Online Advertising Costs

Based on search terms and online behavior, digital advertising is more engaging, adaptable, and cost-effective than offline advertising like print, TV, and radio.

There is a multitude of channels associated with online advertising costs, for instance:

• Google Ads (for search and display advertising)
• Instagram
• Facebook
• Twitter
• YouTube

The trick is identifying which platforms work most effectively for connecting with your audience and to allocate funds appropriately. Keep in mind that setting an online advertising budget isn’t just about the cost-per-click or cost per impression for each channel. You will also need to spend money on the advertising design itself, such as a banner ad design cost.

Studying online advertising pricing models and having a strategy beforehand can help prevent your team from overspending. Create an advertising cost comparison chart of your different options. Ask design firms to provide a banner ad pricing guide to get a better sense of how much does it cost to make an advertisement.

A lot of digital advertising information is dominated by US-centric data, so make sure to take your location into account. For instance, if you’re a British company, specify “cost of online advertising UK” or “website banner advertising rates UK” to get the most relevant information.

Another benefit of online advertising is that you can monetize your digital assets (website, apps, etc) by hosting ads for non-competing brands. Determine the size of your online audience, your average monthly traffic, and consider the following:

• How much should I charge for advertising on my website?
• How much to charge for newsletter advertising?
• How much can I charge for ads on my blog?
• How much to charge for a link on my website?
• How much do banner ads pay?

Tools like a website advertising rates calculator can be useful for researching and establishing benchmarks.

Google Ads

Search advertising is a great way to directly target people looking online for your products or services. Meanwhile, display ads, also known as banner ads, are shown to your target audience across the digital landscape (not just when they’re searching for something).

Google handles over 90 percent of all search queries worldwide. So, if you’re involved in digital marketing, you need to be using Google Ads. This gives you access to Google’s search network, display network, and YouTube (covered in more depth later). Your ads will also run on the websites and apps of hundreds of Google’s search partners.

Google Ads uses a cost per click (CPC), cost per impression (CPM), or a cost per acquisition (CPA) model depending on the network and format. How much does it cost to advertise on a website will depend on multiple factors like traffic levels, competition, ad relevance, landing page quality, etc.

Constantly changing conditions means there are no standard website banner advertising rates. However, knowing the average cost of website advertising and search advertising using Google Ads can help give you a rough idea of what you might pay. For instance, the 2019 cost per click across all industries is $2.69 on the search network and the average CPM 2019 was $0.58 on the display network.

Google has many options for beginners to get started, but all the nuances mean things can get expensive if you don’t know what you’re doing. For this reason, partnering with an agency or consultant is recommended, even if you use Google.

Instagram Advertising

Since its inception in 2010, Instagram has turned from a simple photo-sharing app into a multi-billion dollar advertising juggernaut – especially for B2C brands. In addition to single image ads, the platform now offers a range of different ad formats, including carousel and collection ads, video ads, story ads, and even live streaming opportunities.

Currently, there are over one billion monthly Instagram users. And over 500 million people log-in every day. More than 80% of Instagram users follow at least one business. Furthermore, 60% have discovered a business or product using the platform. As you can see, Instagram can be a highly-targeted, visual way of marketing your business and engaging your audience.

So, how much does it cost to advertise on Instagram?

As with Google Ads, there is no set Instagram advertising cost. Rather, you establish an Instagram promotion budget, where the platform can only spend up to that amount for the ad campaign. When does Instagram charge for promotions will be determined by the duration of your campaign and how quickly the platform reaches your set billing threshold.

The system uses a sophisticated auction system, where your ad bid amount, relevancy score, and estimate action rates (i.e. how likely people are to convert) affect what you will have to pay for each click or impression. This is why if you search for something like “Instagram CPM 2019” or “how much does advertising cost on Instagram” you’ll only find rough instagram advertising estimates across different industries.

