An ad that gets many likes can still bring no customers. An ad that gets few likes can fill the diary. For a local business, the question is not "did people like it?" but "did people get in touch, and did they buy?". This article shows a simple way to answer it for Meta (Instagram and Facebook) and Google ads.
What to count
Pick the actions that matter to your business and count each one. Do not count likes, reach or views as results. They can help you understand a campaign, but they are not the goal.
| What | Where it shows up | How to record it |
|---|---|---|
| Phone calls | Phone log, call button clicks | Count calls from ad traffic; ask "how did you find us?" |
| Bookings | Booking tool or calendar | Add a "source" field to the booking form |
| Messages | WhatsApp, Instagram, Messenger, email | Note the source when a new conversation starts |
| Form enquiries | Website form | Save the source with every form entry |
| Walk-ins | Front desk | Ask once, write the answer down |
The last row matters. Many customers see an ad and then walk in or call without clicking anything. A simple question at the door or on the phone catches what the tools miss.
Tag every link with UTM
A UTM tag is a short piece of text added to the end of a web address. It tells your website where a visitor came from. Without it, ad visits blend into "direct" or "social" traffic and you cannot tell what worked.
An example:
https://yourbusiness.lu/book/?utm_source=meta&utm_medium=paid&utm_campaign=autumn-menu
Use the same three parts every time:
- utm_source: the platform, such as meta or google.
- utm_medium: the type, such as paid for ads.
- utm_campaign: a short name for the campaign, such as autumn-menu.
Keep a small sheet with the names you use. If one campaign is spelled three ways, your numbers will split into three rows.
Set up conversion events
A conversion event is a signal that tells the ad platform "a useful thing happened". Meta and Google can use it to show you which ads brought results, and to find similar people.
Useful events for a local business:
- A booking form is sent.
- A contact form is sent.
- A click on the phone number or the WhatsApp button.
- A click to open a message conversation (for ads that start a chat).
Set up one or two events, not twenty. Test them yourself: click the ad, send a test form, then check that the event appears in Meta Events Manager or in Google Ads. If your site cannot send events, ask the person who built it. This is a few hours of work, not a project.
A simple monthly table
Once a month, fill in one table per channel. It takes fifteen minutes if the sources are recorded along the way.
| Month | Channel | Spend | Enquiries | New customers | Cost per enquiry | Cost per customer |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| … | Meta | € … | … | … | € … | € … |
| … | € … | … | … | € … | € … |
The formulas:
- Cost per enquiry = spend divided by enquiries.
- Cost per customer = spend divided by new customers.
"Enquiries" are calls, bookings, messages and forms together. "New customers" are the ones who actually bought, so you need to follow up on the enquiries and mark who came. Put a number in the spreadsheet only if you really counted it. A blank cell is more honest than a guess.
Read the table in three steps
- Is the cost per customer lower than what a customer is worth to you over the first visit or the first few months? If yes, the channel pays.
- Does one channel have a much lower cost per customer than the other? Move budget in small steps, not all at once.
- Are there many enquiries but few customers? The problem may be the reply time, the offer or the booking page, not the ad.
Common mistakes
- Counting likes and reach as results. They are signals, not outcomes.
- No source recorded. If nobody writes down where an enquiry came from, the table stays empty.
- Changing everything at once. If you change the picture, the text and the audience in one week, you will not know what made the difference.
- Judging after three days. Ad platforms need some time to learn. Let a campaign run through a full cycle before deciding.
- Mixing the ad and the website. A weak result may come from a slow or confusing website. Check the page the ad leads to.
- Forgetting follow-up. An enquiry that gets an answer two days later is often lost. Count how fast you reply as well.
- Ignoring phone calls. For many local businesses in Luxembourg the phone is still the main way to book. Count calls too.
Who does what
Keep it clear who owns the numbers. The person who runs the ads sets up the tags and events. The person at the desk records the source of each enquiry. Once a month someone fills in the table and looks at it together with whoever runs the ads.
Our ads service covers Meta and Google campaigns, and our numbers screen shows enquiries, sources and cost per customer in one place. If many of your enquiries come through chat, see how messages and bookings can record the source for you.
If you are not sure what to measure first, start with the numbers: write to us and we will look at what you already have.