Every once in awhile, you notice that your Facebook™ ads are not delivering. Some of them are stuck in the “Pending” queue for too long. Others were approved but you get the “Not Delivering” message in your Campaigns panel. Both situations are worrying, especially if you are running a time-restricted campaign (seasonal sales, flash sales, special discounts for a limited period of time). Even if you miss a few hours of ad delivering, your chances of getting the sales you were expecting to drop significantly.
However, there is no need to panic. In most situations, you can fix this problem quickly and save your Facebook™ ad campaign. The first thing you must do is check the status of your ads in a timely manner. In this way, you will note any issue in the early stage and have sufficient time to act.
Rule Number 1: Make Sure Your Facebook™ Ads Meet the Requirements
The most frequent situation when ads are not delivering is when they get rejected by Facebook™. This means that your ad does not comply with the basic requirements concerning:
Number of characters in the copy
Image/text ratio
Image proportions (in pixels)
File size (for photos or videos.
You can review the most recent Facebook™ Ads Policies here.
If your ads did not get rejected, here are other common situations of Facebook™ ads not delivering and how to fix them:
1. The Ad Is Stuck in the “Pending” Queue
The Facebook™ algorithm for ad approval and delivering has to perform millions of operations at the same time and it is not a perfect mechanism. Occasional glitches occur and your ads are overlooked.
To fix this, you have two options. One is to rename your ad campaign so that it appears as a new ad to the Facebook™ algorithm. The other one is to delete the pending ad and recreate it all together. In this case, you have the opportunity to take a second look at all the settings and criteria and improve them.
2. Too Many Edits Confuse the System
When you start creating Facebook™ ads it is a good idea to have the final version ready, with all the settings, including objectives, audience and bid level. Otherwise, if you start editing the ad, you will delay its approval.
Facebook™ ads usually start delivering within 24 hours after you create them. Thus, for every supplementary edit, the delivery moment is extended by another day. In this way, you can completely miss out on an entire campaign (for Black Friday, for instance).
3. Your Set Too Many Selection Criteria for the Audience
Every audience filter you apply will reduce the number of people who may see your ads. If you apply too many selection criteria, you will be left with a very small audience. Facebook™ informs you of the average audience size as you define it. If you get a warning that the potential audience is too small, you should cancel some of the filters.
Otherwise, your Facebook™ ads may not deliver at all, especially if there is a large competition for that audience segment from companies that bid more than you.
4. Your Campaign Goal Is Hard to Reach
The more complicated an ad set-up is, the more likely it is that it will not deliver. Basically, to reach a goal your specific ad audience must perform a specific action. For example, your ad goal is to get people who interacted with similar ads by your competitors to complete a purchase on your website.
This type of goal is extremely hard to reach, and you should aim for something more doable – for example to get those people to sign up for your newsletter or at least click on your ad and get on your landing page.
5. You Have Run Out of Advertising Budget
This happens more frequently than you’d think. Busy entrepreneurs or marketers set up an ad campaign, determine a fixed budget and then leave it running. Ad a certain point, the budget runs out.
You will not get a warning or an email/push notification from Facebook™ that you’ve run out of budget. You will simply see that your ad is not delivering anymore. Thus, it is your responsibility to check the rate at which your ad budget is used up and supplement it, if necessary.