Advertising online: Cost Per Acton (CPA) similar to published stats?

[Fitzy1]

Hi All,

So I've seen some numbers online here:
https://www.google.com/search?q=marketingprofs+cpa&spell=1&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwia07WUlajZAhWjq1kKHSkVBTwQBQgkKAA&biw=1366&bih=650
(I am not affiliated with this web site - the article is behind a paywall, but viewable through google indexing magic - top result)

The graphs show the CPA for "Employment & Job Training" at $23.24 per "action". Since I plan to run and operate a resume service, I would take this to mean that it would take roughly $24 on average in advertising to gain 1 client for my lowest advertised package. So already that seems like better than 4% conversion, which I'm somewhat skeptical about. Most of my other research points towards 1 or 2% being average, with 3% or up being good (although most of my other research was geared toward selling a physical product). Indeed, another bar graph on the same page shows 11% conversion rate (facebook only) - if I did my math correctly, isn't that in direct opposition to their CPA being $23.24 in the same category, one would hope from the same set of data?

Obviously, unless by some luck I've managed just now to reach the author of the above website - we have no way of knowing how those numbers were reached.

So my question is - do the CPA rates, published on the site I listed above, roughly match up with your own experiences?
Am I defining CPA correctly if I think of it as "cost to acquire a sale"? Or is that logic faulty, since it fails to compare elasticity of price?

Thanks

[MrSal]

Cost per Action or do you mean Acquisition? If it's per action it seems rather high!! that means assuming a 3% conversion rate your costs to acquire a customer are like 600 dollars?

Cost per action or cost per click or cost per engagement, are different than the acquisition itself. Depending on the industry yes a 3% conversion rate seems to be the standard.

[mustachemarine]

As someone who works in digital advertising, the cost per conversion can vary widely between advertising campaigns. Your conversion costs are highly related to 1. Your advertising creatives and landing page 2. Campaign targeting (what users you serve your ads to) 3. What sort of volume you desire.

The only way to get realistic numbers is to run an experiment. You may also want to consider the costs of other marketing channels -- like starting a blog.