Facebook & Instagram Advertising (Meta Ads)

On Google, people search; on Facebook & Instagram, they discover. That's where desire for your product or service is built — often before the customer even realizes they need it. It's the channel where you create demand, not just wait for it.

The "boost post" option offered by the platform itself is just the tip of the iceberg. The real power of Meta Ads lies in proper campaign structure, targeting, and — above all — the creatives.

We build full-funnel campaigns: prospecting to reach new audiences, remarketing to close the sale, and creatives (graphics & reels) that actually sell. All with reliable measurement through Conversion API.

We are certified Meta Partners and work data-driven: we continuously test creatives & audiences, keep what performs, and optimize your ROAS, as we do for the Daskalakis Jewellery eShop.

Advantage+ Sales or a manual structure? When do we let the algorithm decide?

Meta pushes everything towards Advantage+: broad audiences, automatic placements, one campaign for everything. It works impressively when it has something to learn from, meaning purchase history in the Pixel and the Conversions API, a connected product catalogue and enough different creatives. And it fails quietly when it does not, because "broad" without purchase data simply means cheap clicks from the wrong people.

The structure we build for an eShop

One Advantage+ Sales campaign for prospecting, with the catalogue connected, an existing-customer budget cap (so the algorithm does not "rest" by selling to people who would have bought anyway) and six to ten live creatives. Next to it, a testing campaign with budget per ad set (ABO), where every ad set changes a single variable: the angle, the format or the offer. Winners move into Advantage+. And a remarketing campaign with dynamic product ads for people who viewed a product or left a cart, with exclusions towards prospecting, so you never pay twice for the same person.

When we do not leave the algorithm alone

Lead generation for services, local businesses working a radius around the shop, B2B, and new accounts with no conversion history. There the structure is manual, with clearly defined audiences and optimisation on the event that carries real value, not the cheapest one. As data accumulates, we open up targeting step by step.

How do we test creatives systematically?

In Meta Ads the creative is the targeting. The algorithm shows each video to the people who react to it, so changing the creative effectively changes your audience. That is why we do not test a "nice" image against a "less nice" one, but message angles and formats, with discipline.

The weekly routine

We start from three message angles, such as problem and solution, social proof with reviews or UGC, and offer or value proposition, and produce them in three formats: reel or UGC video in 9:16, static image and carousel. Every week two to four new creatives enter the testing campaign. In video we judge the hook first with thumbstop rate, 3-second views over impressions, then the message with hold rate, interest with CTR and, finally, cost per purchase. Anything that spends above the target cost without a purchase is paused. Winners do not stay as they are: we produce variants with a new hook on the same body, because even the best creative wears out.

How we know it has worn out: frequency rises and CTR drops in the same week. The answer is a new angle, not more budget. We combine UGC material, which wins the hook, with studio material, which shows the product properly, and write primary text that states the price and the reason to buy in the first line.

Conversions API: why the Pixel alone is not enough

The Pixel runs in the user's browser. iOS App Tracking Transparency, ad blockers, Safari and cookie banners mean a significant share of purchases never reaches Meta. Without that data the algorithm optimises with half the picture and reporting shows a lower ROAS than the real one, so you cut campaigns that are actually working.

How we set it up

The Conversions API sends the same events (ViewContent, AddToCart, InitiateCheckout, Purchase) from the eShop server, either through a WooCommerce plugin or through server-side Google Tag Manager for custom platforms. Each event leaves both from the browser and from the server with the same event_id, so Meta deduplicates and counts one purchase, not two. Along with it we send hashed customer details such as email, phone, name and city, which raise Event Match Quality and make remarketing more accurate. Purchase always carries value and currency, otherwise Advantage+ cannot optimise for ROAS.

Before opening any budget we verify every event's route in Events Manager with the test events tool, the browser-to-server ratio and the EMQ score. If we build the store, all of this is part of the eCommerce development from day one.

Audience targeting and frequency: broad, lookalike or interests?

Interests are now the least useful targeting tool. With Advantage+ audience, Meta treats them as a suggestion and moves beyond them as soon as it finds better buyers. Real targeting is done by the creative and by the purchase data the Conversions API sends. Custom audiences, however, keep two jobs nobody is retiring: remarketing and exclusions.

How we build the audiences

In prospecting we go broad, with a purchaser lookalike as a starting signal in new accounts and a geographic radius where the business is local. Mid-funnel we collect people who watched 50% of a video, engaged with your profile or opened a lead form in the last 30 to 90 days, and show them a new angle for the same product. At the bottom, people who viewed a product or left a cart in the last 7 to 30 days see dynamic product ads with the exact item. Purchasers are excluded from prospecting for 180 days and worked separately with retention: cross-sell, repeat purchase, new collections.

Frequency is read per stage. In prospecting it should stay low; when it climbs and CTR falls, the audience is tired of the creative. In remarketing we tolerate higher frequency, but in awareness campaigns with a reach objective we set a frequency cap, so you do not pay for the tenth impression to the same person.

How much does advertising on Facebook and Instagram cost?

As with Google, there are two separate costs: the spend paid to Meta, which you set and can change daily, and the management fee. Creative production, photography, filming and editing, is priced separately depending on the material needed.

What shapes the cost

CPM, the cost per thousand impressions, is set by the auction: how many advertisers want the same audience in the same season. The fourth quarter, with Black Friday and Christmas, is consistently the most expensive. CTR is set by the creative, and conversion rate by your eShop: speed, checkout, shipping costs. When cost per purchase is high, the diagram shows which of the three factors is to blame, and we fix it there, not with more budget.

To exit the learning phase, Meta's indicative guidance is roughly 50 optimisation events per ad set per week. On a small budget, then, we do not build ten ad sets of a few euros each; we build one or two, optimise for Purchase rather than traffic, and put all creatives together. For small businesses, our social media management packages include Meta Ads management for monthly budgets up to €1,200. For larger budgets and eShops, request a quote with your numbers.