It’s easy to get caught up in the trap of overspending! It might be hard to believe, but sometimes tech companies’ motives aren’t aligned with yours 😂
Meta legit told me on a support chat one day I should expand the suggested audience size to one million and told me the ad wouldn’t work with audience sizes below 100,000 people. I always keep my audience sizes below 100,000 as I’ve found that beyond that, you need to spend quite a lot to get market penetration. For some gyms, getting an audience above 100K would mean expanding the target area way beyond any reasonable travel distance.
My recommended spend for client is $1 (or €1 or £1) per 10,000 people in your estimated audience size per day with a minimum spend of $5/day. You can increase this to $2/day but rarely have I seen any benefit to going beyond this. This allows you to get in front of potential customers without over exposure.
Meta will always spend your money. Even if you have an audience size of 100,000 people or above, your ad will be relevant to a small percentage. Once Meta has shown that ad to them, it will start expanding out to people outside your age bracket, location, or even interest. If you’ve ever seen an ad that’s completely irrelevant to you, this is probably why.
At $1/day spend, your ad will get shown to the relevant market at least once a day. It mightn’t be the first ad, but it will be in the top 2-4. Depending on how active the user is, they may see it more or less.
Beyond $2/day, I’ve found that your link click through rate goes way down, and your cost per lead starts to rise considerably. Also, with a high spend you will need to update your ads more often, as your audience will suffer from creative fatigue.
So why do Meta and some marketing companies recommend it? For Meta, it’s to increase their revenue numbers 🤷🏻♂️ Marketing companies will recommend high spend as a strategy to guarantee your ad is omnipresent. It will mean your ad is shown first, and multiple times, but not necessarily lead to conversions. I prefer a strategy that doesn’t break the bank and gives you a steady supply of leads, rather than feast or famine.