How Much Do Agencies Charge for Facebook Ads? [Pricing + Services]

When it comes to ad budgets, you need your investment to deliver the highest return.

So, if you’re looking for Facebook ads agency pricing but aren’t sure where to start, in this article, we'll explain different pricing structures, monthly fees and associated costs you can expect to see.

Partnering with an experienced agency ensures your Facebook ad campaigns are researched, developed, and optimised for your brand’s goals and target audience – but how much do agencies charge for Facebook ads? It depends.

Luckily, as an award-winning agency ourselves, we understand the various pricing models that marketing agencies often charge for Facebook ad management services.

But the cost to advertise on Facebook through an agency fluctuates widely based on your brand’s budget and the agency’s price structure.

Use the guide below to plan your Facebook advertising budget and figure out if you should partner with an agency to manage your campaigns.

Each agency uses a different pricing structure for running Facebook ad campaigns. Quotes vary depending mostly on your budget and campaign expectations.

Monthly retainer fees

Agencies often work on a monthly ongoing basis, so you can expect them to propose a monthly retainer fee (that could either be fixed, or room for fluctuation) to keep up with basic ongoing tasks. Most agencies charge £1,000 for monthly retainers, but prices can range all the way up to £10,000 per month – mostly for enterprise clients.

This monthly fee may only include maintenance work like testing, optimising, and delivering reports on existing campaigns. Other agencies may include creatives, copy, and new campaigns in their monthly fee but as a fixed rate depending on ad budget.

Performance-based pricing

Some agencies and consultants charge based on performance. You might not pay for anything until the agency delivers results, and when/if they do, the agency takes a cut of your ROAS.

Make sure to ask how the agency determines performance, what kind of strategy they typically use, and prior results they’ve achieved.

Fixed fees

A Facebook ad agency might charge a fixed fee to make their services accessible to businesses of every budget.

A fixed monthly fee retainer won’t change, no matter the performance the agency is providing you or the level of monthly ad spend they manage for you.

Percentage of ad spend

It’s common for Facebook advertising agencies to charge a percentage-based fee of whatever you plan to spend on ads each month, usually in addition to a monthly fixed fee.

This percentage pricing ensures the agency can devote appropriate time and resources to companies with large budgets of £10,000 to £50,000 or more.

Companies with larger ad budgets need more campaigns, research, testing, and optimising to deliver the ROAS they expect. The percentage of ad spend pricing is often the best way to maximise your budget while ensuring the agency has an effective strategy (because they know you expect a hefty return).

The Social Shepherd’s Facebook advertising services include us switching to a percentage-based price for budgets over £10,000. This lets us offer our expertise to businesses with smaller budgets while maintaining the resources to serve companies with large budgets too.

Prices often fluctuate between agencies because each company requires a unique strategy to pull off successful campaigns.

Some factors an agency may consider in their quote:

• Expertise and strategy: More experience working with Facebook ad campaigns and delivering proven results comes with a higher price tag than someone off Upwork.
• Complexity: Enterprise company campaigns, advanced targeting, tracking across several platforms, and creative elements take extra time to perfect.
• Starting point: Existing ad campaigns, audience research, strategy, and creatives can either create more or less work for an agency depending on current results.

Budget: A company spending £20k per month expects more time, effort & thought than a company spending £1,000. High-budget complex campaigns require more research, configuration, creatives, and reporting.

It can be common for an agency to charge a setup fee – usually a flat rate reflected in your first month’s billing or invoice. Agencies typically spend about two weeks setting up your strategy and preparing everything to run your campaigns.

Even if you switch from one agency to another, the new agency will need to evaluate your current campaigns to decide what steps to take or whether to start fresh.

Whether the Facebook advertising agency charges an additional setup fee or flat rate for the first month, here’s what they need to do for a new client.

Onboarding to understand your expectations, brand, and objectives

Each brand – even those within the same vertical – needs a 100% unique Facebook advertising strategy. An agency needs to understand:

• Your brand’s mission and voice
• How Facebook ads fit into other marketing strategies
• What works/doesn’t work from your existing strategy

Audience research, competition analysis, and campaign strategy

During setup, a Facebook ads agency must spend time researching your target audience segments and competition to figure out what kind of campaign content, message, ad placement, and targeting will meet your objectives and ROAS.

Preparing creatives to run successful Facebook ad campaigns

A bad creative can’t be saved by a well-structured ad account, which is why producing highly converting video ads and static images are critical to the success of any campaign. They also take time and resources to develop.

A mixture of video, images & carousels works best with a researched strategy, which is why we have an extensive ad creative process through both creation and optimisation.

Which has allowed us to achieve an average of 2.06% Facebook Ad CTR across our client accounts, beating the average of 1.11%.

Configuring your Facebook business account, linking, and tracking

Configuring your business account, importing your audience, developing new audience groups all need special care. An agency may also link the Pixel for improved tracking and integrate other marketing campaigns.

Developing the actual campaigns and planning metrics for performance

Aside from creating the campaigns, an agency will plan your KPIs for Facebook ads individually, holistic Facebook performance, and in combination with other marketing platforms.

When considering Facebook ad agency pricing, think about where your business stands and what you need to accomplish by running Facebook ads.

1. You’re a new business or startup with a large marketing budget.

While tempting to make do with minimal in-house resources, new businesses or startups that plan to spend at least £3,000 per month running Facebook ads should consider partnering with an agency.

2. Your current Facebook ad strategy hit a dead-end, and you’re ready to level up.

Partnering with a Facebook advertising agency unlocks resources, time, and fresh ideas. They can take what works from your existing campaigns and develop creative ways to reach your audience while maximising the budget.

3. You need someone with more Facebook ad experience managing your budget.

Whether you plan to spend £5,000 or £50,000 on Facebook ads each month, you’ll never see the ROAS you want without the right expertise and adequate time. Experienced agencies already know what works in your industry, so you won’t waste time testing campaigns that don’t work.

4. Your in-house team needs someone with Facebook ad expertise.

If your in-house marketing team lacks the experience or time to carry out everything required for successful Facebook ad campaigns, an agency is a smart way to fill the gap. Instead of hiring one Facebook ad expert, an agency gives you access to an entire team for a fraction of the price.

We know Facebook ad campaigns are complex, and each business requires a unique approach. That’s why we offer flexible rates based on your budget:

• £2,500 per month for budgets under £20,000 per month
• 10% of ad spend for budgets over £20,000 per month

No matter where your budget fits, you always get:

1. Our creative testing framework to research and strategize
2. Campaign structure optimisation to maximise performance
3. Custom scaling strategies based on what we know works for brands like yours
4. Robust reporting so you can understand your campaign performance

Facebook doesn’t exist in a vacuum. That’s why we’ll also run optimised campaigns across your other social platforms – like TikTok, Snapchat, and Instagram – for no extra fee.

Check out our recent work and creatives to see how the Social Shepherd team has helped 97% of clients increase their return on ad spend within two months.