Meta Ads and agency glossary

A

• A/B test

  A test that compares two versions that differ in one way, with the audience split between them.
  Creative
• ABO

  Ad set budget optimization: budgets set separately for each ad set.
  Delivery and budget
• Ad

  The creative and copy people actually see, inside an ad set.
  Account structure
• Ad account

  The account in Meta that holds your campaigns, billing and settings.
  Account structure
• Ad delivery

  How and whether your ads are shown to people.
  Delivery and budget
• Ad set

  The middle level of the ad structure, where you set audience, placements, schedule and often budget.
  Account structure
• AOV

  Average order value: the average amount spent per order.
  Metrics
• Attribution window

  The period after someone sees or clicks an ad during which a conversion is credited to it.
  Tracking
• Audience exclusion

  Removing a group from an audience so they do not see an ad.
  Account structure
• Audience fatigue

  When an audience has seen your ads enough that they stop responding.
  Delivery and budget

B

• Bid strategy

  The rule that tells Meta how to spend your budget to get results.
  Delivery and budget
• Break-even ROAS

  The ROAS at which ad spend exactly equals the gross profit it brings in.
  Metrics
• Broad targeting

  Letting Meta find the audience with few or no interest or demographic restrictions.
  Account structure
• Budget pacing

  Whether spend is on track to use the monthly budget evenly across the month.
  Delivery and budget
• Business Manager

  Meta's tool for managing a business's ad accounts, Pages, pixels and who can access them.
  Tracking

C

• Campaign

  The top level of the ad structure, where you choose the objective.
  Account structure
• Campaign objective

  The goal you choose for a campaign, such as leads, sales or traffic.
  Account structure
• CBO

  Campaign budget optimization: one budget set at the campaign level that Meta spreads across its ad sets.
  Delivery and budget
• Client onboarding

  The steps that take a new client from signed agreement to a well-run first month.
  Agency operations
• Conversion event

  An action on a site or app that you tell Meta to count, such as a purchase or a lead.
  Tracking
• Conversion rate

  The share of visitors or clicks that complete the action you want.
  Metrics
• Conversions API

  A way for a website or server to send events to Meta directly, alongside or instead of the pixel.
  Tracking
• Cost cap

  A bid control that aims to keep the average cost per result near a limit you set.
  Delivery and budget
• Cost per result

  Spend divided by the results Meta counts for the ad set's chosen optimisation goal.
  Metrics
• CPA

  Cost per acquisition: the average cost to get one customer or conversion.
  Metrics
• CPC

  Cost per click: what you pay on average for each click on your ads.
  Metrics
• CPL

  Cost per lead: the average cost to get one lead.
  Metrics
• CPM

  Cost per thousand impressions: what you pay for 1,000 ad views.
  Metrics
• Creative fatigue

  When a particular ad stops performing because the audience has seen it too often.
  Delivery and budget
• Creative testing

  Running different ads against each other to learn what works.
  Creative
• CTR

  Click-through rate: the share of impressions that led to a click.
  Metrics
• Custom audience

  An audience built from people who already know the business, such as customers, site visitors or engaged users.
  Account structure

D

• Daily budget

  The average amount you are willing to spend on a campaign or ad set each day.
  Delivery and budget
• Domain verification

  Proving to Meta that a business owns a website domain.
  Tracking

F

• Frequency

  The average number of times each person saw your ad.
  Metrics

H

• Health score

  A single score that summarises how a client account is performing against its own recent average.
  Agency operations
• Hold rate

  The share of 3-second viewers who kept watching to a longer mark, often measured as ThruPlays.
  Metrics
• Hook rate

  The share of impressions of a video ad that became a 3-second video view.
  Metrics

I

• Impressions

  The number of times your ads were shown on screen.
  Metrics

K

• Key-person risk

  The risk that important knowledge or relationships live with one person.
  Agency operations

L

• Learning limited

  A status meaning an ad set is not getting enough results to exit the learning phase.
  Delivery and budget
• Learning phase

  The period after an ad set launches or is significantly edited, while Meta works out who to show it to.
  Delivery and budget
• Lifetime budget

  The total amount you are willing to spend over a set schedule.
  Delivery and budget
• Link click

  A click on a link in your ad that takes someone to the destination you set.
  Metrics
• Lookalike audience

  An audience of people who resemble a source audience you provide.
  Account structure

M

• MCP

  Model Context Protocol: an open standard that lets AI tools read from and act on external services.
  Agency operations
• Media buying

  Planning and purchasing advertising space or ad delivery for a client.
  Agency operations
• Meta Pixel

  A piece of code on a website that reports visitor actions back to Meta.
  Tracking

O

• Outbound CTR

  The share of impressions that led to a click that took someone away from Meta to your destination.
  Metrics

P

• Percent-of-spend fee

  An agency fee set as a share of the client's ad spend.
  Agency operations
• Performance marketing

  Marketing where spend is tied to measurable outcomes, such as leads or sales.
  Agency operations
• Placements

  The places your ads can appear, such as feeds, Stories and Reels.
  Account structure

R

• Reach

  The number of unique people or accounts that saw your ads at least once.
  Metrics
• Retainer

  A fixed monthly fee for a defined scope of work.
  Agency operations
• Retargeting

  Showing ads to people who have already interacted with the business.
  Account structure
• ROAS

  Return on ad spend: the revenue you get for each unit spent on ads.
  Metrics

T

• ThruPlay

  A video view counted when someone watches to the end or for at least a set length, as Meta defines it.
  Metrics

U

• UTM parameters

  Tags added to a link that tell analytics tools where a visit came from.
  Tracking

W

• Wasted spend

  Ad spend that is very unlikely to produce a useful result.
  Delivery and budget
• White-label report

  A client report that carries the agency's own name and branding.
  Agency operations