How to Lower Your Facebook Ad Costs

While many companies appreciate the results they get from using Facebook Ads, they are less happy with the charges assessed for that kind of advertising. There are two primary choices that any company will have when setting up Facebook advertising. The first of these is referred to as cost-per-impression, which means that you will be charged every time your ad is viewed, even if the user doesn't click on your ad. In cost-per-click bidding, which is a more common method of being charged for Facebook Ads, you get charged only if a user actually clicks on your ad.The factors which influence your Facebook Ad costs are fairly numerous, although there are a handful that have the greatest impact. The placement of your ad can have a major effect on your cost-per-click or your impression views with users, and this means you may want to eliminate ads which have a high cost but yield fairly lackluster results. Facebook also uses a Relevance Score to determine how much you have to pay and how frequently your ad will be displayed.The higher your Relevance Score, the less charge will be assessed against you, and the better your results will end up being. There is also a bidding strategy associated with your Facebook Ad charges, each having its own set of advantages and disadvantages. You can help to mitigate the effects of this bidding strategy by establishing a target cost or a bid that will eliminate expensive and unnecessary clicks.

It's also true that the day of the week, the time of the year, and the time of the day will all have an effect on what you're charged for your Facebook Ads, so setting up an ad schedule can lower your costs significantly. The final major factor associated with your Facebook Ad cost is the target audience that you're trying to reach. Because some audiences are deemed more desirable than others, it can be more expensive to have your ads displayed to those audiences. By managing these factors and taking some of the steps described below, you should be able to lower your Facebook Ad charges, and improve your results at the same time.

Monitor ad placements

When you first run a Facebook Ad, you'll probably have to make use of all available ad placements, so that you can determine which ones work best for you. However, after your ad has been running while, it would be worth your while to check on the placement breakdown, so you know which placements are achieving the best results.You can do this in the Facebook Ads Manager dashboard, by selecting the ad set you're monitoring, then clicking the Breakdown menu selection, and choosing By Delivery > Placement. This will show you how your ad has been performing in various placements, as well as whether that placement appeared on a mobile app, mobile web, or desktop.

Evaluate your bid strategy

There are four possible bid strategies you can use in conjunction with your Facebook Ad charges, although your campaign goal may serve to limit those choices. To prevent having your bidding choices limited, make sure to establish your campaign goal as Conversions, since bidding on conversions will provide you with a number of additional options, and will generally allow you to get the best results from your Facebook Ads. After having set up your campaign for conversions, you should optimize your bidding strategy and ad delivery.The Lowest Cost bid strategy well often serve to provide you with the cheapest cost for clicks and impressions, but it also tends to underachieve on results. That's because it sometimes acts to prevent your ad from being displayed to your intended audience, which will damage your click-through rate, lower your Relevance Score, and increase your click-through cost.A Target Cost strategy for bidding will help you to achieve a more stable average cost, while also providing you with high-quality placements. These better placements give you an increased likelihood of getting additional clicks, accomplishing your goals, lowering your costs, and improving your Relevance Score.

Run your ads during scheduled hours and days

It's possible for you to pause and have your ads run on specific times and specific days, using Facebook Ad Dayparting. The thing that makes this strategy so effective is that it schedules your ads for display only during those times which have historically proven to be high-performing periods during any day. This will help you to maximize your limited ad budget, and make the most of your ad spend.

Before you can establish a schedule for your ads, there are a few setup requirements you'll need to manage in Facebook. First, you have to change your budget to be a Lifetime Budget, and then you'll have to set beginning and ending dates for your ad set. In the Ad Scheduling section, you'll have to choose Run Ads on a Schedule. In order to determine which days and times actually produce the best results, you can check out your reports from Facebook Ads. These are available on your dashboard, by clicking on the Reports menu and then selecting All > Time of Day.

Edit audience segments

In general, any saved audiences you may have are outperformed by Look-alike Audiences as well as Facebook Custom Audiences, and these will also increase your Relevance Score. To further refine these audiences, you can combine any saved audience criteria you used with your look-alike audiences and your custom audiences. When you target these hybrid audiences, which are much more specific, you will be focusing only on those customers who are the most profitable.You can check out which customers are the most profitable by going into your Ads Manager dashboard, and opening up a specific ad set. Then choose the Breakdown menu and select the option for By Delivery > Age. This breakdown will show you how a specific ad set performs with various age groups, and you can use that information to refine your look-alike audiences or your custom audiences. These kind of refinements can make your Facebook ad campaigns much more effective, as well as much less costly in terms of charges assessed to you.