Why Is My Facebook Ads Not Delivering? Expert Tips To Fix [2024]

Receiving a ‘Facebook Ads not delivering’ warning message can drive advertisers crazy. In reality, most people with little experience optimizing ads go through this situation. So why does it happen and how can advertisers get rid of it? In today’s article, I will discuss common causes behind this issue and suggest corresponding solutions. Stay tuned until the end to solve your problem and make your ads work in no time!

What Is Facebook Ads Not Delivering?

Let’s take an example:

You launch a test campaign with a small daily cap of $25. Your ads run normally and spend their full daily budget.

However, when you increase the budget to $200, they no longer spend, even though you are paying money for them.

This means your Facebook ads are not delivering.

So, Facebook ads not delivering infers to the situation when your ads are not spending and not shown to your intended target audience. 

It can happen to both new ads and existing ads that were performing well in the past.

In business circumstances, not delivering Facebook ads can hurt revenue goals because they generate zero impressions and clicks. As a result, you lose a lot of sales and revenue that you were able to get from Facebook users.

Facebook ads not delivering stem from multiple causes, such as ads stuck in review, low bids, wrong targeting options, etc.

How To Check Facebook Ads Delivery Status?

To check the delivery status of Facebook ads, log into Facebook and go to Ads Manager.

Look at the message in the delivery column next to the Campaign/ Ad set/ Ad column, as in the screenshot below. 

If it says Active or Learning, your ads are running smoothly.

If it states Not delivering, Rejected, Learning limited, Scheduled, In review, Processing, or Preparing, there may be something unusual about your ad, account, or any other aspect.

Thus, your ads are not delivering to the intended audiences. 

The thing is, the delivery status doesn’t really pinpoint what needs fixing or why it’s happening in the first place. 

But don’t worry, we’re about to dive deep into the reasons behind this and how to get your ads back on track.

Why Is My Facebook Ads Not Delivering?

Multiple causes can result in this frustrating situation. Let’s have a glimpse at the table below.

Quick review: Common causes for Facebook ads not delivering

Now, we will take a closer look into the most common reasons behind Facebook Ads not delivering and possible fixes to boost your campaigns.

Ads still under review or disapproved

For those who don’t know, Facebook reviews every ad before it’s allowed to be shown to your audience to make sure it complies with Facebook’s policies and terms of service.

There are two types of ad reviews: automated reviews by the system and manual reviews by real people, done by Facebook’s support team.

According to Facebook’s Business Help Centre, most ads are reviewed within 24 hours. Nevertheless, some cases can take longer.

This means that sometimes it can take longer than 24 hours to review an ad – especially during special occasions when there are high volumes of ads like Christmas or Black Fridays. So if your ad is still in this review process, you should wait a little longer.

Next, if your ad is rejected and not delivered, Facebook will notify you by email and in Ads Manager. Typically, the reason Facebook disapproved your ad is because your ad violated Meta Ads Policies:

Some Meta Ads Policies that you may violate can be:

• Prohibited content: Advertising products or services that are illegal or harmful, such as drugs, weapons, tobacco, cryptocurrency, etc.
• Misleading claims: Making false or exaggerated claims about your product or service, or using deceptive tactics to attract clicks.
• Personal attributes: Targeting audience based on sensitive personal attributes like race, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, or health conditions.
• Low-quality or disruptive content: Promoting content that is irrelevant, spammy, or disruptive to the user experience.

>>> Related: Let’s Find Out Facebook Ads Policy 2024 Updated

Suggested solution

Take a close look at Facebook’s notification, make the necessary changes to your ad, and resubmit the revised version. Double-check Meta Ads Policies and compare them against your ad. Make absolutely sure your ad copy, website link, or landing page doesn’t violate any of Meta Ads Policies.

If editing doesn’t get your ad delivered, you might consider appealing to Facebook to review your account and ad (I’ll guide you through that later). It’s entirely possible that Facebook has simply misunderstood something about your ad.

Post no longer available

This error is a common headache for advertisers running PPE (Page Post Engagement) campaigns. If you’re still promoting a post that’s been deleted or removed from Facebook, your ad delivery will come to a screeching halt.

Maybe you accidentally deleted the post, or perhaps it violated Facebook’s Community Standards. It’s easy to overlook with so many posts and ads running simultaneously.

Suggested solution

Make it a habit to regularly check, manage, and track your Facebook posts and ads. Don’t let any posts or ads slip through the cracks!

Ad spent over budget

If you’re not keeping a close eye on your Facebook Ads spending and haven’t optimized your budget carefully, your ads could easily run into delivery issues.

This can also happen if the number of people clicking on your ads suddenly spikes. It’s a tricky situation to control unless you’re really monitoring your campaigns closely.

