Ads guide by Mark Parfenov, published 10 November 2026
Meta ads reach people who aren’t searching yet, which makes them good for creating demand and for reminding people who already visited your site. They also make it easy to collect cheap leads that never buy. This setup keeps the focus on customers.
In Meta Business Suite, create a business portfolio in your company’s name, connect your Facebook Page and Instagram account, create the ad account inside it and add your team with the right roles. Keep personal and business accounts separate.
Add the Meta pixel to your website and send the same events from your server or tools through the Conversions API, so tracking holds up when browsers block cookies. Verify your domain, and ask for consent where the law requires it.
Choose Leads or Sales, not Traffic or Engagement, when you want customers. Meta optimises for whatever you ask for, so asking for clicks gets you clicks.
Instant lead forms on Facebook and Instagram are quick to fill in, so they bring more leads but often lower quality. Add a question or two, or choose the higher-intent form option, or send people to your own landing page instead.
Short vertical videos and clear images that show the problem, the result and who it’s for usually matter more than targeting. Test a few different ideas, not small variations of one.
Start with your location and a broad audience and let Meta find people based on your conversions. Add a separate campaign for people who visited your site or engaged with your page but didn’t contact you.
Ads about housing, employment, credit, and social issues, elections or politics follow stricter rules and have limited targeting. Declare the category if it applies, or the ads can be rejected.
Call or email every lead quickly, track which ones become customers and send that back to Meta where you can. A cheap lead that never answers costs more than an expensive one who buys.
What I’ve learned and use in practice, checked against current benchmarks and official checklists on 10 November 2026. Experience and benchmarks, not guarantees.
Meta works best alongside search: search catches people who are already looking, and Meta creates new demand and brings back people who visited and left. Both need the same tracking from click to customer.
The first call is free. The diagnostic (€950, fixed) finds where your leads and deals are lost and gives you the fixes in priority order.