Running PPC campaigns on Facebook Ads is unavoidable when you try to sell online. With more than three billion users monthly, Facebook Ads is one of the best-performing social media. It is best to use it when trying to overgrowth a business.
But you need more than just Facebook Ads for your business. You will also need a way to create a dashboard and analyze your campaign performance.
That's when Looker Studio comes in. Looker is a free tool developed by Google. It allows you to create charts and dig into your data quickly.
We will see in this tutorial how to create your first Facebook Ads report for Looker Studio.
First, you need to understand how Looker Studio works. You have two main entities: reports and data sources. A report uses a data source to access data and display it.
So let's create our Facebook Ads data source and then a report.
To create a data source, you must use a partner connector. You can learn more about data sources and connectors on this page.
To access our Facebook Ads connector for Looker Studio, follow this link, and click Connect in Looker Studio green button.
You arrive in the Facebook Ads connector in Looker Studio :
Once these three steps are over, you will access the configuration of the data source:
Then select the configuration (if you don't know what to choose, you can skip this part and modify it later, the default configuration will be applied).
For the left column:
For the right column:
Uncheck the Use report template for new report options. We want to start a blank new report.
Finally, click Connect on the top right to create your Facebook Ads data source on Looker Studio!
The next page you'll see is the field list of your data source. Every field you see here is usable in a report.
One last tip before creating your report: rename your data source at the top right. It will be easier to find later.
Now that your data source is configured, connected, and renamed, we can proceed.
From your Facebook Ads data source, click on Create report at the top right.
This new page is your new report. Start by renaming it at the top left.
You can learn more about this interface on this page.
Now we need to decide what we want our report to show and which metrics and dimensions I want to use.
Facebook Ads metrics:
I aim to lead the user on my website and make him purchase my product. So here's the list I will use :
These metrics will give me a good idea of my ads' performance. I could have included more metrics like the Leads and Cost per Lead or the Landing page views, but I did not want to surcharge my report. Instead, I might include them in a website focus page.
Custom metrics and custom events:
I won't use any custom metrics or custom events in this report, but you can find yours in your data source:
If you cannot find one, please ensure your data source is only connected to 1 account. Data sources created with multiple accounts will only have shared metrics and dimensions, therefore, not have the custom one.
Facebook Ads dimensions:
I choose all the metrics I need. Now, let's select the dimensions to break down these metrics:
Since IOs 14.5, it's irrelevant to use breakdowns like age, gender, and country. So instead, you better name your campaign and ad set with all these pieces of information and use calculated fields to extract them (this will be a subject for another blog post, link coming soon).
You can find the complete list of metrics and dimensions on the data source or in our academy.
We choose the metrics and dimensions, but before using them, we will just add a Date Range Selector.
Date range selector:
Add a date range selector to your report. It will let your viewers filter the temporality of the result display.
You can fix your default date range instead of the "last 28 days" used.
Now let's use the metrics and dimensions !
Scorecards:
To start, we will place a line of cards with the global metrics :
We place our first card. As I want to save time, we will add a style and copy this card instead of recreating it:
Now copy and paste this card and change the metric for Reach. You can repeat this action for every base metric.
For the calculated fields, proceed like this:
Here are the formulas for all calculated fields:
Once set up, we can align them perfectly :
Great, we finished the setup for overall metrics. Let's do the breakdown now!
Table:
We will use a table for the breakdown by Campaign name and Ads creative image:
Time series:
Let's use a time series for our evolution by day. I want to know two things:
To do so :
Filter by Objective:
Sometimes, even if your main goal is user purchases, you can define other objectives for some campaign (notoriety, for example). You can set up a dynamic filter with the different objective types by doing this:
You can find a complete template for Facebook Ads here. It is ready to go if you copy it using our Facebook Ads connector.
There is more template for Facebook Ads and other platform on our template list.
Now you need to learn how to share your reports, created from scratch or copied from the template. You will find a complete explanation of "How to share your report" following this link.
You can easily create a Facebook Ads report following these steps:
Get all your marketing data in your favorite data activation, database or reporting tools.