Recently, I set up a Facebook campaign with strictly manual placements—no Instagram, no Audience Network, just Facebook. To maintain complete control, I disabled all Advantage+ features, including audience expansion, automatic placements, and creative enhancements. Everything looked good at launch.
But then, I revisited the campaign later, and—surprise! 🤯
The manual settings I had carefully configured were gone, replaced by Meta’s Advantage+ defaults.
Has anyone else experienced this? Is it a glitch, or is Meta subtly steering advertisers toward automated solutions?
I understand the push for automation. Advantage+ features can be powerful, leveraging machine learning to optimise performance. But when a campaign’s strategy hinges on precision and strict targeting, these overrides create major challenges. Advertisers who need full control—whether for compliance reasons, audience testing, or specific objectives—shouldn’t have to constantly check if their settings are being altered.
So, what’s going on here? A temporary bug or a deliberate shift in Meta’s advertising ecosystem?
If you’ve encountered the same issue, let’s discuss! How do you maintain control over your campaigns in a landscape increasingly driven by automation?
