Facebook Ad Spend Climbed In Q4, But Google Outpaced Its Growth

Nanigans released its Global Facebook Advertising Benchmark Report for Q4, which it says delivered strong return on Facebook ad spend for retailers, as purchase rates and average order values soared.

The report found that ad budgets continued to climb, retailers generated higher revenues, and advertisers increased their investment in video.

“Across sectors, marketers continue to derive value from Facebook, as demonstrated by the continuing trend of growing ad budgets,” the report says. “A significant majority of advertisers using Nanigans over the past two quarters increased their spending during Q4, with same-advertiser ad spend growing by an average of 11%. This follows a 16% quarter over quarter increase in Q3 2015.”

“Expectations were high for online retailers in Q4 2015, according to a NRF survey,” it says. “Quarter-over-quarter retailers saw substantial increases in key revenue metrics on Facebook. Among the top ecommerce companies using Nanigans advertising automation software, same advertiser purchase rates (68%), average order value (49%), and return on ad spend (87%)from Facebook all jumped by double digit percentages.”

Overall video ad spend growth was up 41% quarter over quarter with mobile video ad spend growth up 44%. Non-US video ad spend growth was 86% and non-US was 94%.

There was also a 210% quarter-over-quarter increase in advertising using dynamic product ads and a 34% increase in carousel ad spend. Here’s some CTR, CPC, and CPM data from the report:

You can find the full report here.

Another report from IgnitionOne finds that Google outpaced Facebook in spend growth. U.S. paid search was up 18% year-over-year, according to that.

“Google’s shift to shopping ads in a carousel format has led to an overall decrease in CPC growth, particularly in mobile, which saw CPCs down by -21%,” a spokesperson for IgnitionOne tells us.

The report also found automotive saw a 66% increase in spend and a 58% increase in clicks year-over-year.

Images via Thinkstock, Nanigans