customer languagelimiting beliefs
Directly challenges limiting beliefs using customer language, with the desired outcome front and center.
Beauty & Body Care
Besque
Body oil for crepey, dry skin (women 40+)
Besque's ads bring shoppers in, and 23,213 reviews at 4.9* are waiting on the page. *besque.co, Nov 13
My proposal: one new kind of ad, where a customer says her doubts out loud, then shows what changed her mind.
- Product
- Besque® Magic Body Oil XL
- Platform
- Meta Ads
- Deliverables
- Research + creative roadmap + static mockups
- Format
- Statics
Independent spec work, not affiliated with this brand. This is my own research, writing, and creative execution.
Static mockups
Static mockups that spark interest at TOF and close with the offer at BOF
Quick copy tests built on customers' own words, proof, and offers. Open any static for headline options.
Mockups made for this spec study. They are not live Besque ads or real customer results.
customer languagepromo offer
Stops the scroll with the pain point in customer's words, and visually appealing offer.
comparisonoffer visual
Calendar tangibly shows the time difference in purchasing the XL and copy creates scarcity around the offer.
social proofpattern interrupt
Reframes the outcome and sells confidence and self-worth through social proof, without ever pointing at the viewer's skin.
Creative roadmap
What I'd do on day 1 as Besque's Creative Strategist
Spec work from public data: Meta library (~107 live ads on Besque, ~370 on 40 Plus & Fabulous), ended ads, 210 reviews & comments, 4 competitors, and besque.co.
1 Decipher the data
The 3 biggest research takeaways
Determined from public data. On day 1, I'd go deeper into every internal Besque data source, starting with your ad account and internal customer feedback. Each takeaway points to the strategic recommendations below.
Customers buy on hope. Some doubt reviews and ads.
Besque's product page shows 23,213 reviews at 4.9 (Nov 13), but skeptical shoppers don't trust a brand's own page. In my sample of 210 comments from Trustpilot, Reddit, Instagram and besque.co reviews, 40 describe how shoppers felt before buying. 21 of those 40 doubt the ads, the brand, or that an oil alone can visibly smooth crepey, sagging skin. 5 of the 10 happy buyers who describe their pre-purchase thinking doubted first.
Besque advertises from two pages that do different jobs. Both lean on price or pain before proof.
Customer-on-camera stories sit near the top by impressions. In the ones I watched, overcoming doubt only surfaces in a line or two inside the larger story. Proof and a guarantee are what answer doubt and lower the risk of buying. Ads led by proof, honesty or education are 14 of ~107 on the main page and 11 of ~370 on the second. In the two guarantee ads I watched, the guarantee comes near the end, not up front.
Competitors race to out-claim each other. Q4 gifting is a live opportunity.
Competitors lean on bigger claims like peptides and a "#1" badge. NØRD, Besque's closest competitor, leads with a 60-day money-back guarantee in 30+ of its top 120 ads by impressions. Besque's simpler cold-pressed oil story can win on trust instead. For Q4, Besque's gift set page already has a Black Friday banner, yet in the ads I watched gifting is a passing beat. Only 2 of Crépe Erase's 61 ads mention it.
Core messages in the ~107 live ads on Besque's main page, as of November 9, 2026
56%
28%
13%
Price and size (60)
bundle offer (42), XL upgrade (18)
Pain-led (30)
crepey or dry skin (21), loose skin (6), menopause (3)
Proof and honesty (14)
"550,000+ women" (6), reverse psychology (5), "it's not that nothing works" (3)
Other (3)
ingredients (1), creator lifestyle (2)
Core messages in the ~370 live ads on 40 Plus & Fabulous, as of November 11, 2026
64%
12%
11%
9%
Pain-led (237)
crepey/dry skin (171), body part (36), post weight loss (22), menopause (8)
Life-event stories (45)
wedding, divorce, vacation
Price and size (41)
offer, bundle or price in the opening lines
Proof and education (11)
lotion-vs-oil education (8), social proof (3)
Other (34)
no single theme
Biggest constraint on scale, from public data: trust before purchase. Shoppers question the reviews: "I actually think that alot of the reviews on here are fake." And question whether oil works: "No body oil is going to actually firm up crepey skin." Happy buyers describe the same doubt: "I didn't take a before picture because I honestly thought it would not work." 21 of the 40 pre-purchase comments in my 210 sample doubt the ads, the brand, or that an oil alone works. More trust before the click, built in more than one way, is the next place to unlock new growth.