When your ads burn through your entire budget, they’ll simply stop running and won’t be shown to anyone else. This can seriously hurt your advertising efforts because you could be missing out on a lot of potential customers.

Suggested solution

If you are new and have no experience in optimizing ad budgets, you can consider enabling the Campaign Budget Optimization (CBO) feature. Or when using Daily Budget, pay attention to visiting the ad every day to monitor and optimize it.

Your budget or bid too low

Setting your budget or bid too low can lead to Facebook Ads not delivering for a few key reasons:

• Lack of competitiveness: Facebook’s ad delivery system works like an auction. Ads with higher budgets and bids are typically prioritized over those with lower budgets. When your budget is too low, your ads may not be able to compete effectively in the auction, resulting in limited or no delivery.
• Limited reach: Your budget directly affects the number of people your ads can reach. A low budget will significantly restrict your ad’s reach, preventing it from being shown to a large enough audience to generate meaningful results.
• Insufficient learning: Facebook’s ad delivery algorithm relies on data to optimize your campaigns. A low budget might not provide enough data for the algorithm to learn and make informed decisions about who to show your ads to, leading to inefficient delivery.
• Daily spending limits: Facebook may set daily spending limits based on your budget. If your budget is too low, you might hit these limits quickly, causing your ads to stop delivering for the rest of the day.

Suggested solution

To avoid this issue, it’s crucial to set a budget that aligns with your campaign goals and target audience size. Consider the average cost per result in your industry and allocate a budget that allows your ads to reach a significant portion of your target audience.

Audience size is too small

Facebook requires a minimum number of users in the target audience for ads to be delivered effectively. If the audience is too small, there aren’t enough users for the ad to reach and display, leading to no delivery.

Besides, Facebook uses algorithms to optimize ads and display them to people with the highest likelihood of interaction. When the audience is too small, the algorithm does not have enough data to learn and optimize, making ad delivery ineffective.

Suggested solution

Review your target audience and make sure the number of people you are targeting is greater than 1000.

Wrong ad scheduling

Ad Scheduling is directly related to your budget and ad delivery. If you accidentally set the wrong ad schedule (you set it for a date in the past) or the ad date in the schedule you set has passed, your ad will not be delivered.

Suggested solution

Pay attention to Ad Scheduling under ‘Budget & Schedule’. You need to make sure that the start and end dates have not passed. While the ad is running, you also need to monitor how it performs to ensure it runs and spends the budget properly.

Audience overlap

Unlike a small audience size, audience overlap means your ads are targeting the same group of people. Targeting and advertising on Facebook means you’re competing with other businesses to reach that audience. But with audience overlap, you’re essentially competing against yourself.

Why does this condition cause ads to not deliver? According to Facebook, the algorithm only focuses on delivering ads with higher relevance and quality scores if there is audience overlap. This causes the remaining ads (with lower relevance and quality scores) with the overlapping audience to not be able to deliver.

Suggested solution

Go to the Audience section in Meta Ads Manager, where you can check the audience overlap percentage. Tick the Audience List boxes of the ads that are not delivering, then click ‘Show Audience Overlap’, the result is as shown below:

Right here, you can see how many percent overlap the selected audience. If this number is higher than 40%, it is quite dangerous, you need to eliminate these overlapping audiences. However, according to leading advertising experts, it is best to keep this number below 20%.

Target wrong audience

Targeting the wrong audience can be a major culprit behind your ads not delivering. To understand why, let’s take a quick dive into how Machine Learning works:

After you create your ad and hit ‘Publish,’ it enters the Machine Learning Phase. During this learning phase, your ad is shown to a few different audiences. If they don’t interact or click on your ad, Facebook assumes your ad quality and relevance are low, leading to poor delivery.

You might be wondering why they wouldn’t interact. It’s very likely because your ad is targeting the wrong people. If your audience isn’t interested or engaged, your ad won’t get delivered.

Suggested solution

Revisit your potential audience research. You’ll need a solid strategy and the right tools for this. Consider using AdTargeting or Meta Audience Insights to understand your potential audience’s behavior, interests, and demographics before you target them.

Additionally, to improve your ad score, you can also follow some of the following guidelines from Facebook:

Broken website, link, or landing page

Of course, the website link or landing page you use for advertising must also comply with Ads Policies. If it contains elements that violate the policies, such as inappropriate content, images, or videos, it will affect the entire ad campaign and prevent your ads from being delivered.

Suggested solution

You need to review all the links to your ads, whether they are product links, website links, or landing pages, you must make sure they are working properly. You also need to check all the images and text in those links and make sure they comply with Meta Ads Policies.

Wrong ad goal

Your Facebook ad optimization goal is the action you want your target audience to take. Choosing the right goal is crucial for ad performance.

