Meta's Ads Manager will happily show you fifty columns. Ninety percent of them are noise. When I'm deciding whether a campaign deserves more budget, I look at five numbers – and only five.
1. Cost per acquisition, against your target
ROAS is the headline, but CPA against your allowable target is what decides scale. Know your margin, set a break-even CPA, and only pour fuel on campaigns beating it with room to spare.
2. Hook rate (3-second views / impressions)
If people don't stop, nothing else matters. A hook rate under 25% on a cold audience usually means the first frame is the problem, not the offer.
3. Click-through rate (link, not all)
Link CTR tells you the creative and offer are aligned with intent. Sub-1% link CTR on cold traffic is a creative problem; fix the ad before you touch the landing page.
4. Landing-page conversion rate
Great ads with a leaky page burn money. Segment conversion rate by ad set – a single weak page can drag a whole campaign's CPA.
5. Frequency and CPM trend
Rising frequency with rising CPM and falling CTR is fatigue. Refresh creative before the account tips into diminishing returns.
Master these five and you can predict, within reason, whether a campaign will scale before you spend the money to find out.