something i've noticed about facebook ads.

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mberman84

mberman84

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let me know if anyone has noticed this as well....

basically, how your ad does on the first day determines how well it will do forever.

when i launch a new ad...we all now know that FB assumes .07 CTR. if your ad doesnt do better than this on the very first day, its pretty much doomed.

ad CTR fluctuates daily. if the day you launch an ad your ad does poorly (i would say .05 and lower is bad)...they will immediately charge you higher CPC's and put you in the lower ad spots or later in the rotation. this means you immediately get higher CPC's and less impressions to try to improve your CTR. so your ad is basically stuck.

i relauched a bunch of ads that had this problem on different days and with the same ad copy and image and they had a much higher CTR, lower CPC, and MUCH more impressions.

i have an ad i launched months ago, that started with a .15 CTR, and now hovers around .06-.08....i am paying .36 CPC on this ad and .57 on the ad i just launched which has EXACTLY the same CTR currently.

that was a long rant...anyone else experiencing this?
 


I've noticed the exact same thing.

One thing that has worked for me is to always use a *fresh* ad when "creating a similar ad." When I have an ad that has just been approved I immediately pause it, and then create similars from it. This way I've noticed that all the clones get major impression boosts, even if they end up having a shitty CTR. Never create a similar ad from an ad that's been running for a while (if it has a bad CTR).
 
yea...keith from FB just private messaged me and said i am partially right. he said that performance on the first day (IMO the first few thousand impressions) will heavily determine how many impressions you get going forward.
 
following up on this...just got another tip from FB manager:

"When the ads are more targeted it costs more because you are trying to hit a smaller population so your bids need to be higher. If you were trying to reach 18 million people, the ad server would have a lot of opportunities to deliver your ads, but if you’re only trying to reach 10k, then it needs a higher bid to be able to do that."

i'm not really sure this makes sense. i would figure if you're hitting a smaller population (and therefore higher targeted and higher CTR)...you would be paying less.

so lets say im targeting 18+ year olds. does it make sense to split them up into different age groups? (18-24, 25-36, 37-50 etc.). for targeting and testing reasons it does make sense but by the logic stated by the FB rep it would make more sense to combind all those ad groups

thoughts?
 
mberman84 said:
following up on this...just got another tip from FB manager:

"When the ads are more targeted it costs more because you are trying to hit a smaller population so your bids need to be higher. If you were trying to reach 18 million people, the ad server would have a lot of opportunities to deliver your ads, but if you’re only trying to reach 10k, then it needs a higher bid to be able to do that."

i'm not really sure this makes sense. i would figure if you're hitting a smaller population (and therefore higher targeted and higher CTR)...you would be paying less.

so lets say im targeting 18+ year olds. does it make sense to split them up into different age groups? (18-24, 25-36, 37-50 etc.). for targeting and testing reasons it does make sense but by the logic stated by the FB rep it would make more sense to combind all those ad groups

thoughts?
Click to expand...
That doesn't sound right...more targeted ads(split into different age groups/cities) have lower CPC than those for all adults 18+, CTR is about the same.
 
machinecontrol said:
That doesn't sound right...more targeted ads(split into different age groups/cities) have lower CPC than those for all adults 18+, CTR is about the same.
Click to expand...

what do you mean CTR is the same? the CTR is def. lower on 18+ than split into age groups. but, i do agree with you that the CPC's should be lower...however thats not what FB is telling me. i am testing it right now.

EDIT: actually what i mean is the CTR on some of the age groups will be higher and some will be lower...and theoretically it should average out to the same. but, since there's a bigger pool of impressions for the 18+ ad to pick from, the cost is lower (according to FB rep)
 
mberman84 said:
following up on this...just got another tip from FB manager:

"When the ads are more targeted it costs more because you are trying to hit a smaller population so your bids need to be higher. If you were trying to reach 18 million people, the ad server would have a lot of opportunities to deliver your ads, but if you’re only trying to reach 10k, then it needs a higher bid to be able to do that."

i'm not really sure this makes sense. i would figure if you're hitting a smaller population (and therefore higher targeted and higher CTR)...you would be paying less.

so lets say im targeting 18+ year olds. does it make sense to split them up into different age groups? (18-24, 25-36, 37-50 etc.). for targeting and testing reasons it does make sense but by the logic stated by the FB rep it would make more sense to combind all those ad groups

thoughts?
Click to expand...
Essentially, both what facebook and you said are right. There are two countering factors which determine if targeting a smaller demo would result in lower CPCs:

A. The lower CPCs due to higher CTRs from more focused targeting AND
B. The lower CPCs obtained from targeting a larger audience

To the extent that the effect of A outweighs that of B, adopting A would give you lower CPCs and vice versa.
 
KHyuga said:
Essentially, both what facebook and you said are right. There are two countering factors which determine if targeting a smaller demo would result in lower CPCs:

A. The lower CPCs due to higher CTRs from more focused targeting AND
B. The lower CPCs obtained from targeting a larger audience

To the extent that the effect of A outweighs that of B, adopting A would give you lower CPCs and vice versa.
Click to expand...

well put...i think you're correct
 
The game is all about getting high enough CPMs. Period.

If you don't have a good CTR, a higher bid will keep traffic flowing.
 
I notice the same thing, and I think KHyuga is right on describing how the CPCs work, at least from what I've seen.
 
As Mr Website said it's all about CPM so everything else in the discussion is pretty meaningless. Forget what the low paid monkey at FB says too you, FB is just like all other advertising mediums and they make their money based on impressions so watch your CPM closely and work off that.
 
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