Maximizing the effectiveness of your Facebook ads can help you grow your business. Unfortunately, these ads can be expensive. Luckily, there are ways to lower your cost per acquisition of a sale or lead on Facebook. You do not need to sacrifice the quality of your ads, either.

1. Utilize Lookalike Audiences

Do not rely on a Facebook user’s interests alone to determine whether he or she is a potential buyer of your products.  Instead, create a lookalike audience by sending Facebook seed data of your prior patrons. Facebook will then use this information to find others on the social media network who are similar to these people. You can then target your ads to this audience.

Unfortunately, you need at least 100 datapoints to get a lookalike audience. For best results, you might need to provide Facebook with the names of several hundred or even a thousand people who have confirmed interest in your products.

This is pretty easy if you already have tons of sales. If you are just starting out with your business, create a lookalike audience based on the people who have liked your page, added your products to their carts or engaged with your posts.

2. Gather Data

Data helps you make important decisions about your Facebook ads. Facebook offers a Breakdowns feature that lets you see who is engaging with your content, when they are doing so, and how they are reacting.

Of course, some of these metrics are more valuable than others are. Pay particular attention to the CPA of each gender and age bracket. This should help you see what is working, and what you need to adjust.

The placement of your ads is also important. Facebook lets you see which ad location leads to the cheapest CPA. Typically, this is the mobile news feed on Instagram and Facebook. Your CPA should be fairly low for ads in the marketplace, as well.  

3. Do Split Testing

Split testing is another way to collect key data about your ads. Create several different versions of an ad and place all of them on the website. You may be surprised at which one does the best.

Facebook lets you spilt test your audience, as well. There will not be any overlap in this test, so you will not be competing against yourself.

The above steps should help you lower the CPA of your Facebook ads. This, in turn, will give you more money to put into other aspects of your business or your marketing campaign.