Facebook uses your chosen goal to analyze user behavior and find the perfect audience for your ad. For example, optimizing for Add to cart means Facebook will target people likely to add products to their cart based on their past engagement with similar ads. Experts often call this Audience value signals, and it works like this:

If there are no signals, in other words, your audience doesn’t take the action you want, then your ad won’t deliver.

Suggested solution

Switch to a more easily achievable goal, you can choose different CTAs.

Temporarily change the optimization goal to Link Clicks. This allows Facebook to track conversions while also identifying interested users based on clicks, optimizing delivery accordingly.

Facebook’s server error

If you are sure that you do not make the above mistakes. There is a high possibility that Facebook is having some new updates and their server is having problems.

Suggested solution

In this situation, there is nothing else you can do but wait.

Normally, these updates take only a few hours, at most a day. Please stay calm and try to wait until the update is completed and you can use Meta Ads Manager as usual.

>>> You also may like: Why Is My Facebook Ads Not Spending? How To Fix It Quickly?

Step-by-Step Process To Fix Facebook Ads Not Delivering

The flowchart below shows specific steps to implement when you receive a Facebook ads not delivering message.

Here is the detailed guide.

Check your ad again

There are 4 important things you need to review if you encounter an ad that is not delivering or being rejected. It includes:

• Ad content: This includes images, videos, primary text – basically everything in your Ad Copy. You need to review and make sure they don’t violate Meta Ads Policies. You can also use ad compliance checker tools to double-check.
• Audience: Your target audience is the next thing to consider if this frustrating situation arises. If you’re targeting audiences that aren’t allowed to see ads (children, minors, or certain sensitive groups), your ad won’t be delivered either.
• Budget and bidding: This is another aspect you need to review. Make sure your bid is competitive enough compared to other advertisers. Also, ensure your budget is sufficient for the ad to be delivered and function normally.
• Website link and landing page: Finally, double-check the link in your ad. Is it working properly? Does it contain any elements that might violate Ads Policies? If so, modify the information accordingly and ensure your link is fully functional.

After reviewing and editing your ad, resubmit it and wait for Facebook to review it. If the Facebook Ads not delivering status persists, continue reading the next section right below.

Send a request to the Facebook support team

If you are too helpless with the Facebook Ads not delivering situation, you can send a request for Facebook to check your account. I will share the steps to do this below:

Please try to upload a picture of the condition you are experiencing. At the same time, describe carefully the duration of the problem and the remedies you have tried but to no avail.

You have to wait about 1 day for Facebook to approve the request and contact you via Email.

Video: How to solve Facebook ads not delivering

Source: E & T Academy

How To Prevent Facebook Ads Not Delivering?

Last but not least, below are simple but effective methods to prevent Facebook ads from not delivering.

Understand and comply with Meta Ads Policies

To avoid violating Facebook’s advertising policies, it’s important to familiarize yourself with their policies and guidelines. You can find them on the Facebook Business Help Center.

You need to read the content there carefully so as not to violate anything. Basically, these principles are mandatory to follow to ensure a clean and civilized Facebook environment.

Pay attention to audience size when targeting

A simple piece of expert advice for advertisers when targeting: Don’t be too specific or too broad, let’s aim for a green balance. 

You need to try to adjust the audience so that it is neither smaller than 1000 people nor too large. The important thing here is to target enough so that the ad can be delivered to the right people at the right time.

Set reasonable budgets and bids

To avoid Facebook Ads not delivering due to budget and bidding issues, you must research your target audience and campaign goals thoroughly. 

You can start with a minimum budget and gradually increase it based on performance data, and choose the bidding type that suits your experience level and campaign objectives. 

Next, you can utilize Facebook’s suggested bids and automated features for optimization. Continuously monitor and adjust your budget and bids based on real-time performance data to achieve the best results. 

Join Facebook groups to find support

Typically, Facebook groups related to paid advertising include all sorts of troubleshooting guides, announcements about new updates, Q&A sessions about Facebook Ads, etc. It’s a treasure trove of knowledge that you shouldn’t miss.

This includes clever ways to deal with Facebook ads not delivering. You can go on Facebook and search for relevant groups to join. However, be mindful of each group’s specific rules, or you might face penalties.

Contact GDT Agency

GDT Agency is a leading Facebook partner. We are always ready to help you overcome any advertising challenges, including Facebook Ads not delivering.

Facebook Agency Account For Rent is one of our best services to help you avoid this situation in the future. You can check it out to start your professional advertising journey.

Epilogue

To summarize all the points above, I hope you can overcome the Facebook Ads not delivering status and advertise effectively. However, mastering Facebook Ads is a long process that requires patience and a thirst for knowledge. So, keep exploring new insights in our Facebook Ads Blog. Good luck to all advertisers and happy advertising!

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