Before I run Facebook ads for a client, I run them on myself. This is the first proper test I have done for my own business: a 14 day traffic campaign built for UK builders and plumbers, £2 a day, £28.85 spent in total.
This post shows you the exact numbers, what they mean, and just as importantly, what they do not prove.
If you are weighing up Facebook ads for builders and plumbers in your own area, this is the kind of detail I think you should see before you trust anyone with your budget, mine included.
The numbers at a glance
14 days. £28.85 spent starting at £2 a day. 3,388 people reached. 105 landing page views at £0.27 each. Facebook Feed accounted for 99% of spend and all 105 recorded landing page views. This post explains what those numbers mean and, more importantly, what they do not prove.
Why I tested this on my own business first
I was promoting my own free social media audit prize draw, not a client's offer. That mattered. It meant I could test small, watch closely, and learn from a real campaign before recommending a setup to someone else. If something had gone wrong, it cost me £28.85 and two weeks, not a client's trust.
Campaign setup
| Detail | What I set |
|---|---|
| Dates | 17 to 30 August 2026 |
| Audience | UK builders and plumbers, aged 28 to 58 |
| Platforms | Facebook and Instagram |
| Campaign type | Traffic |
| Optimisation | Landing page views |
| Budget | £2 per day |
| Total spend | £28.85 |
| Creative | One advert, one audience, no split testing |
I kept it simple on purpose. One advert and one audience make the results easier to read, and easier to be honest about.
The real numbers
| Metric | Result |
|---|---|
| Total spend | £28.85 |
| Reach | 3,388 people |
| Impressions | 5,292 |
| Frequency | 1.56 |
| Landing page views | 105 |
| Cost per landing page view | £0.27 |
| CPM | £5.45 |
Where the spend and views went
Nearly all of this came from one placement. Facebook Feed accounted for 99% of spend (£28.61 of £28.85) and every one of the 105 recorded landing page views. Instagram Feed, Instagram Stories, Marketplace and Search picked up small amounts of leftover impressions but no recorded landing page views in this test.
Frequency (1.56) = impressions (5,292) divided by reach (3,388). CPM (£5.45) = spend (£28.85) divided by impressions (5,292) multiplied by 1,000. Both calculated from the confirmed Ads Manager screenshot.
What a landing page view actually is, and why I optimised for it
A landing page view is not the same as a click. A click just means someone tapped the ad. A landing page view means the page then actually finished loading on their device. It is the closer of the two numbers to a genuine website visit, which is why I chose it over clicks as my measure for this test.
One honest caveat worth knowing
For traffic campaigns like this one, Meta does not always count every landing page view directly. In some cases it models, or estimates, the figure based on behaviour. Meta says as much in its own documentation on Instant Experience metrics, where it states plainly that some of these values are estimated. That does not make the number useless, but I treat it as a strong directional signal, not a number to take to two decimal places and build a business case on.
What this test does not prove
This is the part most people skip, so I am not going to.
A £2 a day test on my own free prize draw does not prove what a properly funded campaign would do for your business. It does not prove you would get enquiries. It does not prove anything about your trade, your area, or what you are offering, because all of those change the result. That is exactly why I do not promise a fixed number of leads to any client, and I am not going to start by implying one from my own small test.
What it does show is how I test, measure and report, even when the budget is tiny and the stakes are just mine. That is the same discipline I would bring to a client's account, just with a proper budget behind it. For a campaign built to generate enquiries rather than traffic, I would recommend starting at £15 to £20 a day, roughly £450 to £600 a month, which is well above what this test used.
What is next
The next test moves from traffic to leads: a shorter journey, measuring completed, qualified entries rather than page visits. Traffic tells you people showed up. Leads tell you whether they were interested enough to act. That is the number that actually matters to a trades business, so that is what I am testing next.
Should you run this yourself, or get it done for you?
If you have the time and patience to learn Ads Manager, you can absolutely run a small test like this yourself. If you would rather someone who already tests, measures and reports this way does it for your business, that is what Meta Ads Management is for: full strategy, creative, setup and a plain-numbers report every month, from £449 a month per campaign.
If you are not ready for an ongoing commitment, I also build single campaigns as a one-off through the Meta Ads Campaign Build, £349, where I set everything up properly and hand it to you to run yourself.
Ready to test properly?
I will give you an honest view of whether ads would pay off for your firm. If I think they would not, I will say so rather than take your money.
Book a free 20 minute callNot ready for an ongoing commitment? The Meta Ads Campaign Build (£349) sets everything up and hands it to you to run yourself.
Common questions
Is £2 a day enough to test anything?
Enough to learn how a small budget behaves and which placement performs, as this test shows. Not enough to generate meaningful enquiries. For that, budget closer to £15 to £20 a day.
Does a traffic campaign get me enquiries?
Not directly. A traffic campaign is built to get people to a page, not to capture a lead. That is a different campaign type, and it is what I am testing next.
What happened to the free audit prize draw this campaign was promoting?
It was part of my launch offer, with entries closing 30 August 2026. I now run this as a monthly draw, so it is not a one-off any more.
Do you guarantee results if I hire you for Meta Ads Management?
No. Nobody honestly can. What I guarantee is that I will manage your budget as carefully as I managed my own £28.85, and show you exactly what it is doing every month.
Landing page view definition: paraphrased from Meta's About Instant Experience Metrics (accessed 30 August 2026; some values stated as estimated; note this page documents Instant Experience metrics, not standard traffic campaigns, and is used here as the closest available primary source) and Jon Loomer Digital, Landing Page View glossary entry (published 16 October 2020, accessed 30 August 2026). Modelled/estimated landing page views for traffic campaigns: consistent with pixelart-agency analysis (accessed 30 August 2026). All stats in the results table are either directly visible in the Ads Manager screenshot or calculated from those confirmed figures, with the method shown in the article. Outbound clicks and cost per outbound click are not included pending confirmation. Budget recommendation (£15 to £20 a day) sourced from the Meta Ads Management page, updated 12 August 2026.