2 Build a testing plan
Strategic recommendations by priority, with the data behind each
1First test
The Skeptic Convert: a customer says her doubts out loud, then shows why she bought anyway
An ad set where a customer says what a shopper is thinking before she buys: "I thought it was just marketing." "I didn't think an oil alone could do this." She says why she bought anyway, what results she saw, and what about Besque earned her trust. Like current top ads, it opens on the pain.
Testimonial with demo
Like Dawn from San Antonio + 72-year-old "elephant skin" video style
Organic skit
Like the woman stealing her mom's oil hiding in bathroom
Podcast-table talk
Like the Victoria's Secret model video
Reply-to-comment
new format to test: answers a skeptic's comment on-screen
Testing mix: 8 ads, 4 formats, 2 doubts: (a) can an oil alone make a visible change on crepey skin, and (b) can the ads and reviews be trusted. Each ad gets a second cut that opens with the guarantee instead of the pain.
Competitor NØRD leads with its guarantee in 30+ of its top 120 ads by impressions. For a shopper who doesn't trust the ads yet, a guarantee works as a safety net: she can try it knowing she can get her money back.
Creative rationale: She hears her own objection said by someone who held it too. The doubt comes from a peer, and the ad never reads as defensive. 21 of the 40 pre-purchase comments in my sample doubt the ads, the brand, or that an oil alone can work (see Customers above). In the top live ads I watched, doubt gets a line or two. Here it is the whole ad.
KPI: Higher purchase rate measured against a control, with no rise in refund requests and incremental CPA monitored.
Do on day 1, then monitor
Landing page and site edits
- One guarantee (window and conditions) matching ads, policy and page
- One application instruction
- Plain subscription terms next to the VIP offer
- A "what to expect and when" block
- A gift path (gift message, ship to recipient) if Besque offers it
Why: ads can't earn trust the page loses. KPI: purchase conversion by landing page and refund requests, monitored after the change.
2
On a clock
Gifting for Q4
Black Friday is Nov 27 and Christmas shipping follows. Ship a gifting angle on products that already exist (the gift set and the bundle), once the site's gift path is confirmed.
Why: Besque's own gift set page is already up with a Black Friday banner. In the ads I watched, gift mentions on the second page are a passing part of a larger video, not the reason to buy.
3
Feel-first winter hydration
Lead with how it feels: an after-shower routine and the soft-skin feel. Use the angle of upcoming winter months and dry winter weather.
Why: 43 comments in my sample come from women whose main complaint is dry, uncomfortable skin. Few ads cover winter: 5 of ~370 second-page ads mention it (Nov 11), yet the second page's longest-running ended ad (155 days) was a winter-skin static.
3 Ask key questions
Questions I'd ask on day 1 as your creative strategist
Public data only gets me so far. These are the first answers I'd need from Besque to get the work moving.
What is the guarantee, exactly?
WHAT I FOUND
The terms of service say 60 days of use, a 75-day claim window, a $17 processing fee and one product per claim. The landing page says a 60-day money-back guarantee. One ad says 90 days, another says 60.
I'D ASK
Which is current, and how often is it used?
Besque's XL product page says to apply to dry skin, and Dawn's ad says slightly damp skin.
Unlocks a guarantee-led test (NØRD leads with one)
Which page brings new customers and which brings repeat buyers?
WHAT I FOUND
The second page, 40 Plus & Fabulous, runs ~370 live ads (checked Nov 11), about 3.4 times the main page's ~107. The Ad Library shows what each page runs, not spend or sales, so I can't tell which page brings which buyers.
I'D ASK
How do spend and CPA compare across the two pages?
Unlocks the full picture of spend
What did you learn from the longest-running ads on both pages?
WHAT I FOUND
Main page: ended ads cluster on a few dates (Mar 3 to 4 and Jul 7 to 11, 2026), which looks like batch pauses, not individual losers. The 8-month testimonial, the lotion-vs-oil ad and the skeptic-converted ad are among them. Second page: ~420 of its ~690 ended ads ran a week or less, and its longest-running ended ads were all statics.
I'D ASK
What happened at each batch on both pages, what won, and what were spend and CPA by concept?
Unlocks past test data