CPM
Cost per mille (cost per thousand impressions)
In short
CPM is the price for 1,000 impressions of an ad. Pay NOK 600 for 10,000 impressions, and your CPM is NOK 60.
The M stands for the Latin word mille, meaning thousand. CPM is used mostly for ads on social media, video and banners, where the goal is often for many people to see you. You pay for the ad being shown, whether anyone clicks or not.
Seen is not the same as sold
CPM tells you what it costs to be seen, not what it costs to win customers. A low CPM can mean the ad is shown to people who will never buy. A high CPM can be worth it if the audience is narrow and right, for example homeowners in one municipality.
The number makes most sense alongside CTR. With both, you can work out what a click actually costs, and compare with ads where you pay per click, known as CPC.
A worked example
CPM is NOK 60 and CTR is 1 percent. Then 1,000 impressions cost NOK 60 and give 10 clicks, so each click costs NOK 6. If CTR drops to 0.5 percent, the price per click doubles to NOK 12, even though CPM is unchanged. So always look at both numbers in your Meta ads before you decide whether an ad works.
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