Meta Ads Consultant

Meta Ads Consultant
for Ecommerce Brands

Facebook and Instagram, built and run by one person. Most accounts I take over are not losing money because of bidding — they are losing it because the creative stopped working and nobody noticed, or because the pixel has been reporting fiction since iOS 14.

Book a Discovery Call
What It Costs

The Problem

Why Does Meta Not
Work Like Google?

On Google, someone is already looking for what you sell and the job is to be there efficiently. On Meta, nobody asked. The ad has to create the want.

Which means the lever that matters most is not the bid, the budget or the campaign structure. It is whether this week’s creative is better than last week’s.

Meta’s algorithm is very good at finding buyers for an ad that works, and completely unable to rescue one that does not. Most of the accounts I inherit have a tidy structure and four ads that have been running since spring. What it has to work from is signal: the Meta Pixel and the events behind it decide which buyers it can even look for, so a creative problem and a tracking problem look identical in the dashboard.

The Structure

Who Should You
Actually Be Targeting?

Budget split is the second decision, after creative. These are the shares I start from and then argue with using your own data.

Cold

They have never heard of you

Broad and interest-led prospecting carrying your strongest creative. This is where nearly all the learning happens and where most accounts underspend because the return looks worse in-platform. It looks worse in-platform partly because the platform and your analytics disagree about what counts as a Meta visit — Analytics files it under a default channel group of its own.

Warm

They engaged but did not buy

Video viewers, engagers, site visitors. Different message: not who you are, but why now. Usually the cheapest incremental revenue in the account.

Hot

They added to cart and left

Dynamic product ads and abandoned-cart retargeting. Excellent returns and the easiest place to fool yourself, because much of it would have converted anyway. Meta’s Conversions API improves what gets attributed here, which makes the numbers better and the self-deception easier, not harder.

The percentages are a starting position, not a rule. An account with a strong email programme can carry less retargeting; a brand nobody knows yet needs more cold.

The Work

What Does Running
Meta Actually Involve?

What has to be set up once?

  • Pixel and Conversions API, server-side, deduplicated
  • Catalogue and feed health for dynamic product ads
  • Domain verification and aggregated event measurement
  • Attribution settings agreed with you, not left on default

What happens every week?

  • New creative concepts into testing on a fixed rhythm
  • Winners scaled, losers cut before they drain the budget
  • Audience and placement checks, budget moved to what earns
  • A monthly report you can read in five minutes, and a call

I do not produce creative in volume. I direct it — concepts, briefs, angles and the decision about what gets made next — and I will bring in an editor or a UGC creator at cost when the account needs one. If you need a studio, an agency is genuinely the better buy.

Proof

What Do the Results
Actually Look Like?

Pulled from live ad accounts, not estimated. Every figure covers the last 24 months. Real brands, real numbers, named.

3.6x

Shurhold — Google and Meta run together, seven years on the account

17.5x

The Lifeguard Store — spend scaled from $1,500 to $14,600 a month

44%

Revenue growth at Shurhold while spend rose 35%

Meta rarely works in isolation for ecommerce. The accounts above run it alongside Google, which is why the tier prices additional channels at $500 rather than doubling the fee. The Google Ads side is here.

Channel Mix

Google Ads or Meta:
Which Comes First?

The wrong question, asked constantly. They are not substitutes — they buy different things, and the right split changes with spend.

Google AdsMeta Ads
What you are buyingExisting demand — someone already searchingNew demand — someone who was not looking
Intent at the clickHighLow to none
Creative dependenceLower — the feed and keywords do most of the workTotal — creative is the targeting
CeilingCapped by how many people searchHigher — the audience is not limited by search volume
Speed to learnFaster — search terms tell you immediatelySlower — needs creative volume to find what works
MeasurementCleanerHarder since iOS 14, needs CAPI
Start here ifPeople already search for what you sellYour product needs to be seen to be wanted

Most stores under about $20k a month should be on one channel done properly rather than two done badly. Above that, running only one is usually leaving the other’s job undone.

Audit

What Does a Meta
Ads Audit Cover?

Priced and published, so you can decide without booking a call first.

Every audit on this page is credited in full against your first month if you start a retainer within 30 days of the report being delivered. The audit is how we both find out whether there is enough here to work on together. If there is, the audit costs you nothing. If there is not, you keep the report and owe nothing further.

Meta Ads Audit

$250 one time

For an account where the numbers in Ads Manager do not match what you see in your store.

  • Account and campaign structure
  • Audience setup and overlap
  • Creative: what is running, and how long it has been running
  • Pixel and Conversions API setup
  • Findings written in the order they are worth fixing
  • Requires read access to the Meta account

Google & Meta Ad Audit

$400 one time

The Google Ads audit and the Meta Ads audit together, plus the part neither one can see alone.

  • Everything in the Google Ads audit
  • Everything in the Meta Ads audit
  • How both platforms are counting the same conversions
  • Requires read access to both accounts

Includes a walkthrough call

SPECTRUM — Full Marketing Audit

$1,500 one time

Both ads audits, plus the SEO audit, three competitor teardowns and a call where we go through every finding together.

  • A walkthrough call covering every finding
  • Everything in both ads audits
  • Full SEO audit, including Search Console and Analytics
  • Three competitor teardowns
  • Up to 250 pages
  • 7 to 10 business days

See the full SEO audit page →

The $1,500 full marketing audit is priced on the SEO page because it covers SEO as well as both ad platforms. It is the same audit either way.

