How much do Facebook ads cost?

Facebook Ads are an exceptional pay-per-click (PPC) advertising option. You can launch targeted campaigns for specific audiences. This will ensure that your ads appear in these users’ News Feeds, even though they may never have heard of your brand. It is undeniable that Facebook Ads offer a huge opportunity to all businesses, regardless of their shape or size.

But all that, of course, sounds too good to be true. There is obviously a catch and it is called the PPC. You have to pay to get a chance to play. Facebook Ads, like any other PPC platform, can grab a significant chunk of your budget quite quickly.

To prepare, many businesses are looking for a simple answer to “How much do Facebook Ads cost?”. This is a tricky question because the Facebook auction system is constantly evolving and the prices aren’t fixed.

We will still try to answer this question by looking at how the auction system works and other factors affecting the cost.

How do Facebook auctions work?

The Facebook advertising network operates on an auction system. Advertisers “bid” on placing their ad in the feed of a small audience. Basically, whoever places the highest bid wins the placement.

This is an important notion since advertising space is limited, even though Facebook is always creating new ad placements.

You should also know that you are not the only one who wants this advertising space. You play against your direct competitors and other businesses. For example, your coaching business wants to reach entrepreneurs between the ages of 25 and 30. Not only will you be competing with the auto company that wants to show them expensive cars, but also the real estate agent who wants to sell them a house and the tech company that is looking to put Apple Watches on their wrists.

Each time you add targeting criteria to your ad, you can see the size of your audience, but you can’t tell who else has chosen that target.

In the end, how much do Facebook Ads cost?

There is a lot of data that determines the cost of Facebook Ads based on different factors.

Research has shown that the standard cost on Facebook Ads is $0.25 per view to reach 1,000 users, making it the most affordable option.

Another case study states that the average CPC is $2.20 on Facebook Ads, but it can go up to $5. Sometimes the CPCs are much higher, like $35 per click.

According to other data, the average is around $115. Placements on Instagram are even more expensive, whether in the feed or in the stories (CPC of around $1.36 for the feed). This data also shows an increase in CPC during the holidays, with CPCs increasing by $0.15 on average between October and December.

We can still see that the factors affecting the cost of an advertisement are numerous. There is no easy answer.

Often, brands with targeted and well-written advertising campaigns have a CPC ranging from $1.20 to $2. The cost can obviously be higher. If you are in a difficult industry or in an industry with a longer reflection phase/higher customer investment, then the costs will be higher. As soon as Halloween has passed and Black Friday has officially started, CPCs and CPAs soar.