How did your advertising campaign perform? Part of the battle is knowing which Facebook ads metrics actually matter.
I’m often asked about what I care about. Facebook does a good job of surfacing metrics that are relevant to your objectiveThe objective reflects the goal you want to achieve with your advertising and is established at the campaign level. More, but that’s not good enough for me.
You can customize your columns in Ads Manager to include the metrics you care about most. You can also save those settings and make them your default.
Let me walk you through how to do that first. Then I’ll give you an overview of my saved settings that I call “The Good Stuff.”
Customize, Save, and Set as Default
In most cases, the default column preset is “Performance.” This is a preset that Facebook created. If you click that drop-down, select “Customize Columns.”
Then you can add and remove columns as you please. You can also drag and drop columns to prioritize what appears where.
Once you have a set-up you like, you can save it.
Click that drop-down again, scroll down to “Custom” and click the “Save” link.
Give it an amazing name.
Once saved, you can then make that columns preset your default.
If you ever make a change that you want to save, just click into that drop-down again and click “Save.” Name it the same thing as the preset you previously created.
Then click the button to replace the existing preset.
“The Good Stuff”
My default column preset is saved as “The Good Stuff.” Basically, these are all of the main metrics that I care about most, regardless of the objectiveThe campaign objective is the ultimate goal for your Facebook ad. Your selection will impact options, including optimization and delivery. More or optimizationHow you optimize impacts who sees your Facebook ad. Facebook will show your ad to people most likely to perform your desired action. More. It allows me to easily compare campaignsThe campaign is the foundation of your Facebook ad. This is where you'll set an advertising objective, which defines what you want your ad to achieve. More and ad setsAn ad set is a Facebook ads grouping where settings like targeting, scheduling, optimization, and placement are determined. More without making changes.
I currently have 30 metrics in this setup. It’s a lot, I guess, but everything I need is there. If there’s ever something I need that isn’t included, I just customize columns.
To make it easier, let’s group the metrics I use by category…
Metrics: Campaign Basics
These metrics aren’t exciting, but they have to be included. Otherwise, you’d start asking questions.
They’re the campaign basics. The staples.
- Delivery
- BudgetA budget is an amount you're willing to spend on your Facebook campaigns or ad sets on a daily or lifetime basis. More
- Amount Spent
- Results
- Cost per Result
Metrics: ReachReach measures the number of Accounts Center accounts (formerly users) that saw your ads at least once. You can have one account reached with multiple impressions. More, ImpressionsImpressions are the number of times your ads were displayed to your target audience. Impressions aren't counted if it is detected they came from bots. More, and FrequencyCalculated as (Impressions/Reach), Frequency is a Facebook ads metric that measures the average number of times users have seen your ad. More
I want to know how many people I’m reaching and how many times. But, it’s also really important to know how much it’s costing just to show these ads, both by impression and by person reached.
- Reach
- Impressions
- Cost per 1,000 People Reached
- Cost Per 1,000 Impressions
- Frequency
Metrics: Clicks
Not every click is the same, but I still like to see the reporting on each click type. I also like to see rate and cost metrics related to those clicks.
- Link ClicksThe link click metric measures all clicks on links that drive users to properties on and off of Facebook. More
- Outbound ClicksOutbound clicks measure the number of clicks on ads that take people to properties away from Facebook. More
- Landing Page ViewsLanding Page View is a Facebook ads metric that represents when people land on your destination URL after clicking a link in your ad. More
- CPC (Cost Per Link Click)Facebook reports on CPC (All) and CPC (Link Click). The first refers to all clicks and the second on all internal and outbound links. More
- Cost Per Outbound Click
- Cost Per Landing Page View
- CTR (Link Click-Through Rate)
- Outbound CTR
Metrics: Standard Events
The standard pixel events you care about will differ depending on your website. The main two standard events that matter for my website are purchases and registrations. I could include ViewContent or Search pixel eventsPixel events allow you to track specific actions on your website that can be used for reporting, targeting, and optimization. More, but I’m just not prioritizing them.
- Registrations Completed
- Purchases
- Cost Per Registration Completed
- Cost Per Purchase
- Purchase Conversion Value
- Purchase ROAS
Metrics: Custom EventsConversion events tracked by the pixel, app SDK, or API that are outside of standard events. These tend to be created to fit the publisher's needs when a pre-defined standard event will not. For example, this website has custom events that fire based on scroll depth and time spent on a page. Read more about custom events here. More
I’ve created three different custom events. I track quality traffic with the Time on Page and Scroll Depth events. I also have a custom event for embedded YouTube video views, but I just don’t prioritize that event.
Maybe you use different custom events. Maybe you don’t even use custom events. Feel free to track custom conversions, too, if they matter to your business.
Here are my metrics that matter related to custom events:
- Time on Page Event
- Scroll Depth – 70%
- 60 Seconds Time on Page AND 70% Scroll Depth
- Cost Per Time on Page Event
- Cost Per Scroll Depth – 70%
- Cost Per 60 Seconds Time on Page AND 70% Scroll Depth
Find What Works for You
There’s a ton of room here for adjustments. I guarantee if you ask me a month from now, I’ll make changes to this. Most likely, that would be due to adding custom conversionsCustom conversions let you create rules for events or URLs so that you can better track and optimize for specific actions with Facebook ads. More to monitor more specific conversionsA conversion is counted whenever a website visitor performs an action that fires a standard event, custom event, or custom conversion. Examples of conversions include purchases, leads, content views, add to cart, and registrations. More.
But the main point here is finding the metrics that represent “The Good Stuff” for you. Save it. Default it.
It makes the Ads Manager experience so much easier.
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Your Turn
What metrics would you include in “The Good Stuff?”
Let me know in the comments below!
