I need to get something off my chest. It’s a rant, so you’ve been warned.
Hey Facebook! Bid amount is NOT an advanced option
You’re a multi-billion dollar company now, with a market cap of over $289 billion (with a “B”) as of this writing. You have 1.55 billion (with a “B” again) active monthly users as of Sep. 30, 2015 and that includes an average of 1.01 billion daily active users.
Your advertising solution has been around for several years now. It’s not new and it’s not in beta. You passed 1 million advertisers in 2013 and now have over 2.5 million active advertisers.
I think we can all agree that you’re grown up and you’re a big boy advertising platform now. So why do I have beef? Look at this screenshot.
For those of you who don’t reflexively recognize it, this is a screenshot from the Facebook Ads interface where you edit your ad set (equivalent to an ad group). This is the Budget & Schedule area. Your budget is shown. That’s pretty basic. Your schedule is shown (as long as it’s continuous or a specific end date). Again, pretty basic and matches the heading. But then you’ll notice the “Show Advanced Options” link. Sounds scary right? I live on the edge, so I clicked it. Behold!
There in the “Advanced” area is where you find your cost/click bid. What? An argument can be made for some of the other stuff shown, but really? Your bid, that thing that tells Facebook what you pay when someone clicks your ad, is a hidden option?
That is an important setting and one that should be given high visibility. People should know what they’re bidding and be able to find it without expanding a set of advanced options. Am I wrong?
