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In the attention economy, where supply is increasingly limited, social media marketing offers access to under-priced attention. In other words, marketing on social media is one of the most cost effective ways to reach your audience and strengthen your brand. So, how much does social media marketing cost? To understand the cost of marketing on social media you will need to distinguish between the types of marketing activities which can take place on these platforms.

1. Organic social: Content that is posted for free and appears on your brand’s account page and in the feeds of those who follow you.
2. Paid social: Content with ad spend behind it which will appear in the feeds of your target audience and on your brand’s account page if you wish.

For the sake of keeping your attention this article will start with number 2, paid social, and answer your questions about the cost of paid social media marketing.

Paid social Media Marketing

Why is the cost of social media marketing different on each platform?

The cost of ad space varies across platforms simply because there is a different audience behind each one. The audience you can reach on Instagram and Facebook for example is a mildly engaged, relaxed audience who are likely to be scrolling through their feeds just to pass the time. In contrast, LinkedIn’s audience is highly engaged. They are on the platform to find career opportunities, buyers, suppliers or partners. People spend time on Instagram and Facebook, but invest time on LinkedIn. For this reason advertising on LinkedIn is more expensive.

How does my audience affect my social media ad spend?

The size of your audience will also affect your recommended budget with larger audiences requiring larger amounts of ad spend. Additionally, the demographics of your audience including age, gender, and location will affect your costs as some groups are more “in demand”. When so many advertisers are trying to reach the same audience it makes sense that those willing to pay more will earn more ad space.

So, does the highest bidder always win?

No, it’s not just your budget that dictates whether or not your ad will be shown. Social media platforms want to display engaging, relevant and high quality ads on their platform so that users will continue to use them. In other words, ad space on social media is not always won with the highest bid, you need to show that your ad is adding value to the platform and its users.

What’s the minimum social media ad spend I can start with?

Facebook is a great platform to reach a wide range of audiences and you can start advertising on Facebook with as little as €5 a day! Your €5 is unlikely to revolutionise your marketing strategy, but it does allow you to experiment, test and most importantly learn. If you are seeing a good ROI in terms of brand awareness or even revenue then you should be very excited to see what happens when you start to scale that budget! Remember, in order to optimise your ads and learn what works for your audience you need to monitor your ads every day. If €5 is a totally inconsequential amount to your business, then you need to start with a figure that you will actually care about and invest your time in.

Now that we’ve looked at the cost of paid social media marketing, next week I’ll be diving into the cost of organic social media marketing. If you missed last weeks post and are interested in learning Neworld’s two golden rules for brands on social media click here! Additionally, if you want to explore the topic of budgeting for social media marketing further I would recommend checking out Ben Heath’s YouTube channel for some helpful tips.