How to Increase ROAS in Facebook Ads

Chasing a higher Return On Ad Spend in your Facebook Ads can feel like trying to hit a moving target. Instead of searching for a single magic bullet, this guide will walk you through a complete system for boosting your ROAS, focusing on the fundamentals that actually move the needle. We’ll cover everything from sharpening your audience targeting and crafting better offers to creating standout ads and optimizing your campaigns for profitability.

First Things First: What is a "Good" ROAS?

Before you can increase your ROAS, you need to know what your target is. ROAS is a simple metric: for every dollar you spend on ads, how much revenue do you get back? It’s calculated like this:

Total Revenue from Ads / Total Ad Spend = ROAS

For example, if you spend $100 on ads and generate $400 in sales, your ROAS is 4x (or 400%).

But here’s the thing: a "good" ROAS is different for every business. A company selling high-margin digital products might be profitable with a 2x ROAS. A dropshipper with razor-thin margins might need a 5x or 6x ROAS just to break even after factoring in the cost of goods sold, shipping, and other operational expenses.

Calculate your break-even ROAS first. Know the absolute minimum you need to hit to avoid losing money. Anything above that is profit, and that’s what we’re here to maximize.

Nail Your Foundation: Audience, Offer, and Funnel

No amount of ad-hacking or creative testing will save a campaign if you’re showing the wrong offer to the wrong people. Getting your foundation right is 80% of the battle. If your ROAS is struggling, start here.

Refine Your Audience Targeting

Going after broad interest audiences like "Fitness" or "Skincare" can burn through your budget quickly. Your goal is to find pockets of people who are not just interested in your category but are actively looking to buy what you sell. Start with your highest-intent audiences and work your way out.

1. Start with Your Warmest Audiences (Custom Audiences)

These are people who already know you. They are the most likely to convert and will almost always deliver your highest ROAS.

• Website Visitors: Create audiences based on specific actions. Target people who viewed a product, added something to their cart, or initiated checkout but didn't buy. These are your hottest prospects.
• Email List/Customer List: Upload your customer or email subscriber list to create a Custom Audience. These individuals have already shown interest in your brand and are perfect for new product launches or specific promotions.
• Social Media Engagers: Target people who have recently engaged with your Instagram or Facebook page. They already have brand familiarity, making them more receptive to your ads.

2. Expand with High-Quality Lookalikes

Lookalike Audiences are Facebook’s way of finding new people who are similar to your existing customers. The quality of your Lookalike depends entirely on the quality of your source (or "seed") audience.

• Create Lookalikes from your best customers first. Instead of using a Lookalike of all website visitors, create one from a list of your actual purchasers. Go even deeper: create a Lookalike from your repeat customers or those with the highest lifetime value.
• Test different percentages. A 1% Lookalike is the most closely matched to your source audience, while a 10% Lookalike offers broader reach. Start with 1% and gradually expand to 3% or 5% as you test and validate performance.

Craft an Irresistible Offer

Sometimes the problem isn’t your ad, it’s your offer. Increasing your Average Order Value (AOV) is one of the most direct ways to increase your ROAS. If you can get customers to spend more per purchase, your ROAS goes up even if your ad spend and conversion rate stay the same.

• Bundles and Kits: Package complementary products together at a slight discount. For example, a skincare brand could sell a "Morning Routine Kit" that includes a cleanser, serum, and moisturizer.
• Tiered Discounts: Encourage larger purchases with offers like "Save 10% on orders over $50, 15% on orders over $75."
• Free Shipping Thresholds: If your average order is $45, setting a free shipping threshold at $50 is a powerful incentive for customers to add one more small item to their cart.

Optimize Your Landing Page Experience

Your ad's job is to get the click. Your landing page's job is to get the conversion. If you have a high click-through rate (CTR) but a low ROAS, your landing page is likely the culprit. A slow, confusing, or untrustworthy site will kill your conversion rate and tank your ROAS.

Make sure your landing page is mobile-optimized, loads quickly, has clear calls-to-action (CTAs), displays social proof like reviews and ratings, and builds trust with clear shipping and return policies.

