Top Growth Marketing benchmark puts Meta CPM at $13.52 for DTC ecommerce

Top Growth Marketing’s new benchmark report says the median direct-to-consumer ecommerce brand spent $13.52 per thousand Meta impressions and generated a 2.96 purchase ROAS over the last year. The findings are based on 15 brands, $2.46 million in spend, and 171 million impressions across Facebook and Instagram from July 2025 through June 2026.

Why it matters: - The report gives DTC marketers a current benchmark for Meta efficiency across cost, traffic and sales outcomes. - The median results show what actively managed ecommerce accounts are seeing on Facebook and Instagram, not an industry-wide average. - The data can help brands judge whether their Meta performance is tracking ahead of or behind similar accounts.

What happened: - Top Growth Marketing published a Meta ads benchmark report using first-party data from 15 direct-to-consumer ecommerce brands. - The report covers $2,464,453 in Meta spend on Facebook and Instagram between July 2025 and June 2026. - The median cost per thousand impressions was $13.52. - The median cost per click was $0.57. - The median click-through rate was 2.68%. - The median purchase return on ad spend was 2.96. - The median cost per purchase was $49.04.

The details: - The middle half of brands paid between $11.04 and $22.90 for every thousand impressions. - The middle half of brands paid between $0.33 and $1.01 per click. - The middle half of brands posted purchase ROAS between 2.50 and 5.30. - The middle half of brands saw cost per purchase range from $6.63 to $195.17. - The benchmark draws from 171 million impressions, 4.6 million clicks and 92,051 purchases. - Each account’s rate was calculated first, then the median was taken across accounts. - That method limits the influence of one large advertiser on the benchmark. - No brand is named in the report. - Jack Paxton said ROAS travels poorly across brands because it depends on margin, price point and attribution settings. - Jack Paxton said brands should look at cost per thousand impressions and click-through rate first when judging whether media buying is working. - The report says all 15 accounts are managed by Top Growth Marketing, so the figures reflect actively managed accounts rather than an industry average. - The panel’s implied average order value is about $145, roughly double that of the broad advertiser base. - That higher order value helps raise both ROAS and cost per purchase. - The figures are published under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 licence and are free to cite. - Top Growth Marketing also maintains a free library of more than 370 ecommerce ad examples across 15 product categories, refreshed monthly.

Between the lines: - The strongest takeaway is that ROAS alone can mislead because sales efficiency shifts with price, margins and tracking setup. - CPM, CTR and CPC may offer a cleaner read on whether Meta ads are becoming more expensive or less effective before revenue metrics are interpreted. - The high spread in cost per purchase shows how uneven ecommerce outcomes can be even within a managed portfolio.

What's next: - Brands can use the benchmark as a reference point for future Meta campaign planning and performance reviews. - Top Growth Marketing is likely to keep updating its library and benchmark materials as new account data comes in. - Marketers comparing their own results will need to adjust for order value, margin structure and attribution settings before drawing conclusions.