Pricing

What Does It Cost
to Work Together?

Published, so you can rule me in or out without booking a call.

Channel Management

Starting at $1,500 /month

You own the plan. I run the channels.

  • Campaign build and management
  • Conversion tracking and reporting
  • Monthly performance call
  • SEO is not included at this tier
  • Additional channels +$500 each
  • Minimum ad spend $5,000/month
  • 6 month commitment

How one channel gets run →

Book a Call

Most Popular

Growth Partner

Starting at $4,000 /month

I own paid strategy end to end.

  • Everything in Channel Management
  • Every channel included, priced as one
  • SEO included: technical, on-page and content
  • Channel mix and budget allocation
  • Creative direction and briefs
  • Quarterly CRO roadmap
  • 25 hours a month included
  • Minimum ad spend $10,000/month
  • 3 months, then month to month

What owning the mix means →

Book a Call

Fractional CMO

Starting at $7,000 /month

I own the whole marketing function.

  • Everything in Growth Partner
  • Email, SEO and site direction
  • Contractor sourcing and management
  • Quarterly planning with you
  • 40 hours a month included
  • Minimum ad spend $20,000/month
  • 6 month commitment

What a Fractional CMO does →

Book a Call

FAQ

Questions About
Meta Ads

If yours is not here, ask it on the call.

What does a Meta ads consultant cost?
From $1,500 a month here for Meta alone, with a $5,000 monthly ad spend minimum. Adding Google or another channel is $500 each rather than a second full fee. Full pricing is above.
What does a Meta Ads audit cost?

$250 on its own, or $400 together with the Google Ads audit. The $1,500 full marketing audit adds SEO, three competitor teardowns and a walkthrough call, and is priced on the SEO page because it covers more than advertising. Every one of them is credited in full against your first month if you start a retainer within 30 days of the report being delivered.

Is my Meta pixel actually broken?
Very often, yes. Since iOS 14 the browser pixel alone under-reports badly, and most accounts I audit either never set up the Conversions API or set it up without deduplication, so conversions get double-counted. It is the first thing I check and usually the first thing I fix.
Do you make the creative?
I direct it rather than produce it in volume: concepts, briefs, angles, and deciding what gets made next. Where an account needs an editor or a UGC creator I bring one in and you pay them at cost. If you need a studio, an agency is the better buy and I will say so.
How long before Meta improves?
Tracking fixes show up within days. Creative takes longer, because you need enough tests to know what the winner looks like — usually four to six weeks before the pattern is clear.
Should I run Meta or Google first?
If you sell something people already search for, Google first: the demand exists and you only have to capture it. If you sell something people do not know they want, Meta, because it has to create the demand. Most brands past $1M need both.
Do I keep my ad account and pixel?
Always. Everything is set up under your own Business Manager and billing. If we stop working together you keep all of it, including the audiences and the learning.
How much do Facebook ads cost?
There is no list price. You set the budget, and what you pay per result is settled in an auction against everyone else who wants the same person’s attention, so the same campaign costs different amounts in different weeks. This is why published averages are close to useless: a cost per purchase that is comfortable on a $300 product is fatal on a $30 one. The number to work from is what your margin lets you pay for a customer, not what someone else reports paying.
What are Meta ads?
Meta ads are the paid placements Meta sells across Facebook, Instagram, Messenger and its Audience Network, bought and measured in one place through Meta Ads Manager. “Facebook ads” and “Meta ads” are the same product — the name changed with the company, and most advertisers still say Facebook.
Do Facebook ads work?
Yes, for products someone can be persuaded to want while they are scrolling, which covers most ecommerce. They are a poor fit for demand that already exists and is being typed into a search box, which is Google’s job. The failure I see most often is not that the ads stopped working: it is that they work, and the account still loses money, because the offer or the margin cannot carry what the auction charges for a customer.
How do Facebook ads work?
You give Meta a budget, a conversion event and creative, and its system finds people likely to trigger that event and bids for them. Nearly all of the targeting is now done by the system rather than by you, which leaves two things that actually decide the outcome: whether the conversion event you are optimising toward is tracked correctly, and whether the creative gives the system enough genuinely different things to test.
What is a good CPC for Facebook ads?
CPC is the wrong number to judge an account on. A cheap click that never buys is more expensive than a dear one that does, and chasing a lower CPC usually means buying worse traffic. Judge cost per purchase against your margin, and treat CPC as a diagnostic — if it moves sharply while everything else holds still, something changed in the auction or in your creative.
How do you scale Facebook ads?
By adding winners rather than by pushing budget into them. A large budget increase resets the learning a campaign has done and results get worse before they get better, so increases are staged. The honest constraint is that scale is limited by creative: an account with one winning ad cannot be scaled far, whatever the budget does.

Let’s Talk

Book a free 30 minute call. I will tell you what I would do with your accounts, whether or not you hire me.

Book a Discovery Call

30-minute strategy session

Prefer to Reach Out Directly?

Happy to talk it through over email or a quick call. I usually reply within a few hours on weekdays.

Who You Talk To

Me, Every Time

What to Expect

  • 30 minutes with me, not a salesperson
  • What I would change in your account first
  • No pitch deck, no obligation