Google, Facebook advertising becoming more Costly!

For many businesses, social media has become a priceless tool for advertising and marketing campaigns and allows small and medium-sized companies across the globe to expand their audiences, target demographics, and more without needing to put forth extra time or expenses for advertising. However, if you’ve noticed a slowly creeping increase in the cost of things like CPM (cost per 1000 engagements on an ad) or CPC (cost for click) on these platforms, you certainly aren’t alone.

In a recent survey of costs going back several months, Let’s Nurture has found a growing trend with Google and Facebook advertising and the overall cost for this endeavour. For example, from July to August, we found that on average CPC engagements fell by 20% while using Google and almost 40% on Facebook. Moreover, CPM through Google fell roughly 3% between these months, whereas they fell a dazzling 35% on Facebook between the same interval. Clearly, advertisers have been paying more money in order to reach the same audiences and demographics on these platforms. But why?

The Rising Cost of CPMs and CPCS: Explained

While advertisers may be scrambling for answers as to why these costs are rising, the answer likely isn’t that simple. There is likely a combination of factors that have led to the increase in costs. For one, the COVID-19 crisis of the last two years might have a share of the blame; with many companies being forced to make the jump to digital marketing and social media after many stores were shuttered. In addition to this, new businesses are launched every day, and with e-commerce brands, digital storefronts, and other platforms; many new entrepreneurs find themselves turning to established platforms such as Google and Facebook to begin making a name for themselves. This creates an influx of companies seeking value in using social media and online advertising, which creates more competition, and in turn, more expensive advertising. So, what can the average small business do to combat this new challenge of advertising supply and demand?

Minimizing the Impact of High CPM and CPC on your Advertising

As more businesses continue to enter the increasingly competitive digital sphere, it’s likely CPM and CPCs will continue to rise in price over the coming months. So, advertisers should take a few simple steps in order to minimize the overall price impact on their ad spending and returns.

1. Optimize your Conversion Rates

Digital advertising often has the goal of trying to drive traffic to a specific website or webpage. It’s important then to ensure that when your user reaches your site that their experience is positive and effective in terms of having them do business with your company. Conversion rate optimization is simply the practice of maximizing visitor time by focusing on and optimizing content and various elements of your website. You might create a conversion-focused home page, perform A/B testing to discover which elements work best for creation conversion rates, or improve the overall flow and design of your website to better streamline the business process for your customers.

2. Rethink Visuals and Advertising

Performance-driven visuals and great advertising are the lifeblood of your campaign and having grabbing images are important, especially on social media. When creating advertising, try to keep these basic principles in mind:

My ad is where the customer is in their customer journey: This involves creating various advertisements and messaging for instructing a customer on how to proceed with doing business with your company and in turn, converting them into a customer.

My ad is designed for the platform they appear on: Specific platforms have their own design aspects and elements which need to be taken into account. Look into specific design practices for various social media platforms.

My ad triggers emotional or rational benefits in my customer: The pathology of your customer is important, so finding a way to tap into a customer’s personalized interest, behaviours, or emotions is a key way to meeting their needs as a company.

It’s also important to regularly perform A/B testing on advertising in order to figure out what works best and is most effective with your audience.

3. Diversity your Marketing Campaigns

While paying for your Google and Facebook advertisements are a great way to reach users online, they aren’t the only means at your disposal. There are plenty of other methods such as email marketing, search engine optimization, influencer marketing, content marketing, and affiliate marketing which can all be used to raise awareness of your company and in turn, drive conversions and make sales. Many of these marketing methods are also incremental, meaning doing them over a long period of time can have a highly positive impact on your business. Remember, you always have options in advertising; so don’t be afraid to diversify and find a bigger pool of prospective customers waiting for you!