Beginner’s Guide to Social Media Advertising: Which Platform to Choose + Costs of Each

Raise your hand if you’ve ever bought something you saw in a social media ad. Looking at you, my favorite lamp, candle, timer, and headphones (um, yeah, I might have a problem). 🙋‍♀️

I’m far from alone: 43% of participants in a Disqo survey said they’ve purchased a product they saw in a social media advertisement. This hefty number makes sense — their product of choice was likely targeted directly at them. 

Social media advertising can be an excellent way to reach more people with more precision than organic marketing allows.

But if you’ve not run social media advertising campaigns before, it can be challenging to figure out which platforms you should invest in, what kind of ads you should run, and how much money you need to begin.

In this article, we’ll cover everything from what social media advertising is to how you can start running ads on social and how to make the most of your investment.

What is social media advertising?

Social media advertising is a digital marketing strategy where you use ads on social media platforms to reach your target demographics. Think of the posts that appear on your feed with a “sponsored” label.

Instead of relying on algorithms to push your posts in front of the right people, social media advertising gives you back the control to bypass the algorithm and reach your target audience directly using paid ads.

Social media ads are a great addition to your organic social media marketing strategy. In fact, your organic marketing can help you understand what your audience loves — by extension, helping you improve your social media advertising efforts.

5 benefits of social media advertising

Should you consider running ads on social media? If you have the budget, a carefully crafted social media advertising strategy can go a long way. Here are its top five benefits:

1. Reach more of the right people 

Social media ads don’t just expand your reach, they allow you to target your potential customers with accuracy — you can choose demographics, user behavior, location, and more. Advanced social media advertising tactics even include retargeting people who’ve already interacted with your website or social media posts!

2. Adjust your spending in real-time

Social media advertising allows you to understand what’s working quickly and tweak your campaigns based on feedback. This can minimize learning costs — especially compared to traditional advertising. 

Most social media platforms also allow you to start advertising spend at a minimal amount and scale as you learn more. This flexibility also helps when you want to adjust the spending on social ads depending on season, budget, etc.

3. In-depth analytics

It’s hard to prove the impact of your organic social media marketing efforts. But in social media ads, you can easily calculate your return on investment (ROI) to report and improve your campaigns.

4. Flexible formats

Most social media platforms offer various ad formats so you can choose the one you’re most comfortable with and spend money on high-ROI media types.

5. Bypass the algorithm

Social media ads allow you to bypass the algorithm by blending into your audience’s feed and building awareness more quickly than you would with organic social media marketing alone.

If that wasn’t enough to convince you, these social media advertising stats speak for themselves:

• 74% of marketers say they find social media advertising effective.
• Social media advertising spend will reach 345 billion dollars (!!) by 2029.
• 83% of total social media advertisement spending will be generated through mobile by 2029.

The biggest obstacle to social media advertising for marketers is the lack of understanding of the investment required. The next section will help you understand the budget you need to start running ads on social networks.

How much does social media advertising cost?

According to a study by WebFX, marketers spend anywhere between $850 to $2,000 per month on social media advertising. This is 11–25% of their overall digital advertising budget.

How much you will spend on running, optimising, and managing social media ads depends on the following factors:

• Ad format and placement: Different ad formats are priced differently depending on how much they engage the audience. Video ads and interactive ads cost more than image ads, for instance. Similarly, many social media platforms also adjust prices depending on where you place your ads (feed, stories, search results, etc.)
• Industry: If you’re in a competitive industry or a small niche, you might need more precise audience targeting — inflating the costs.
• Campaign ob