6 ways to reduce Facebook Ad CPA

A few clients have been in touch lately about the rising cost of Facebook's CPA (Cost Per Acquisition) or increasingly variable CPAs. Below are some ideas that should help.

All instructions relate to the older Facebook Ad Manager interface. I can't get on with the new layout ??

1. Improve Click Through Rate (CTR) - Improving click through rate will reduce CPA so look to optimise ad format and creative. Make sure you ad stands out visually and if you've not yet tried using video in ads, you should. Ensure you use an appropriate call to action button. I saw an ad recently were copy text referred to 'download' 3 times and yet the button was 'Sign-up'. Make sure your ad is consistent.
2. Set Cost control setting - Look for this setting -Cost control (optional) under Budget and Delivery. Here you can set a minimum for 'average cost per initiated checkout' which essentially puts a cap on CPA. But it's not available on all ad types. If it is, you've solved the increasing or variable nature of CPA at a stroke.
3. Refine your audiences - eg try changing the 'Everyone who engaged with your business' period of time and new custom audiences eg 'People who engaged with any post of ad'. If you've not yet tried Lookalike audiences these should be considered too.
4. Custom conversion - Try setting up different custom conversion events and experimenting eg visitors to a number of different pages or clicks on different buttons. There's a fairly new Facebook Events setup tool that makes this easier.
5. Conversion window - Also under Budget and Delivery. Set to how long it takes a buyer to convert after seeing ad if not already. It you have an existing setting, it could be worth a tweak.
6. Audience overlap - Finally, if you're running ads simultaneously there could be Audience overlap. Check this under Audiences in Business Manager.

For further advice on Facebook Ads, book some social media training or a workshop.