Is CPM or CPC better for Facebook ads?

If you have tried using Facebook ads to promote your Facebook page, Facebook event or website you might be a little confused as to whether you should choose to pay by CPM or CPC.

What is CPM and CPC?

• CPM = Cost per thousand impressions = this means you pay when someone views your ad.
• CPC = Cost per click = this means you pay when someone clicks on your ad.

With CPM when I say you pay when someone views your ad, I know what you are thinking: “how do I know someone has actually seen it?” Basically, you don’t! Ads appear on every Facebook page that someone visits on the right-hand side, if that person stays on the page for a nano-second or five hours (without visiting another tab – every time the person visits a new tab the ads refresh) that is counted as a view.

If you choose CPC it means that you are paying for a definite action, ie. a click, which means you know that:

• The person has seen it.
• Is interested in what you are promoting.
• The clicker wants more information.
• You know pretty much exactly the cost to drive each person to your Facebook page, Facebook event or website.

That doesn’t mean that CPC is better for you… You want to experiment with it, as some ads I’ve run, people have had to see them five to 10 times before they clicked on them, as it was a new product and people needed to see it repetitively before they took action.

What I have found interesting with CPC and CPM is that whichever I have used for my ad campaign, afterwards if I work out what it would have cost had I used the other method, the cost is more or less the same. I just worked out what I spent last year and it turned out that CPC cost $20 more than CPM, so really I question whether it matters which you choose.

Facebook themselves don’t tell you decisively which one you would choose over the other, which doesn’t help matters.

Personally I always choose CPC. Why? Because I know what I am going to get for my budget in terms of traffic. I know roughly how long I need to run the campaign for to get the results I want.

I would love to know your thoughts on Facebook ads if you have run any. What worked, what didn’t? Do you prefer CPC or CPM? Please comment below.

c is the founder of Mocks, mobile phone socks www.MyMocks.com, founder of Social Rabbit – your guide in the world of social media www.Facebook.com/SocialRabbit and author of ‘Brand New Day – the Highs & Lows of Starting a Small Business’. Lara’s business LaRoo was the winner of the NSW Telstra Micro-Business Award in 2008.