Paid Advertising Terms: Facebook Ads

Like many industries, digital marketing is full of acronyms and terms that appear gibberish to outsiders. In today’s blog, instead of going over terms such as clickthrough rate and cost per click that are common to other advertising platforms, I’m going to focus on words and phrases unique to Facebook. Whether you’re new to Facebook advertising or a veteran, this glossary of current terms will help you understand some common Facebook ad terminology.

Account ID – A unique, 15 character ID of an advertising account

Ad Set – A group of one or more ads. Targeting is set at the ad set level

Ads Manager – Facebook’s basic tool to create and optimize campaigns, ad sets, and ads

Amount Spent – The amount your ads have spent in the specified time period (may be different than budget)

Audience – The group of people who potentially can see your ads

Audience Network – A network of mobile apps, websites, videos, and instant articles that Facebook has approved for running ads on

Billing Threshold – The amount spent on ads after which Facebook will bill you; varies by country; can be changed

Campaign – A group of one or more ad sets. Objectives are set at the campaign level

Campaign Objective – Choose between awareness (boost posts, promote your page, reach people near your business, increase brand awareness), consideration (send people to your website, get app installs, raise attendance at your event, get video views collect leads for your business), or conversion (increase website conversions, increase app engagement, get people to claim your offer, promote a product catalog)

Custom Audience – A type of audience you create and define that can be later be targeted

Daily Budget – The maximum amount your ad sets will spend per day on average

Delivery – Whether your campaign, ad set, or ad is running; different from status

Engagement – The number of actions that occur on your page, post, or app because of your ads

Frequency – The average number of times your ads were shown to each person

Impressions – The number of times your ad was seen; different from reach

Lifetime Budget – The maximum amount your ad sets will spend over the lifetime of an ad set or campaign

Lookalike Audiences – An audience created within Facebook that attempts to mirror another audience of your choosing

Page Engagement – The number of actions (e.g. likes, comments, shares, etc.) your Facebook Page received because of your ads

Page Likes – The number of likes your Facebook page received because of your ads

Page Mentions – The number of mentions your Facebook page received because of your ads

Post Engagement – The number of actions (e.g. likes, comments, shares, etc.) your post received because of your ads

Post Likes – The number of likes your post received because of your ads

Power Editor – Facebook’s advanced tool to create and optimize campaigns, ad sets, and ads

Reach – The number of people your ads have reached (different from impressions)

Results – The number of actions taken because of your ads, depending on the campaign objective

Status – Either on or off in regards to your campaigns, ad sets, or ads (different from delivery)

These are just a few of the many terms that you could come across as delve into the world of Facebook advertising. For those interested, Facebook offers a more complete ad term glossary. If even this basic list seems a bit daunting, contact the experts at Epic Marketing and we will take care of your advertising needs!