Reach — is the number of unique people who have seen an ad, post or other content at least once. Repeat views by the same person do not increase reach.
Reach is often confused with impressions, but these are different metrics. Impressions count every time an ad appears on a screen, even if the same person sees it several times. For example, if an ad is shown to three people a total of 10 times, the reach is 3, while the number of impressions is 10.
These two metrics are used to calculate frequency — the average number of times a person has seen an ad. It's calculated by dividing impressions by reach. In the example above, the frequency is approximately 3.3.
Types of reach
Reach is divided into three types based on how content reaches people:
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organic — people saw the content without paid promotion: in their followers' feeds, search results or recommendations;
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paid, or advertising reach — content was shown through paid promotion;
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viral — content spread on its own: people shared it and forwarded it to friends. This type of reach is difficult to measure accurately.
Reach in traffic arbitrage
In an ad account, reach — is one of the basic metrics. Together with frequency, it shows who is seeing your ads: new people or the same users repeatedly.
If frequency increases but leads and purchases don't, the ads are most likely being shown to people who have already grown tired of them and stopped noticing them. In that case, it's time to update the creative or broaden the targeting.
When setting up targeting, the ad account displays potential reach — the approximate number of people who could see the ad with the selected settings. This is an estimate, not an exact figure: Facebook, for example, displays it as a range.
Reach is also important when buying advertising in Telegram channels. Advertisers look not at the number of subscribers but at post reach, meaning how many people actually see a publication. If a channel has many subscribers but its posts receive few views, part of its audience may consist of artificially inflated subscribers.
Important: high reach alone doesn't generate revenue. Payouts depend on what's specified in the offer's terms: a click, lead, purchase or another action. That's why reach is evaluated alongside these metrics and advertising costs.
