Look Beyond Surface-Level Results

One of the many mistakes I see advertisers make is related to the interpretation of results. They do one of two things. First, they might oversimplify the results to focus only on the number of conversions and cost per conversion. Second, they might get lost in all the secondary metrics like CPM, CPC, CTR, and everything else that might contribute to results, but are not necessarily all that important.

The conversion itself is absolutely most important, but there are layers to those conversions. Let me explain.

First, make sure that the Compare Attribution Settings feature is a regular part of your routine. Do not take your conversion results at face value. How many of your conversions are one-day view? If it is a high percentage, your results mean a whole lot less. How many are seven-day click versus one-day click?

While both are meaningful, one-day click is a clearer indication that the conversion was driven by your ad. Especially if you are not selling a high-priced product, seven-day click could be getting help from remarketing and other platforms.

You can also uncover more conversions with 28-day click. This is especially useful when running ads for leads and you have a sales outreach team that starts immediately. You can get a sense of how many of those leads ended up buying from you within 28 days by extending the window.

Now, what is the difference between first conversion and all conversions? Meta reports all conversions by default, but that can be an inflated view. One person could perform multiple conversions, and this often leads to mismatched reporting. You can get a clearer sense of unique customers by using first conversion reporting.

Second, get to know your breakdown options.

Break down by audience segments to see how budget and results are impacted by remarketing. Break down by age or gender to see if performance is impacted by these demographics. You might even spot a problem in distribution if you are getting cheap actions from a specific demographic group.

Break down by placement to see where people are seeing your ads. Break down by dynamic creative element to see whether people are seeing your video or static image version from a single ad. You can also break down by text or headline when you use multiple text options.

Third, understand the impact of conversion value.

Your results do not necessarily reflect the purchase of the specific product you are selling in your ad. As long as it is a purchase, it will be reported. That means the value may not match what you expect. View total value and return on ad spend and make sure those numbers are not inflated by view-through conversions.

Next, look at what is happening on the backend. Is Meta over-reporting or under-reporting? What is actually happening?

Are your events set up properly and firing on the right pages? Are they deduplicated? If you are running ads for lead generation, what do those leads do next? Are you able to contact them? What is your conversion rate?

If you are getting low-quality leads, what makes them low quality? Is it a problem with your sales process, or is it something you can control with your ads?

So here is the bottom of the glass.

Measuring performance is not as simple as looking at a couple of metrics and deciding whether results are good or bad. There are many layers to this analysis. You do not need to paralyze yourself by reviewing every possible layer every time, but you should understand that these layers exist.

Do the extra digging when that digging is needed. Be a sophisticated advertiser who looks beyond surface-level results. Be curious and ask questions. Do not trust results that seem too good to be true or impossibly bad. Keep digging.

One of the most useful tools I mentioned is Compare Attribution Settings. I wrote a blog post about my four favorite ways to get better reporting with this tool. Read it at jonloomer.com/compare.