Everything that happens before you see "Active Ads"
Organic first, then the page gets checked
Every ad starts as organic content first. If a post gets reactions, comments, and saves on its own, that's what gets the ad budget behind it; not a guess. Before any spend goes out, we also check the page the ad sends people to; broken buttons, missing prices, a CTA that goes nowhere. No point paying for clicks that land somewhere broken.
The setup
Business Manager and Ad Manager get set up clean, no personal accounts anywhere near ad spend. Pixel goes on the site itself, and what it tracks depends on what the site is. On a landing page it's the form fill or the call click. On a full ecommerce store it's add to cart, checkout started, and purchase, tracked as separate steps. Without it, there is no real way to know which ad actually brought the sale. WhatsApp and Messenger get connected before launch too, since most buyers here ask a question before they buy.
The ad itself
We run image ads, video ads, carousel ads, and collection ads, picked based on what's actually being sold. One strong product gets a clean image or a short video. A store with a full catalogue does better with a collection ad, since people can browse a few products right inside the ad instead of landing on one item and leaving. Copy gets tested and rewritten until it actually gets people to stop and act, kept if it converts, dropped if it doesn't. We calculate TV (Bid + Estimated Action Ratio + Copy's AD Quality) to make sure the quality, then whichever ads performs the best we only continue that.
Why two separate campaigns
Running only action ads looks cheaper at first, but it's asking complete strangers to buy the moment they see the brand, so cost per sale climbs fast and orders dry up quickly. Awareness ads get the brand seen first. Action ads then go to people who already know it, past visitors and past engagers, and ask for the sale directly. We follow AIDA, attention, interest, desire, action, because that's the actual order someone goes through before buying. Splitting the two keeps orders coming in steadily instead of one spike that dies out.
The numbers that matter
ROAS
Return on ad spend. For every dollar spent, how much comes back. 3x is solid; below target, the campaign gets paused, not defended.
CPA
Cost per acquisition, what one sale actually costs. Spend $60, get 20 orders, that's $3 per order. If profit per order is $5, the campaign is working. If profit per order is only $2, it's losing money even while it looks like it's performing.
Reach / wk
New people reached each week. Tracked to catch fatigue early; reach that flattens out while spend stays the same means the creative needs a refresh.
Funnel
The path from visitor to buyer: sees the ad, adds to cart, starts checkout, buys. Tracking each step shows exactly where people drop off instead of guessing.
Testing before scaling
Two or three versions of an ad run against each other first, different image, different hook, sometimes a different audience. Whichever wins gets the bigger budget. Nothing gets scaled on a hunch.
Who it's shown to
Every campaign starts with a persona, who's actually buying, not who might. Age, city, interest overlap, even the time of day they tend to purchase, narrowed down until the audience is priced right, not just wide.