CPA CPC and CPM explained

Whether you are interested in advertising for your website or showing ads on your website to generate revenue from your website. The terms CPA, CPC, and CPM are all terms you will readily come across. In this blog post we will explain the difference between them and how you can use them for your website or business.

Advertisements can ensure that you get the necessary revenue from your website, whether this is by displaying ads on your WordPress website or other Content Management System. Or advertising your website hosting and services on the Display network or in Google search. Advertisements can be a godsend for many to generate first sales in the initial period of a business launch. And also for existing businesses to bring in new customers.

Almost every online business or webshop advertises with Google or another advertiser to bring in new customers where needed. The way of advertising can be described with the following metrics in the Display network, and also to some extent in the Google search network.

CPA Cost per Acquisition

Cost per acquisition is an advertising model where an action is required from the one who serves the ad. After an ad has been clicked on by a user another action needs to be performed before you earn or spend money on it. For example by joining a newsletter, leaving an email address or phone number for later contact by a company. Or a request for a quotation. Once these actions are carried out you receive income as a publisher from ads on your website. These are often the higher class of income through advertisements, as they are also the most difficult for the end user.

A click or a view is much easier than an action that needs to be carried out.

CPC cost per click

The cost per click is the most common in the ad networks, with a click on the ad in a website visitors are redirected to the page where they need to be. This can be a separate landing page, the storefront or a request for a quote. As soon as the ad is clicked the revenue from this is in. And so you spend here as an advertiser.

This way of advertising is also very popular in the Google search network. And once you do a search for any term you will often see the first 4 results as ads. So if a user clicks on these then there will be an immediate cost associated with this. Regardless of what the user does next. Like leaving the website directly.

CPC can add up quite quickly in costs and is therefore often the largest part of an advertising budget for many. However, it is possible to measure it directly and quickly, and you can keep track of the conversion per click. For publishers, this is also an important advertisement to have on the website, since a simple click already ensures income. These advertisements are often placed via the display network of Google or others, but they can also be arranged directly between publishers and advertisers.

CPM Cost per mille

CPM is not Cost per million, mille stems from the Latin name for 1000. So you do not need 1 million website visitors to earn 4 euros as a publisher. CPM bids are the impressions that are generated. If an advertisement is 50% in the view of the end user for one second, then this already counts as an impression. If this is subsequently viewed 999 times, then a certain amount of money is paid in return. However, there are also some further rules for this. It is not always necessary to be able to show an advertisement 1000 times. This can also be many times less.

Google Display network or Google Search network

These are the three forms of bidding that occur most frequently in the advertising network. Not only from Google, but also from some other ad networks. Whether you are the website owner who sees ads as a source of income, or you own a web shop and advertise on those websites. Advertising and the Internet go hand in hand.

The Google Display network is easily realized on a website by joining the Google AdSense network. After this you can immediately publish ads on your website and make sure that you can generate income from this. Once you want to advertise on other websites for your company, you can use the Google Display network.

The Google Search network will not be so much of an issue for the publisher for the advertisements. For the search engine marketer among us this is of course extremely important. Where else can you target potential customers who are searching for a specific product? Of course, that's hard not to advertise through Google.