Cost Per Thousand (CPM)

Date created: Oct 12, 2022  •   Last updated: Mar 18, 2024

What is Cost Per Thousand

Cost Per Thousand (CPM), also called Cost Per Mille, is a marketing term used to describe the price of 1,000 advertisement impressions on an advertiser's webpage. If a website publisher charges $2.00 CPM, that means an advertiser must pay $2.00 for every 1,000 impressions of its ad. The "M" in CPM represents the word "mille," which is Latin for "thousands."

Cost Per Thousand Formula

How to calculate Cost Per Thousand

If an online advertiser pays a website $500 that ultimately generates 150,000 impressions, then the CPM would be $500/150,000 X 1,000 = $3.33. Alternatively, if a website charges $2.00 CPM, an advertiser with a budget of $1,000 per month, will get 500K impressions for their ad each month.

Start tracking your Cost Per Thousand data

Use Klipfolio PowerMetrics, our free analytics tool, to monitor your data. Choose one of the following available services to start tracking your Cost Per Thousand instantly.

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How to visualize Cost Per Thousand?

You can use a simple summary chart to effectively visualize your overall Cost Per Thousand data. Additionally, you can segment this data by campaign using a bar chart to study your performance in more detail.

Cost Per Thousand visualization examples

Cost Per Thousand

Bar Chart

Here's an example of how to visualize your Cost Per Thousand data in a bar chart to observe segmented data.

Cost Per Thousand

$12

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0.96

vs previous period

Summary Chart

Here's an example of how to visualize your current Cost Per Thousand data in comparison to a previous time period or date range.
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Cost Per Thousand

Chart

Measuring Cost Per Thousand

More about Cost Per Thousand

CPM is the most common method for pricing web ads. It's the cost a company has to pay for every 1,000 impressions it gets on a webpage they are advertising for. One impression is equal to a potential customer viewing an ad.

The cost will differ depending on the popularity of the keyword they wish to advertise and the site the advertiser is choosing to advertise on.

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