FBX vs. Web Retargeting: Digging Deeper in the AdRoll Study
Published: February 26, 2013
Author: Adam Berke
Facebook Exchange (FBX) was quite possibly the most significant announcement in the online advertising world last year. Advertisers of all sizes continue to be thrilled with the performance, and it’s certainly becoming an essential channel to include as part of any optimally effective and comprehensive retargeting campaign.
Last week, AdRoll released some unique data around FBX that has drummed up some good conversations. We thought we’d take a deeper dive into that data for the FBPPC.com community.
One main question that arose was why we didn’t include ROI as a metric – after all, isn’t that the most important metric? Fair point! The reason we didn’t include ROI in the first place is that more than any other data point, ROI is measured in different ways by different advertisers. Some of our customers utilize sophisticated multi-touch attribution models, others still use last-click, and some even rely solely on CPC. Even the expression of the ROI metric varies! Some marketers focus on ROAS; some look at an ROI multiple and some a blended CPA. For that reason, we didn’t feel comfortable making a sweeping statement about ROI across these 468 customers since there was so much variability in how they measure it.
That said, we can draw some general conclusions that we’re comfortable sharing. First off, when we initially looked at FBX ROI during the beta period, we found that advertisers saw a 16x ROI based on a blended attribution model. That stacks up extremely favorably compared to standard web retargeting, which typically sees an 8-10X ROI based on the same attribution model. Since that point, we continue to see extremely strong performance on FBX. In particular, using our dynamic ad product, LiquidAds, one apparel client saw a 18% lift in click conversion rate and 2X the conversions overall compared to their static FBX campaign. This is why customers are implementing FBX at a breakneck pace that far outpaces the growth of standard web retargeting. This is evident in the impressions breakdown by month across all of our advertisers where 63% of the impressions are now on FBX vs. 37% on standard display.
Since its initial launch last year, we (and most other partners involved in the original beta program) have been vocal about the remarkable results our customers have achieved through FBX. With additional innovations such as dynamic creative, these results have only improved, and the product development is showing no signs of slowing down. We look forward to announcing additional product enhancements that will only take this exciting new channel even further.
– Adam Berke