Create Ads That Actually Convert

With a solid audience and offer, your ad creative is the next biggest lever you can pull to increase ROAS. Your goal is simple: stop the scroll, grab attention, and persuade someone to take action.

Focus on the Hook and the Headline

You have less than three seconds to capture someone's attention in their feed. Don't waste it.

• For Video: Your first three seconds should be visually engaging and immediately present the problem your product solves or the benefit it delivers. Don't start with a slow-fading logo. Get straight to the action.
• For Images: Your headline and primary text are your hooks. Lead with a strong benefit, ask a compelling question, or call out your target audience directly (e.g., "The perfect crossbody for busy moms").

Leverage User-Generated Content (UGC) and Testimonials

Highly polished, studio-shot ads are losing their effectiveness. Today's consumers crave authenticity. Ads that look like real content from real customers often perform best because they feel more genuine and trustworthy.

Encourage your customers to share photos and videos with your products and get their permission to use them in your ads. A simple phone video of a customer unboxing your product and sharing their genuine reaction can outperform a five-figure video production. Screenshots of positive tweets, reviews, or comments also make powerful, trust-building ad creative.

Test Creatives Systematically

Never rely on a single ad creative. You need to be constantly testing new ideas to find what resonates with your audience. Instead of testing random elements, a structured approach works best:

1. Test Big Concepts First: Start by testing completely different angles. For example, test a UGC-style ad vs. a benefit-focused animated ad vs. a static image of the product in use.
2. Iterate on the Winner: Once you identify a winning concept, iterate on it. If the UGC-style ad performs best, test 3-5 different UGC videos against each other.
3. Test Individual Elements: Once you have a winning video, test smaller elements like the first three seconds (the hook), the headline, or the call-to-action. This helps you refine your approach over time.

Use Facebook's Dynamic Creative feature to easily test multiple variations of images, videos, headlines, and primary text to let the algorithm find the most potent combinations for you.

Optimize Your Campaign Structure and Settings

How you structure your campaigns within Facebook Ads Manager can have a major impact on your results. A clean, simple structure often performs best and allows Facebook’s algorithm to work most effectively.

Choose the Right Campaign Objective

This sounds basic, but it’s a mistake many advertisers make. If your goal is to generate sales, you must use the "Sales" (formerly "Conversions") objective. Choosing "Traffic" or "Engagement" might get you cheap clicks or likes, but it tells Facebook to find people who like to click or engage - not people who actually buy things.

Embrace Advantage+ Campaign Budget (formerly CBO)

Instead of setting individual budgets for each ad set, using Advantage+ Campaign Budget (CBO) allocates your total campaign budget across all of your ad sets automatically. It gives Facebook’s algorithm the flexibility to spend more on the audiences and ads that are generating the highest ROAS at any given time.

This simplifies your campaign management and often leads to a more efficient use of your ad spend, boosting your overall campaign ROAS.

Set the Right Bidding Strategy

For most e-commerce businesses focused on ROAS, the best bid strategy is "Highest value." This tells Facebook to bid in a way that maximizes the total purchase value of conversions, aiming for higher-AOV customers. If you have a specific ROAS goal you need to meet (for example, staying above your break-even number), you can set a "ROAS goal" in the ad set settings. This will tell Facebook to only enter auctions it thinks can meet your minimum return.

Final Thoughts

Increasing your ROAS on Facebook Ads isn't about finding a secret hack, it's about building a solid system. It requires a holistic approach that connects a well-defined audience, a compelling offer, standout creative, and smart campaign optimization. By methodically working on each of these areas, you move from guessing to making data-driven decisions that consistently improve profitability.

While mastering paid advertising is critical, remember that a strong organic social presence builds the foundation of trust and brand recognition that makes your ads more effective. When potential customers see your ad and are already familiar with your brand from their feed, their likelihood to convert is much higher. At Postbase, we built our platform to make managing your organic social presence simple and consistent. By streamlining your scheduling, planning, and engagement across all platforms, you can build the brand authority that creates a powerful halo effect, ultimately lifting the performance of all your marketing efforts, including your paid ads.