When is the right time to turn off Facebook Ads?

Hey,

Knowing when to turn off a Facebook Ads Campaign, Ad Set or Ad can lead to some pretty tough decisions.

One of the biggest issues I see authors making with their Facebook Ads (and trust me, I've done this plenty of times too), is turning things off way too soon.

So, when is the right time to turn off a Facebook Ad? How long should you let things run? A day, a week, a month, 2 months?

The Facebook Ads Learning Phase

First of all, it’s important to understand that all Facebook Ads go through something called the Learning Phase, where Facebook is figuring out which Ads are going to resonate the most with which people in your target audience.

And it’s learning how to achieve the best possible results for your chosen objective, for the lowest possible cost.

This process is vitally important to allow your Facebook Ads to function at full efficiency and it generally takes anywhere between 1-3 days to complete and exit the Learning Phase, depending on your budget.

To exit the Learning Phase, an Ad Set needs 50 conversion events, in our case, 50 clicks.

During the Learning Phase, you may see your results fluctuate a little, such as higher CPCs (Cost-Per-Clicks), and lower CTRs (Click-Through-Rates). This is perfectly normal.

I'll quite often see CPCs above $0.30 during the Learning Phase, which is pretty high for my liking. Once out of the Learning Phase, however, CPCs drop to around $0.20, all the way down to $0.10.

Once the Learning Phase is complete, your results will start to stabilize, improve and be less sporadic, provided you’re targeting relevant audiences and have great Ad Creative that resonates with your target audience.

It’s important that during the Learning Phase, you don’t touch your Facebook Ads at all - this could have a negative impact on your Facebook Ads and in a lot of cases, will reset the Learning Phase. Actions such as:

– Any change to targeting

– Any change to Ad Creative

– Adding a new Ad into an Ad Set

Will reset the Learning Phase and slow down your results.

When To Turn Off Facebook Ads

Theoretically, you could turn off a Campaign, Ad Set or Ad immediately after the Learning Phase is complete.

But Facebook Ads are like a good cheese or a good wine - they improve with age, upto a certain point! 

I like to let Ads run for 7 days.

Personally, I set things up on a Monday morning and let them run until the following Monday morning, when I come in and optimize the Ads again, create new Ads and Ad Sets and let things run for another 7 days.

If I see that an Ad or Ad Set isn’t performing after 4 or 5 days, i.e. high CPCs, low CTRs, I may come in and optimize things, but it’s very rare that I'll do that.

Understanding Ad Variance

Another thing to keep in mind is something known as Ad Variance. I recently wrote about Ad Variance here, in a previous edition of The Morning ACOS.

Ad Variance simply means that the performance and metrics of your Ads are going to vary on a daily basis, and that’s ok. Ads are a long-term game!

Although daily metrics are important to track and keep an eye on, it’s how your Ads perform over an extended period of time that matters most.

I’ve run Ads where one day the CTR is 0.97% and the next, it’s up to 4.3% CTR

For some Ads I’ve had a $0.60 CPC and a day or so later, the CPC has dropped down to $0.15

And I’m comfortable with that! 

Unless an Ad has had a high CPC, low CTR, or zero conversions (i.e. sales and page reads) for 7 days consistently, I’m not worried! And if it isn't performing well for that amount of time, I can just turn it off - you are in full control of what you spend and where you spend it - never forget that.

And it’s not wasted money either if that’s crossing your mind - you’re buying data! You’re paying money to figure out what works and what doesn’t work.

So, that's what I've got for you today...

TL;DR (Too Long; Didn't Read)

– Remember, your Facebook Ads go through a Learning Phase (1-3 days)

– Don't touch your Ads during the Learning Phase

– Performance will be less than desirable during the Learning Phase

– Let your Ads run for 7 days untouched

– Optimize your Facebook Ads once per week (ideally on the same day each week)

– Check on your Ads daily, but don't "optimize" daily

– Keep Ad Variance in mind; performance will vary day to day

– It's the results over an extended period of time that matters most, not the day to day

To Your Success

– Matt