
Insights from BigSpy can help users in the following ways:
Spot trends and refine their marketing approach for better results
Monitor competitor spending and performance
Adjust budget allocations on the fly for better ROI
Additionally, BigSpy’s features include:
Real-time tracking and analytics
Capitalizing on hot trends in your niche quickly
Dynamic approach to advertising strategy
Staying ahead of the curve and maximizing your marketing efforts
Cost-Effective Plans
BigSpy offers affordable pricing plans that cater to different user needs and budgets. Here are the available plans:
- Free Plan: Allows users to explore basic functionalities without financial commitment. This basically gives you access to what you could find in the Meta Ad Library.
Basic Plan: Provides more comprehensive features for advanced ad analysis.
Pro Plan: Offers the most extensive capabilities for in-depth ad research.
- Groups: Gives you 5 seats – great for a small agency
- Enterprise: Top charts, new trends… check the table above for more
With these options, BigSpy makes advanced ad analysis accessible to everyone.
Practical Applications of BigSpy
BigSpy’s practical applications are vast, ranging from creating effective ad campaigns to tracking ad performance and identifying market trends. These capabilities make BigSpy an invaluable tool for any marketer looking to enhance their advertising efforts.
Creating Effective Ad Campaigns
With BigSpy, marketers can:
Design ad creatives that resonate with their target audience by providing data on successful ad formats and messages
Discover the latest popular ads tracked by other users
Gain insights that influence creative decisions based on popular trends and audience preferences.
Tracking Ad Performance
BigSpy allows users to track ad performance across multiple social media platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. By offering tools to monitor how well your ads perform compared to those of your competitors, BigSpy provides actionable insights that can significantly improve your advertising strategies.
Using performance data, marketers can make real-time adjustments to their campaigns, optimizing results and ensuring that their ads resonate with their target audience. BigSpy’s ‘Tracked’ feature also organizes saved ads for easy revisit and analysis, making it a powerful tool for continuous improvement.
Identifying Market Trends
Staying ahead of the curve is crucial in digital marketing, and BigSpy helps users do just that by identifying and leveraging new trends in the advertising landscape. By tracking the trend of various ads and analyzing recent data from multiple platforms, BigSpy ensures that users are always up to date with market trends and can quickly capitalize on emerging opportunities.
Pros and Cons of BigSpy
BigSpy possesses significant strengths along with certain limitations. While its comprehensive ad database, detailed analytics, and user-friendly interface are significant advantages, there are also areas where it falls short, such as the learning curve for new users and the limited functionality of the Free Plan.
Pros
One of the biggest pros of BigSpy is its user-friendly interface, which makes it accessible for both new and experienced marketers. The tool’s extensive ad database and detailed analytics are invaluable for anyone looking to gain deep insights into competitor strategies.
Moreover, BigSpy’s various pricing plans, including a free option, offer great value and flexibility, making it an essential tool in any marketer’s arsenal.
Cons
Despite its many strengths, BigSpy does have a few drawbacks. The learning curve for new users can be steep, and the Free Plan offers very limited functionality, which may push users towards purchasing a subscription.
Additionally, while BigSpy provides a comprehensive ad database, it lacks some advanced tools like store spy and influencer marketing analysis, which might make other tools like Minea more suitable for experienced marketers needing in-depth analysis.
Bottom Line
Conclusively, BigSpy serves as a valuable resource for digital marketers aspiring to outshine their competitors. Its extensive functionalities, such as detailed ad insights, a comprehensive ad database, and in-depth competitor analysis, make it a powerful tool for enhancing advertising strategies. The robust search and filtering options, along with the user-friendly interface, ensure that users can easily access and leverage the data they need to succeed.
Given its comprehensive features and efficacy, BigSpy is highly recommended for anyone serious about ad analysis. Whether you’re looking to refine your advertising strategy, gain inspiration for ad creatives, or stay ahead of market trends, BigSpy offers the tools and insights necessary to achieve your marketing goals.
Frequently Asked Questions
What platforms does BigSpy support?
BigSpy supports multiple platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, AdMob, Pinterest, and YouTube.
How does BigSpy collect and analyze ads?
BigSpy collects and analyzes ads by gathering over 500,000 ads each day from different channels, and it offers users the ability to search for ads by product or advertiser name while using filters to narrow down the results.
What are the pricing plans available on BigSpy?
BigSpy offers a Free Plan, a Basic Plan for $9 per month, and a Pro Plan for $99 per month, catering to different user needs and budgets. You can choose the plan that best suits your requirements and budget.
What are the key features of BigSpy?
BigSpy’s key features include a user-friendly interface, advanced search and filtering options, detailed ad insights, archived ads, and competitor analysis. These make it a comprehensive tool for ad intelligence.
What are the main benefits of using BigSpy?
The main benefits of using BigSpy are gaining inspiration for ad creatives, enhancing advertising strategies, and accessing cost-effective plans. It can greatly improve your ad campaigns.
