Common mistakes when comparing media costs

Most cost comparisons go wrong before any money is spent, in how the figures are read. These are the mistakes I would check for first.

Treating a bid as a price

Keyword Planner’s top of page bid ranges approximate the 20th and 80th percentiles of what advertisers have historically paid for the top of the page^[1], and what you pay per click is the actual CPC in your account^[2]. The range is a view of the bidding, for one search term.

Mixing currencies

The 3 November 2026 readings on this site are in pounds sterling, the currency of the account they were read from. Prices on platform pages may be in USD, and a UAE quote will usually be in dirhams. Put every figure in the same currency, and note which exchange rate you used, before you compare.

Reading one day

Google says daily spend can reach twice the average daily budget on a given day, with charges capped at 30.4 times the daily budget over a billing period^[3]. A single day above budget is not a fault. Compare a month with a month.

Stopping at the click

A cheap click that never becomes an enquiry is not cheap. Work to the cost per outcome: whole budget divided by the enquiries or sales you record. The media cost converter shows that line with its equation. A small count of outcomes moves it a great deal, so do not read a month with five enquiries as a rate.

Forgetting what sits on top

A budget is rarely all media. An agency fee, VAT and production can sit inside it. The converter asks for the share that is not media, so that the clicks you see are the clicks the media money bought. Check the VAT position with your accountant.

Treating one price as the market

A single supplier’s page tells you what that supplier publishes. For example, Digitalnexa lists corporate video from AED 10,000 on a page showing a date of 25 August 2020^[4]. That is one price from one agency, not an average. The same is true of every number on this site: I say how many I found, and none of them is a sample.

Comparing a subscription with a build

Shopify’s UAE page lists Basic at $24 a month paid yearly^[5]. That is the software licence. A developer’s quote covers different things, such as designing the shop and writing the product pages. Put them on separate lines.

The checklist for what to ask is in pricing influencer, video and website work in the UAE. If you want me to check your own comparison, I offer a free ads audit. I sell ad management, so my reading is not neutral.