You’re all set with the perfect Facebook ad! You have your goals outlined, you selected the correct ad type to meet your desired goals, you have a targeted audience that is positioned to receive your message and take action. In addition, you have written great copy and selected an image that is appealing and will certainly sell. Whew! You are almost there! You have everything ready to go, except that one burning question…How much should you spend on this Facebook ad?
This is a great question!
The answer is simple and no so simple. It’s about finding the sweet spot where ad spend and results are maximized.
To learn how to set up Facebook ads read: How To: A Guide To Setting Up A Facebook Ad
Facebook Ad Spend: Finding The Sweet Spot
The sweet spot with Facebook ad spend is that point where you spend just enough to get maximum results (this means your cost per result is low and your goals are being met) and where spending anymore will only cause you to plateau or your cause cost per result to increase.
An Example is a recent membership campaign I was running for the nonprofit I co-founded with my daughter – Astronaut Abby – called, The Mars Generation. This was our 3rd membership campaign and the first time that we were ready to use results from past campaigns to really push the goals of the campaign further through Facebook ads.
Our target audience was a retargeted audience of people who visited our website in the past 90 days. We ran our Facebook Ads campaign for the full 2 months of the membership drive. Our first month was simply to prime the target audience using a small ad spend of $5 per day.
For the second month of the campaign, we focused on increasing our ad spend on Facebook to maximize the sign ups. Each week we increased the budget by $10/week. We went from spending $15 to $30 to $45, etc. and for the final 7 days, we ran the campaign for $100 per day. We checked on these ads daily to make sure we were getting optimal results. As a small scrappy startup nonprofit that is volunteer driven, spending money on Facebook Ads is significant for us. Our budget for month 2 was big (for our tiny organization) with an ad spend of $1300. Our analysis and ongoing monitoring coupled with knowing what we could comfortably pay for each membership signup to make it a valuable ROI made us confident in our approach.
With this approach of slowly increasing our ad spend, we were able to find the sweet spot in our final days, which is often the busiest time for a campaign like this. The sweet spot was $100. To test our approach, we increased to $105 and found a plateau. Raising above $105 we found the cost only increased.
This $100 sweet spot was identified for this last week of the campaign and we used that as our daily ad spend budget. Is it possible our next membership campaign the sweet spot will change? Yes. Will we be testing the $100 per day ad spend to see if it holds as the sweet spot? Absolutely! The main thing to remember is that testing is imperative with every campaign. Things change, but in this case, we now have great data to move forward with.
How Much Should I Spend for My Facebook Ad?
We just discussed the sweet spot which is a great way to find the right amount to spend on your Facebook ad. But chances are that you may not have a big enough budget to even find that number. A good way to start your campaign is to be honest with your budget. If your budget is small and your audience is huge (as in hundreds of millions of people) thesweet spot may be near impossible to reach.
Most people’s budgets are not big enough to reach their sweet spot with a huge audience and that is ok too. Our example above was with a small and very targeted audiences (10,000 people who had visited the website). Typically when the audiences are large your goal is to get in front of as many people as possible – often to get more brand recognition or engagement on your page. The important thing to note is that it is worth testing, tracking and watching your ads to find the sweet spot (if possible) and make sure to remain within it. For our membership campaign for The Mars Generation, it would be a waste to spend more than $100 per day if the results did not improve.
Final Thoughts About Facebook Ad Spend and Finding the Sweet Spot for Success
As we mentioned earlier your audience size and goals will matter in determining the sweet spot. This is why we encourage people to create a solid Facebook ads strategy and plan. It really does make a difference when it comes to creating ads that get and maximize your results.
Looking for help with your Facebook strategy and plans from SocialNicole a leading Facebook Ads Expert and social media marketing agency? Contact us today.
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