Measure twice, cut once. It’s always a good strategy. I like to apply it to Facebook ads because carefully checking work is especially important when you’re about to spend valuable ad dollars on Facebook ads campaigns.

There are a lot of moving parts to a Facebook ads campaign. It’s easy to click the wrong button and not even realize it.

I want to make sure you have all of the checks in place to reduce the chances of a campaign going live if it’s anything less than perfect.

This helps make sure your creative is on point and the correct audience is targeted, but it also guarantees you’re not blowing your budget because of a careless mistake (sending visitors to a landing page that doesn’t function, for example).

This checklist will help keep you, well, in-check.

After creating a campaign, use this Quick and Dirty Facebook Ads Checklist before going live to make sure everything is in place.

I’ve broken down this checklist into four categories to make the final review quick and easy; the campaign level, the ad set level, the ad level, and the landing page.

Step 1 - Review the Campaign

Check the campaign name. Is it clear and to the point? A sloppy naming structure creates confusion later on, especially once there are a lot of campaigns in one account.

Check the campaign objective. What’s your goal? Select an objective that matches. (Try to get this right during the creation process as it’s a little tricky to change later on).

Step 2 - Review the Facebook Ads Set

Check the budget. Choose between a daily or lifetime budget and make sure it’s something that makes sense for your business goals.

Verify the target audience. Check demographics or custom audiences and make sure they’re set how you’d like them. If you’re using a custom audience, verify that you have the most up-to-date data.

Verify the audience size. An audience should be narrowed, but not too small.

Check the dates. Verify that the ad set will be turned on and/or off at the right time, or that it will run indefinitely if that’s the plan.

Verify the placement. Whether you’re targeting desktop, mobile, right hand, or Instagram, check that your ad will be placed in the correct spot.

Tip: Select all ad sets to edit at the same time to verify variables that will remain consistent across ad sets. This will help you spot any inconsistencies that you may have overlooked while viewing individual ad sets.

Step 3: Verify the Facebook Ads

Check the image for consistency. The image should be consistent with the landing page and reflect the goals of the campaign.

Check image text. Image text shouldn’t exceed 20%. You can use this tool to verify.

Crop images. Take a look at how the image will appear on all of the placements for that ad (mobile, desktop, etc.). Crop the image if needed.

Read copy. Check for typos, grammatical errors, or awkward sounding phrases. Reread the copy in all of the text areas (text block, headline, and link description).

Check for Facebook policy violations. Headlines and link descriptions should be consistent with the landing page and not violate any of the policies.

Check links. If you’re sending anyone to a landing page outside of Facebook, verify the links are correct and functioning.

Tip:  Test multiple images per campaign. You may be surprised at which one converts better!

Step 4: Verify the Landing Page

Check landing page for compliance. Facebook reviews landing pages before approving Facebook ads, so make sure yours is compliant.

Verify the pixels are working. If you haven’t pixeled your pages yet, you really should. Once the pixels are in place, use the Facebook Pixel Helper for Chrome to verify it is working properly on all of your pages.

Verify the landing page on mobile. If you’re targeting mobile, assume a good portion of traffic will come from a mobile device. Make sure your site is functioning and legible on a mobile device.

Tip:  Follow these tips to create a high converting landing page.

If you’ve checked off all the boxes on this Quick and Dirty Facebook Ads Checklist, your campaign is good to go!

At Marigold, we run each campaign through a series of 4-5 levels of review. Each review is conducted by a different member of the team so the chances of going live with a less than perfect campaign are minimal to none.

I suggest you do the same, especially if you’re new to running ads.

If you can have a teammate who can look over the campaign, great. If not, take your time to go over each item on this checklist in detail so you don’t miss those little mistakes that could cause a decrease in conversion.

There you go, the quick and dirty Facebook ads checklist. I hope it helps!