Setup guide · about 5 minutes

Connect Meta Ads

Facebook and Instagram ad accounts, from a new account to your first audit. This guide also explains exactly what Campaign Medic can see, what it can change, and how you stay in control of every change.

Before you start

You will need:

  • A Facebook login that can open your ad account in Ads Manager, either directly or through a business portfolio.
  • Permission to manage campaigns on that ad account if you want to apply changes. With view-only access you can still run audits and see recommendations.
  • Access to an ad account. Paused, disabled, unsettled, or restricted accounts can still appear if Meta shares them with your login; their delivery or reporting may be limited.

Nothing changes without you

Connecting lets Campaign Medic read your ad accounts. It never changes anything on its own. Every change is shown to you first and happens only when you click Apply Now. This connection requests Meta Ads permissions and can include campaigns delivered on Facebook and Instagram placements.

01

Create your account

  1. 1Go to campaignmedic.com/signup.
  2. 2Sign up with Continue with Google, or with your email and a password. If you use email, open the verification link we send you.

The free plan needs no card. It includes 50 actions a month, where an action is one audit or one applied change.

02

Connect Meta Ads

  1. 1In Campaign Medic, open Connect from the sidebar and click Connect Meta Ads.
  2. 2Log in to Facebook if asked, and continue as yourself.
  3. 3If Facebook asks which businesses or ad accounts to share, include every ad account you want Campaign Medic to audit.
  4. 4Review the permissions and continue. You are returned to the Connect page with a confirmation message and your ad accounts listed.

Facebook asks you to allow two things:

Manage your ads

Required

Read your campaigns, ad sets and ads, and make the changes you approve: pausing, turning a campaign back on, or raising a daily budget.

Read your ads

Required

Read results, including spend, conversions, and where available the split by placement and by age and gender, which is where much Meta waste hides.

03

Choose your ad account

Every active ad account you shared is added. Each one is audited separately, so you can compare them.

  1. 1Use the account selector at the top of the app to switch to a Meta ad account.
  2. 2Open Campaigns to check your campaigns and their results are showing. The date picker next to the account selector sets the period you are looking at.
04

Set your guardrails

Guardrails are rules that block changes you never want made, even by accident. They are checked on our server every time a change is applied, on Meta just as on Google. Set them before you apply anything, under SettingsGuardrails:

  • Protected campaigns. Name specific campaigns, or a word such as “brand”, and nothing in a matching campaign will be changed, including its ad sets and ads.
  • Budget increase cap. The most a budget can go up in one change, as a percentage.
  • Maximum daily budget. No change can set a daily budget above this amount.
  • Block pausing. Stops any campaign, ad set or ad from being paused.
05

Run your first audit

  1. 1Open Audit, select Meta Ads, and click Run Audit.
  2. 2Wait about two minutes. The audit looks at the date range selected at the top of the app.
  3. 3Open the finished audit to see its recommendations, ranked by impact, each with the reason behind it and an estimate of what it saves or earns.

A Meta audit reads your campaigns, ad sets and ads, including the ad copy, and where Meta provides them, spend by placement and by age and gender. It looks for ad sets spending with no results, creative fatigue, loss-making spend, wasted placements and audiences, and budget-limited winners.

Scheduled daily or weekly audits are available for Google Ads only for now.

06

Approve and apply changes

Each recommendation goes through the same steps, and none are skipped:

  1. 1Read the recommendation. Click Approve if you agree, or Deny to dismiss it.
  2. 2Click Apply Now. You are shown the exact change that will be sent to Meta.
  3. 3Confirm. Your guardrails are checked, the change is made in your live ad account, and it is recorded.

On Meta, Campaign Medic can:

  • Pause a campaign, an ad set or an ad
  • Turn a paused campaign back on
  • Raise a daily budget

Some fixes are advice

Excluding a placement, narrowing an audience, refreshing creative and reducing frequency are made by you in Ads Manager. For those, Campaign Medic tells you exactly what to change, records that the advice was given, and changes nothing in your account.

07

Undo and measure

Operations lists every change applied to your account: what changed, when, and whether it succeeded. Every change Campaign Medic makes on Meta has an Undo button there: pauses, turning a campaign back on, and budget increases, which return to the budget you had before.

Impact Monitor shows results before and after each change, so you can see whether it helped. If it did not, undo it.

08

Stay connected

Meta gives apps access for about 60 days at a time. A week before it ends, we email you. The Connect page also shows when access ends. When it is due, click Reconnect and continue through Facebook's screens. It takes a few seconds, and your audits and settings are kept.

09

Disconnect

To disconnect Meta, remove Campaign Medic in your Facebook Business integrations settings. Meta tells Campaign Medic straight away, and we delete your Meta connection and ad account records. You can also email hello@campaignmedic.com and we will do it for you.

Access to your account is stored encrypted and is never shared. Our privacy policy explains what we keep and for how long.

Troubleshooting

My ad account is not in the list

Campaign Medic lists ad accounts your Facebook login can reach, including accounts that are paused or have delivery or billing issues. Check that:

  • Your Facebook login has access to the ad account, directly or through a business portfolio.
  • Your login still has access in Meta Business settings. A disabled, closed, unsettled or restricted account may appear but may not deliver ads or return every report.
  • If Facebook asked which businesses or ad accounts to share, you included this one. To change your choice, connect again from the Connect page.
“Meta Ads was not connected because access was cancelled”

The Facebook permission screen was cancelled. Click Connect Meta Ads again and continue through Facebook's screens.

“Your connection attempt timed out or was opened in another tab”

The connection has to finish in the tab you started it from, within ten minutes. Go back to the Connect page and click Connect Meta Ads again.

I am asked to reconnect

Campaign Medic has lost access, usually because the 60-day access period ended, your Facebook password changed, or Campaign Medic was removed in Facebook's settings. Click Reconnect and continue through Facebook's screens. Your audits and settings are kept.

A recommendation says “advice given” instead of “applied”

Some Meta fixes, such as excluding a placement or changing an audience or creative, have to be made by you in Ads Manager. Campaign Medic records that the advice was given and changes nothing in your account.

A change was blocked by a guardrail

That is your guardrails working. The message names the rule that stopped it. If you want the change to go ahead, adjust the rule under SettingsGuardrails and apply it again.

My campaigns show no spend

Figures cover the date range selected at the top of the app. If your campaigns did not spend in that period, choose a longer range.

An audit failed

Open the audit to see the reason, then run it again. If it fails a second time, email hello@campaignmedic.com with the ad account name and we will look into it.

Still stuck? Email hello@campaignmedic.com and we will help.

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