Paid ads: Key terms to know

Jordan Hayward posted on 12 October 2022

When it comes to the world of social media, there’s tonnes of jargon to help keep a track of the metrics of success. I remember walking into my first day as a Social Media Exec and panicking when being asked to ‘check my impressions’, as I’ve always been bad at them.

The same can be said specifically about paid social media, or the dark arts as it’s commonly referred to around these parts. Paid ads can be intimidating if you’re coming from the lofty, creative organic social media, but went stepping into the intrepid waters of paid, you can be confronted by a plethora of acronyms and terms that you might not be familiar with.

Never fear, Locowise is here!

We won’t go into it too much detail because, let’s face it, that’d be boring. Come back to this guide every now and then if you need a quick reminder, or when you need your back covered when you’re on a client call (we won’t tell).

Reach/Impressions

• Reach: The amount of people who have seen your ad.
• Impressions: The number of times the ad has been seen.

Simplified, if an ad has a reach of ten, but eleven impressions, one of those ten people it reached saw it twice.

Campaign/Ad Set/Ad

• Campaign: This will be the type of ad campaign you want to run. Do you want to reach as many people with your Facebook page, get people on your site or get some sales?
• Ad Set: Where your audiences sit, and where you can edit who you target.
• Ad: This will be where the ad goes, and where you can edit how they look to your audience.

Link Clicks/Landing Page Views

• Link click: The number of times your ad has been clicked on.
• Landing Page Views: The number of times your ad has been clicked on, and has been properly looked at.

Link clicks can be temperamental; make sure you optimize for landing page views to see how many people actually are getting to your website and having a look around, as opposed to just clicking a link on you ad.

Page/Post Engagements

• Page engagements: The number of engagements you’ve received on your post or page as a whole as a result of them seeing your ad.
• Post engagements: The number of engagements on your ad.

CPM

The cost per 1,000 impressions. If you have spent £10 on a campaign, and gained 2,000 impressions, your CPM would be £5.

Frequency

Average amount of times your ad is seen by a single individual.

Pixel

A piece of code that sits on your website, that feeds information back to Facebook and allows them to track all goals appropriately. Essential for Traffic and Conversion campaigns.

Placement

Where you want your ad to be seen. In stories, on a feed, in search, in article, video format? Whatever you choose, make sure the creative is optimised to the sizing. 

It may not be everything, but it’s a start. Once you get a handle of the beast, you’ll master it in no time. Now, go forth and slay the social demon today!

Discover how your Facebook ads are performing with Locowise by your side. Start your 21-day free trial today to get started.