Process Flow
Animated overview of the full workflow
TL;DR
Open Ads Manager, click "Create," choose your campaign objective (Leads for lead gen, Sales for e-commerce), set your daily or lifetime budget, define your audience using location, age, gender, and interests (or use Advantage+ audience for broader AI-driven targeting), choose placements (start with Advantage+ placements), upload your creative (image or video plus primary text, headline, and description), set your conversion event, review everything, and publish. Give the campaign 3-5 days to exit the learning phase before making changes.
Before You Start
Ensure you have a Meta Business Suite account with an active ad account, a Facebook Page connected, the Meta Pixel installed with conversion events configured, creative assets ready, and a clear objective.
The Learning Phase
Meta's algorithm tests different audience segments, placements, and delivery strategies. Performance will be inconsistent. The learning phase lasts until approximately 50 conversion events. Do not change budget by more than 20%, edit targeting, or pause/restart the ad set during this period.
First Week Monitoring
Day 1: Confirm campaign is Active and spending. Day 2-3: Check for very high CPM (audience too small), very low CTR (creative or targeting issues), or high CPC with no conversions (landing page problem). Day 5-7: Evaluate CPA, conversion rate, placement performance, and frequency.
Step-by-Step Guide
Follow these 5 steps to complete this guide
- 1
Open Ads Manager and Create a Campaign
Go to adsmanager.facebook.com. Click "Create." Choose your objective: **Leads** for lead generation, **Sales** for e-commerce, **Traffic** for website visits (only if you lack conversion tracking), **Awareness** for top-of-funnel reach. For your first campaign, Leads or Sales is almost always the right choice. Name your campaign with a clear convention.
- 2
Campaign-Level Settings
**Campaign Budget Optimisation (CBO):** Meta distributes budget across ad sets based on performance. **Ad Set Budget:** You manually control each ad set's spend. For your first campaign, ad set budget gives more control.
- 3
Ad Set Settings
### Conversion Event Select the conversion event you want to optimise for — Lead or Purchase. Ensure the event shows a green dot (active). ### Budget and Schedule Start with a budget that allows at least 50 conversions per week per ad set. If your CPA is AED 50, aim for at least AED 350/day. ### Audience Targeting **Manual approach:** Configure location, age, gender, languages, and detailed targeting (interests, behaviours, demographics). Also add or exclude custom audiences. **Advantage+ Audience:** Meta's AI finds the best audience with minimal manual input. Works best with a well-trained pixel. Aim for an audience of 500,000 to 2 million for conversion campaigns. ### Placements Use **Advantage+ Placements** for your first campaign. Let Meta optimise across Facebook Feed, Instagram Feed, Stories, Reels, Messenger, and Audience Network.
- 4
Create Your Ad
### Format Start with single image or single video. Images: 1080×1080 (square) or 1080×1350 (4:5 portrait). Videos: 1080×1080 or 1080×1920 (vertical), 15-60 seconds, capture attention in the first 3 seconds, add captions. ### Ad Copy **Primary Text:** Opens with a hook, states the benefit, includes a call to action. 125 characters show before truncation on mobile. **Headline:** Action-oriented, under 40 characters. **Description:** Reinforces your offer or adds social proof. **CTA Button:** Match to your objective (Learn More, Sign Up, Shop Now, Get Quote, etc.). ### Destination Enter your landing page URL. For Leads, you can also use an Instant Form (in-Facebook lead form) for higher conversion rates. ### Tracking Verify your Meta Pixel is selected. Add UTM parameters for analytics tracking.
- 5
Review and Publish
Check objective, budget, conversion event, audience definition, placements, creative on mobile preview, ad copy, landing page URL, and tracking. Click Publish.
Frequently asked
Questions & answers
How much should I spend?
Enough for 50 conversions/week for Meta to learn. If your CPA is AED 50, budget at least AED 2,500/week.
One ad or multiple?
Start with 2-3 variations in the same ad set.
Why was my ad rejected?
Common reasons: text-heavy images, prohibited content, misleading claims, or landing page issues.
Should I boost posts or use Ads Manager?
Always use Ads Manager for full control.
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