A digital marketing teacher often wants students to build real campaigns, but runs into three obstacles: budget, accounts and risk. Here is a ready-to-use two-hour session that works without any of the three. It adapts to a group of ten or forty students.
Before the session: prepare the case
A good session is decided in advance. Prepare a one-page case sheet containing:
- A concrete brand and product.
- A single objective: awareness, traffic, leads or sales. See Choose the campaign objective.
- An imaginary budget and constraints (country, target audience, deadline).
- A starting question that students answer at the end: “Which campaign do you recommend, and why?”
Then choose the platform: Social Ads Meta-style or TikTok-style. Ask each student to read one guide beforehand, for example Structure campaign, ad set and ad, so the session does not start with an explanation of the interface.
Session plan (2 hours)
| Time | Stage | What happens |
|---|---|---|
| 15 min | Briefing | Present the case, the objective, the constraints and the rule of the day |
| 45 min | Build | Each student or pair builds a campaign: objective, audience, budget, creatives |
| 30 min | Reading | Simulated results arrive; everyone identifies what works and what does not |
| 20 min | Optimization | One change per group, justified by a metric |
| 10 min | Debrief | Compare choices and results, discuss |
Stage 1: the briefing (15 minutes)
Read the case aloud, restate the single objective and announce the rule of the day: a written hypothesis before every change. Stress that the figures are fictional and that you assess reasoning.
Stage 2: the build (45 minutes)
Students build their campaign. Walk around and ask questions rather than giving answers: “Why this audience?”, “What happens if your budget is halved?” For the three-level structure, see Campaign, ad set, ad.
Stage 3: reading the results (30 minutes)
Each group writes down three findings backed by figures. To help, display the link between objective and metric: awareness (CPM, reach), traffic (CTR, CPC), leads and sales (CPA, ROAS). Reading is detailed in CPM, CTR, CPC, CPA, ROAS.
Stage 4: optimization (20 minutes)
Each group chooses a single change and writes: “I change X because metric Y shows Z; I expect this effect.” This is the principle of the A/B test: isolate one variable to know what produced the effect.
Stage 5: the debrief (10 minutes)
Each group presents, in one minute, its riskiest choice and what it learned. Well-analyzed mistakes teach more than successes explained by luck.
Why this session works
- Everyone starts from the same case, so results are comparable.
- Mistakes are free, so students dare to test.
- The discussion is about concrete decisions rather than theory.
- The written-hypothesis rule prevents random fumbling.
Common mistakes to anticipate
- Changing everything at once. Restate the one-change-at-a-time rule.
- Judging too fast. A campaign viewed after a few minutes of data teaches nothing; see The learning phase.
- Fixating on the “real” figure. Remind students that the simulator is for reasoning.
- A vague objective. If the case does not choose between awareness and sales, results will not be comparable.
Variants for your context
- Short version (1 hour): drop the oral debrief and ask for a five-line written summary.
- Challenge version: two teams get the same case and compare their choices at the end.
- TikTok version: same plan, with particular attention to video creative; see TikTok video creatives.
- Remote version: students work from home and share screenshots in a common document.
Frequently asked questions
How many students per group? One or two. Beyond that, some become spectators.
Do I need a different case each session? No: reusing the same case across sessions lets you measure progress.
Can the session be graded? Yes, on method rather than result; see Assess students on fictional campaigns.
To organize your first session, request access.