As the year comes to an end, brands have certainly spent a great deal on ads, and overall ad spend is expected to reach $397 billion in the United States by the time 2024 comes to a close. It’s essential for advertisers to be aware of trends to allocate funds appropriately.
In our benchmarks report, we’ll review common ad performance metrics for Facebook ads across brands using Triple Whale to monitor and maximize their performance. This analysis includes 11,400 ad accounts and compares the period of 11/17/2024-12/16/2024 with 10/17/2024-11/16/2024. The metrics presented in the Facebook statistics also include Instagram ads together.
READ MORE | A Guide to Ecommerce Metrics
Additionally, we’ll break down the industry-specific trends, with data from the following industries:
When we compare the performance for Facebook Ads metrics for the period of 11/17/2024-12/16/2024 with 10/17/2024-11/16/2024, a few things stand out:
Campaigns that drive visitors (and potential customers) to a website or landing page are a common advertising strategy for many brands. Here, we present the average benchmarks for cost per click (CPC) for 12 industries tracking their advertising effectiveness with Triple Whale for the period of 11/17/2024-12/16/2024 compared to 10/17/2024-11/16/2024:
Cost-per-click was up across the board for all industries, which is expected during this period of high competition. The highest increase in CPC was in Food & Beverage (+69.44%). The lowest CPC increase was in Sporting Goods (+19.10%). Industries with significant CPC increases should ensure their ad campaigns optimize for high ROAS and to avoid overspending on broad, non-converting segments.
Every industry experienced a rise in CPM, reflecting the heightened competition during the peak holiday season (BFCM through to pre-Christmas shopping). The most significant increase was seen in Food & Beverage (+81.53%), followed by Clothing (+52.17%) and Fashion Accessories (+47.76%). Clothing and Fashion Accessories increases are likely driven by these products being highly giftable and sought out during this period.
The industries with the highest CPM were Art ($23.69) and Baby ($18.75). These industries likely face stiff competition driven by higher demand for premium giftable products during the holidays.
Since click-through rate (CTR) is the number of clicks your ad receives divided by the number of times your ad is shown, higher competition is expected to result in lower CTR values across industries.
There was a mixed performance across industries for CTR, with some industries showing increases (eg. Fashion Accessories (+12.12%), Food & Beverage (+6.59%), and Electronics (+4.06%)), while others like Books (-28.78%) and Health & Beauty (-15.31%) experienced significant declines.
A number of the industries that are expected to perform well during this ramp-up to the holiday gifting season experienced declines in CTR: Health & Beauty (-15.31%), Toys & Hobbies (-12.88%), and Clothing (-2.87%). It’s possible ads in these categories were oversaturated or had ineffective messaging.
While traffic campaigns are focused on clicks, a conversion-driven campaign strategy must drive actual sales. Depending on the type of industry, you will push for specific conversion rate benchmarks to secure the necessary amount of conversions to pad the bottom line.
Most industries experienced an increase in conversion rate during this period, which reflects improved audience targeting as well as strong purchase intent that is typical of the holiday season. Key standouts for increases include Books (+82.95%), Food & Beverage (+70.52%), and Clothing (+41.01%).
Fashion Accessories was the only industry to experience a decline (-10.86%), indicating a potential challenge with conversion-focused messaging or pricing.
Clothing had a strong increase in CVR (+41.01%), which suggests effective ad campaigns and optimized purchase experiences.
CPA on Facebook represents the cost Facebook charges for promoting content to a specific audience through link clicks, page visits, sign-ups, or app installations. A high CPA means the campaign is unsuccessful, whereas a lower CPA means you’re in the right territory.
Fashion Accessories (+48.28%) experienced the largest increase in CPA, indicating that acquisition costs surged significantly and there may be intense competition driving up costs.
Most industries saw moderate increases in CPA, like Art (+13.06%), Clothing (+11.59%), and Health & Beauty (+18.58%). This is again likely due to heightened competition in the holiday shopping season.
The lowest CPA was in Health & Beauty ($25.08), making it the most cost-effective category for acquisition despite higher CPA than the previous period (+18.58%).
Encouraging customers to spend more in a single order can have a positive impact on the overall revenue of a brand’s business, so increasing AOV should be the goal for any industry.
There was a significant increase in AOV for Fashion Accessories (+79.30%) to $149.61, which indicates this industry had success in targeting high-value customers and effectively upselling bundling strategies during the holiday season.
Food & Beverage had the highest decline in AOV (-19.11%), possibly due to promotional discounts, smaller purchases, or a shift toward acquiring new customers versus driving higher cart values.
Similarly, the AOV for Clothing also slightly declined (-4.61% to $90.49), potentially reflecting pricing strategies aimed at attracting new customers or competitive pressure during the holiday season.
The return on ad spend helps brands understand the efficiency of their marketing efforts. A higher value indicates better-quality ads.
The highest increase for ROAS was in Books (+120.00%), suggesting that its campaigns became significantly more efficient or that it is a high-intent gifting category.
Fashion Accessories also had a strong increase in ROAS (+21.18%) to 3.05, indicating ads in this category efficiently secured customers.
There were declines in ROAS for Clothing (-14.85%) and Food & Beverage (-18.78%), which may also reflect higher competition driving down the efficiency of ads.
With insights from over 11,000 advertisers across twelve different industries, these benchmarks can provide a peek into how Facebook ads performed in mid-November to mid-December, a high-competition period ahead of the holiday season. These benchmarks can provide a crucial reference for brands to optimize their Facebook ad strategies to ensure they maximize returns during this peak spending period.
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