Free-Form Ads
Free-form ads are an ad type built for engagement, letting you convey information complete with images, videos, inline links, and rich text in the body of your ad.
When a redditor clicks or taps on your ad in a feed or conversation, they are taken to your post to continue reading, watching videos, or clicking or tapping out to any linked landing pages. This gives you the flexibility and opportunity to tell your story your way using a format redditors know and love. Paired with targeting the right redditors, you'll be able to get your message to the right people to meet your campaign goals.
Everything you need to create these ads is right in Ads Manager and you can use templates to kickstart ad creation, allowing you to set them up with little friction. Review our detailed specifications for free-form ads.
Do you learn better by watching? Watch the next video or check out other tutorials on Ads Formula.
- Overview
- Build ads
Create a free-form ad
Check out our detailed guide for help on setting up campaigns with Advanced Create.
- Go to Create Campaign and check you're using Advanced Create.
- Choose either a brand awareness and reach or a traffic campaign objective and set up your campaign and ad group.
- Traffic (recommended): Optimize and pay for taps and clicks
- Brand awareness and reach: Optimize and pay for impressions
- Select Free-form as the post type for your creative.
- Use the rich text composer to format text, add media, and create links. Here's what you can add to your content:
You can also paste rich text if you prefer to draft externally. You can also get started using one of our templates or get inspired with real-life examples.
- Rich text styling options (bold, italic, strikethrough, superscript, and headings)
- Inline links
- Bulleted and numbered lists
- Block quotes
- Insert media (images, GIFs, and video)
- Spoiler text blocking
Available templates
| Type | Purpose | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| Tell your story | Guide users through who, what, and why, ensuring a clear, engaging narrative. |
|
| Product deep dive | Showcase a product or something you want people to know more about |
|
| The essentials | A longer post with a few images and a brief snapshot of key points to provide a rapid understanding of core ideas. |
|
| Shopping guide | Feature all your favorite products in one place and help redditors easily find exactly what they're looking for. |
|
Best practices
Provide a TL;DR at the beginning
Before diving into your content, summarize your message at the top of the ad. This lets you entice your audience, convey your message, and provide context at point zero.
Example: “Introducing our newest sneaker model—lightweight, durable, and available now!”
Break walls of text by mixing in media
We recommend using images and videos in your post to break walls of text. This helps with storytelling and makes the ad easy to follow and understand. Bonus points if you add captions to your images and videos.
Make your content easier to digest with heading breaks
Organize your content by leveraging headings and subject breaks. This lets you sort and categorize information, making the ad easier to produce and follow. We strongly recommend this when conveying a lot of information.
Cater to your audience
Free-form ads are designed to be flexible, and we recommend using them to fit your audience and brand goals. Whether it's a sneaker drop, a one-stop shop for your holiday shopping, or a round-up of the latest mobile device, it's important to keep your audience in mind when creating your ad.
Examples:
- If you're focusing on sharing specs and features, consider using a bulleted list to quickly and effectively convey information.
- If you're hosting a discussion, the thread may be more qualitative and exploratory, so you might want to provide more text and links to learn more.
