Have you ever spent hours perfecting your Facebook ad, only to find that the primary text disappears when it goes live? There’s a particularly pesky bug with Facebook ads related to primary text copy that we need to talk about - and more importantly, we need to talk about how to work around it.
It’s incredibly frustrating, but this post will guide you through how to identify and fix this annoying issue. We’ll break down the steps clearly so that you can get your ads running smoothly without any hiccups.
Understanding the Meta Ad Bug
We first noticed this issue rearing its ugly head during a Labor Day campaign. Our ad previews look perfect, but when the ads went live, the primary text was nowhere to be found. What gives?
Here’s what happened: we paused our campaign for adjustments and to create different ad copies for the same campaign. Everything looked great in the drafts and the copy was all there, approved by the client and ready to go.
Later that night, we published the campaign, hoping to wake up to a flood of clicks and conversions. It went live early the next morning, and everything seemed fine until we noticed the text was missing in some ads. Double-checking the ad previews, they looked totally fine, but in the live environment, the primary text was nowhere to be seen.
The long story short is that this bug creates a discrepancy between the ad previews and the live environment, making it difficult for us to trust what we saw before hitting 'publish'.
How to Troubleshoot This Error
Now that we know what the bug is, let's start troubleshooting. The good news is that this is a relatively simple problem with a relatively simple fix, and you shouldn’t have to contact Facebook support (which can be a time-consuming and annoying process).
You can fix this issue yourself, but you’ll need to take a few steps.
First, clear the group customization for each ad. This might sound like a minor step, but it’s an important one. Observe any changes in the text display after doing this. Edit and select the correct ad, making sure the right text appears in the live environment.
Why did this error happen in the first place? As it turns out, duplicated ads with different images were causing the issue. The copy was defaulting to some sort of standard product copy, messing up our customized text. Because of this, the only way to fix the bug is to duplicate the ad to keep the copy and headlines, but to change the individual images. That way, it won’t default to a default product copy.
The most important takeaway from all of this is that you need to channel your inner detective. Make sure, in your QA process, that you are including checks for group customizations. Make sure the correct ads are showing in previews and confirm URLs and other details. Don’t gloss over a single detail - and make sure the primary text matches in both the preview and live environments.
This will add a bit of time to your QA process, but it’s worth it because you’ll avoid so many headaches later on.
The Takeaway
To wrap things up, the key to solving this Meta ad bug is a combination of clearing group customizations and manually adjusting each ad. It’s a meticulous process, but it ensures that your primary text shows up correctly in the live environment.
And the overarching message here is that you always stay vigilant and regularly update your QA processes. This bug isn’t going away anytime soon, so being prepared is your best defense.
By following these steps - and working with Kinetic319 to help you troubleshoot any other issues - you can make sure that your Facebook ads display correctly, keeping your campaigns effective (and your sanity intact).