Facebook Advertising Costs

From its humble beginnings as a college social networking site, Facebook has grown into a global force in social media with over 2.6 billion active users. Facebook has also emerged as a popular online advertising channel for both B2B and B2C organizations, offering advanced demographic and location-based targeting, multiple ad formats, and even a classified section (Facebook Marketplace).

So, how much do Facebook ads cost?

How much does it cost to advertise on Facebook, including how much does it cost to advertise on Facebook Marketplace is determined by how much you want to spend. You set an advertising budget and Facebook’s ad system will try and get you as many results as possible for that amount.

The cost is influenced by a host of different factors, such as market conditions, ad objectives, industry, location, target demographics, format, etc. The number of different variables involved is why searches like “how much do Facebook ads cost 2019” or “how much do Facebook ads cost 2018” will only yield very general estimates.

Depending on your objectives, you can select from one of five different Facebook advertising cost structures:

• cost-per-like (CPL)
• cost-per-action (CPA)
• cost-per-view (CPV)
• cost-per-thousand-views (CPM)
• cost-per-click (CPC)

Of the options above, which one you should select will depend on your objectives. You can use the Facebook ad cost calculator to get a recommended budget for maximum results. This can be a useful tool for helping decide how much to spend on Facebook ads for your current campaign.

YouTube Advertising Costs

YouTube quickly became a hit after its 2005 US launch and was purchased by Google in 2006.

Currently, the platform has over 2 billion monthly users around the world, watching over a billion hours of video (which generates billions of views) every day. YouTube has also evolved into a popular online advertising channel for both B2B and B2C brands, where it generated approximately $15.1 billion in ad revenue in 2019.

But how much does it cost to advertise on YouTube?

Searching for something like “YouTube advertising cost 2019” or “YouTube advertising cost 2018” will quickly reveal that there is no definitive answer. This is because there are several ad opportunities with YouTube, such as in-stream ads, in search ads, in-display ads, mobile display only ads, etc. These different formats affect your YouTube advertising cost. For instance, a YouTube homepage ad cost will differ from non skippable YouTube ads cost.

Pricing on YouTube is auction-based, meaning your budget, various quality parameters, and competition will determine how much you pay. However, the typical video ad price varies between $0.10 to $0.30 per view for something like a TrueView ad. You can use a YouTube cost per view calculator to help you determine your advertising budget.

YouTube is a US-based company, meaning your business location can also dramatically influence YouTube advertising cost. For instance, the average cost of advertising on YouTube in India will be determined by bid, ad performance, etc, as well as on the US dollar to Indian Rupee exchange rate.

Social Media Advertising Costs

Today’s attention economy is fiercely competitive, especially when it comes to social media advertising. Every business is now producing content, but people only have so many hours in a day to consume it. However, the potential reward of social marketing makes it a worthwhile investment – if your brand has the strategy and quality content necessary to stand out from the “noise”.

Picking the right channel or mix of channels is important for a business and its advertising strategy. It also influences social media advertising cost. For instance, when looking at a social media management pricing packages PDF, you’ll generally find that social media marketing pricing plans change depending on the number of channels you want to use.

Social media advertising cost comparison can be a tricky thing. This is because social media advertising strategies won’t be the same for every business and depends on the location, vertical, size, industry, and stage of the business. For instance, social media advertising cost in India will be quite different from the US.

It could also be that you want to customize a plan with specific platforms not included in a social media pricing sheet. Ask potential firms questions like “how much does it cost to advertise on Twitter” or “how much does it cost to advertise on Snapchat” so you can develop a social media advertising cost comparison chart for your specific needs.

How much does it cost to advertise on social media is also affected by content format. You’ll find that social media post design price is higher for video content versus a text post because video is a more resource-intensive format. Focusing on a banner or ad design that stands out is also important, and it requires you to invest in people with strong design skills. Again, location comes into play, where a search for “banner ads cost India” will generate different results than “banner ads cost UK”.