Like perfect men, perfect benchmarks are hard to find. We analysts rely on these common metrics to determine the performance of our ads on social media. These benchmarks help us answer questions like, what’s a good click through rate for healthcare ads? Or, how has engagement rate changed between 2017 and 2018?

While traditional digital advertising benchmarks are well established, the variety of different ad types, placements, and targets on social media can make finding reliable benchmarks a challenge. Social metrics like ‘post engagement rate’ and ‘cost per Facebook event response’ have no agreed upon benchmark. Without current, credible metrics for comparison, how can we effectively measure campaign performance?

In an ideal world, our social media overlords would fund robust studies to determine accurate benchmarks for their platform. Facebook and Twitter have all the data, and could provide us advertisers (their real customers), with statistically accurate global benchmarks in near real time. But of course, Zuckerburg and @Jack have little incentive to do so. If advertisers knew it only cost say, $7 on average to reach 1,000 users rather than the perceived $10, media spending would shrink to fit. It’s more profitable to keep this information close to the chest.

-Data

When we prodded our own Facebook representative for the official benchmark stance, he claimed that the variety of their clientele is too vast to determine averages. While we agree that comparing mom and pops with mammoths like Nike is unfair, Facebook is clearly missing an opportunity. A benchmark report segmented by spend, vertical, and campaign objective would not only give strategists peace of mind, but would strengthen arguments for increased social advertising budgets. With data at the forefront of decision making, benchmarks are the key to prioritizing digital strategy.

Instead, our rep encouraged us to use past client campaigns to mark performance. We can agree that comparisons of YoY or MoM performance are a great way to track growth, but it’s difficult to make historic comparisons with a new client or an untested campaign type. Facebook is constantly rolling out new ad formats without the accompanying data on if they work or not. We are all for testing when it benefits our clients, but we’d rather not be Zuckerberg’s guinea pig. Client analytics are one variable to consider when measuring performance, but they can’t be the only variable. We need to know where we fit in the broader market, not just our own past performance.

Since the platforms themselves drop the benchmark ball, we often rely on industry “benchmark reports” to supplement historic client performance. Media companies with names like SynergyForce Media Systemz aggregate their data to determine the most recent averages in CTR, CPM, CPC, etc. Sometimes this is reported quarterly (thank you AdStage 🙏) and sometimes it’s reported every other year maybe. You’re probably familiar with this type of report. It’s usually titled “The Facebook Ad Benchmarks You NEED to Know NOW — Updated 2018”. Yet, the data is recycled from 2012, the metric calculations aren’t defined, and the methodology is scarcely described, if mentioned at all.

Let’s use click through rate as an example. Googling “Facebook ads CTR 2018” produces a handful of reports, each with wildly different results. One report boasts a CTR of 1.8%, another claims 0.9%, and a third says 1.44%. Once you start digging into it, you will quickly find yourself knee-deep in shifting or absent definitions. Only one of the three authors bothers to mention how CTR is calculated. This distinction is important for social ads, where all clicks on an ad are recorded in addition to outbound link clicks.

While each author makes an “attempt” to explain their report’s methodology, none care to mention the campaign types reflected in their data. CTRs for different campaign types cannot be compared fairly. A brand awareness campaign will not have the same CTR standards as a traffic campaign due to Facebook’s bidding strategy. To make a long story short, these reports are nothing more than clickbait dead-ends at best, and strategically misleading wrong turns at worst.

If you came upon this post in an attempt to find some semblance of a benchmark upon which to compare to: we got you fam. These averages represent over $300,000 in ad spend and 45 million impressions placed by NAIL Communications. As an agency, we mostly focus on the strategic and creative aspects of a campaign, but for the clients who put their faith in our social media buying capabilities, these are the results. As an FYI, our verticals include healthcare, CPG, and nonprofit organizations. The campaigns ran on Facebook between January 2017 and March 2018.

Our Facebook Ads Manager

Below is a dull, yet necessary outline of how these metrics are calculated. The benchmarks are organized by our most used campaign objectives — traffic and brand awareness. Remember, traffic campaigns direct people to your website/app and optimize for link clicks. Brand awareness campaigns focus on impressions rather than clicks.

Traffic Campaign Calculations — Facebook

CPM — Cost per 1,000 impressions. (Spend/Impressions) x 1000

CTR (Link) — Link click through rate. (Link Clicks/Impressions)

CTR (All) — Click through rate. All clicks on the ad are recorded including clicks to expand media, clicks to play video, post reactions, button clicks, etc. (All Clicks/Impressions)

CPC (Link) — Cost per link click. (Spend/Link Clicks)

CPC (All) — Cost per click. (Spend/All Clicks)

NAIL Traffic Campaign Benchmarks — Facebook

CPM — $9.33

CTR (Link) — 1.36%

CTR (All) — 2.32%

CPC (Link) — $0.98

CPC (All) — $0.45

Brand Awareness Campaign Calculations — Facebook

CPM — Cost per 1,000 impressions. (Spend/Impressions x 1000 )

VC% — View completion percentage. The percent of people that watch your video from 3 seconds until completed. (95% video views/ 3 second video views)

Ad Recall Lift % — The percent of people that when asked, would remember seeing your ad within 2 days. (Estimated Ad Recall Lift / Reach)

CPV (3 seconds) — Cost per 3 second video view. (Spend/3 second video views)

NAIL Brand Awareness Campaign Benchmarks — Facebook

CPM — $6.54

VC% — 19.59%

Ad Recall Lift % — 10.43%

CPV (3 seconds) — $0.02

NAIL Brand Awareness Campaign Calculations — Twitter

CPM — Cost per 1,000 impressions. (Spend/Impressions x 1000)

Engagement % — Engagement percentage. Twitter defines tweet engagements as all clicks on your Tweet, including Retweets, replies, likes, poll votes, and hashtag clicks. (Tweet engagements / Impressions)

VC% — View completion percentage. The percent of people that watch your video from 25% until completed. Twitter defines video completions as the number of people who watched 100% of the video. (Complete video views / video plays at 25%)

CPV — Cost per view.. Twitter defines a view as when your video is watched in 50% view for 2 seconds or more, or when a user clicks to expand/unmute your video. (Spend/video views)

NAIL Brand Awareness Campaign Benchmarks — Twitter

CPM — $8.42

Engagement % — 2.57%

VC% — 14.96%

CPV — $0.03

We encourage any social media practitioner to search high and low for credible benchmarks (and then send me the good ones). Read with a critical eye. Ask where the data came from, how it was calculated, when the campaigns ran, and what industries are represented. If you’re left with questions, move along.