How to Remove Facebook Ads: A Detailed Guide
Meta has recently been making continuous “unpredictable” changes to Facebook ad creative, even more than most advertisers realize. More than once, I have received the question: “When should I turn off an ad? How long is a reasonable time to let it run?” In this article, BlackHatWorld will clearly analyze what is really happening and whether you should let Meta optimize automatically. At the same time, we will guide advertisers on how to identify and turn off underperforming ads on Facebook.
How to know if a Facebook ad campaign is not effective?
When advertisers launch a Facebook ad campaign, they will surely sometimes encounter situations where the ad does not bring the desired results. It is important that we know how to distinguish what is an error on Meta’s part, what is a normal phenomenon in the ad delivery process, and what is a problem originating from our own campaign setup.
Meta can make delivery errors
First, we want to emphasize that sometimes Meta does make mistakes. For example, you set up a target for the entire United States but find that most of the impressions come from Indonesia. This is an unusual case and is likely due to the system. In such a situation, you can absolutely contact Meta’s support department to request a review and will usually receive a refund. This rarely happens, but it is still necessary to be aware of it to avoid confusion when analyzing data.
Displaying outside the target audience
Not every time an ad is displayed outside the target audience is a problem. In fact, because Facebook/Instagram is a social network, when users like, share, and comment, the ad can be shown to their friends for free. This is organic reach, and it can sometimes bring benefits. For example, you are promoting a local event, and viewers can tag their friends → helping the campaign reach the right customer group without additional cost.
So how can you tell the difference? It is very simple: look at the ratio. If only 5–10% are displayed in the wrong area or age group, it is just organic reach, which is completely normal. However, if 50–70% are displayed outside the target, it is almost certainly a bug from Meta.
Advantage+ Audience and the risk of expanding beyond the target
Another important point is how Meta operates advantage+ audience. The targeting options for age, gender, and interests are now only suggestions, not hard constraints. Therefore, when you choose the age range of 25–35, the ad can still be shown to people aged 45–50 if Meta believes it will improve efficiency. This surprises many advertisers when they see the results are not consistent with the initial setup.
If you want to have stricter constraints, select original audience options in the audience control section. At the same time, do not forget to turn off the advanced, detailed targeting expansion, so Meta will not automatically expand the audience beyond the range you choose. This is a small but extremely important detail that many advertisers often overlook.
Geographic targeting and a new Meta issue.
Currently, Meta only allows selecting “people living in or recently in this location” instead of “people living in this location”. This can result in ads being shown to tourists or people who have just visited the area. For local businesses, this can be a waste. The way to fix this is to apply the callout method in the ad content. For example, in running travel ads on Facebook: “New Yorkers, here is a special offer for you…” → This will cause tourists to automatically skip the ad, and people who actually live in the area will pay more attention.
Use Breakdown in Ads Manager to check.
To determine whether your ad is being shown to the right audience, we recommend using Breakdown feature in Ads Manager. Analyzing by age, gender, and location will help you pinpoint the exact percentage of displays outside your target. If it is under 10%, do not worry, as that is normal. But if it exceeds this number, it is time for you to review your target, set up audience control, and optimize your campaign. If you need expert support in caring for and optimizing your Facebook ads, contact BlackHatWorld now.
BlackHatWorld is one of the leading reputable agencies specializing in providing Facebook ad account rental services. For more than a decade, we have continuously provided comprehensive advertising solutions, helping many businesses successfully deploy thousands of campaigns and achieve impressive revenue figures.
Our strength lies not only in the quality account system but also in our team of experienced experts who always accompany customers on a 1:1 basis and provide 24/7 support. From technical tasks such as pixel setup, domain verification, and creating professional landing pages to campaign setup, localizing content consultation, measuring, and optimizing ads, everything is done as a comprehensive package to ensure you can confidently deploy and achieve a breakthrough in revenue.
When should you delete a Facebook ad?
During your Facebook ad campaigns, you and other advertisers must have wondered: Should I keep the current campaign running, or should I boldly delete it? This is one of the most important decisions because if we do not base it on actual data and only on intuition, it will be easy to “burn” your budget for nothing.
Based on the CPP data
We want to share a specific example so that you can easily visualize it. Let’s say we have two campaigns: one has a cost per purchase (cpp) of 35 USD, and the other campaign has 73 USD. In addition, there are two other campaigns that have been running for more than 7 days with CPPs of 236 USD and 454 USD, respectively. With these numbers, you clearly do not need any other reason – the campaigns with such high CPPs must be turned off immediately.
When comparing the data from the most recent 7 days, if any campaign consistently fails to bring effective results, we should eliminate it. A campaign with a CPP of up to 280 USD certainly cannot be considered profitable. Conversely, if another campaign yields good results, you should keep it to focus the budget.
When metrics do not reflect the reality of peak season.
Many online shop owners or advertisers often make the mistake of consoling themselves with “beautiful” results during peak seasons. For example, during Black Friday, you might have achieved a ROAS of 5.8 with a CPP of only 13 USD when spending nearly half a million dollars. However, that number does not reflect the long-term reality. The important thing is to look at data from normal months, such as in January, you spent 186K with an average CPP of 31 USD, which is the standard for comparison.
When a new campaign performs better than an old one (CPP is lower, ROAS is higher), the old campaign is no longer worth keeping, even if it still generates orders. Our job is to accept the new standard and reallocate the budget to more effective campaigns instead of “clinging” to the old ones.
Important Note
A common mistake is to compare the costs of retargeting and cold traffic. You have to remember that retargeting is always cheaper and yields better results, so comparing these two forms will lead to a false conclusion. In this article, we only discuss cold traffic, the most important factor for scaling a business.
How to Remove Facebook Ads: A Detailed Guide
Meta has launched Advantage+ creative (formerly known as standard enhancements) to help advertisers optimize ads with AI tools. This feature can automatically adjust images, add music, brighten, add text frames, etc., helping ads become more lively and suitable for each user.
Meta just changed some advertising restrictions, which will benefit advertisers. However, we recommend that you do not give Meta full authority to decide. Look at each option carefully, and turn it on or off as appropriate so as not to ruin the creativity that has already been invested in it. Some noteworthy points:
Relevant comments
Meta prioritizes displaying relevant comments. This is helpful if the ad receives a lot of positive feedback, but it is dangerous if it gets negative comments. Therefore, you need to monitor closely and delete bad comments in time.
Music
Automatically adds music to photos or ads. It can make the content more engaging, but sometimes it is not suitable for the brand. Be proactive and change the music when needed.
Image filter & Visual touch-ups
AI can adjust brightness, increase contrast, or crop and resize to fit multiple display formats. This is useful, but if the images have already been carefully edited by a designer, you should consider turning it off.
3D animation & Image template
You can add slight animations or a headline frame. Be sure to preview it before activating to avoid breaking the layout.
Text improvements
Meta can swap headlines, primary text, and descriptions. Beginners can take advantage of this, but seasoned advertisers often want tight content control, so consider turning it off.
Expand image
AI automatically extends the background to fit the vertical aspect ratio. This is often very useful, but sometimes the resulting image looks unnatural, so you need to check it before running the campaign.
How to turn off or delete a Facebook ad campaign
To easily manage your campaigns, you can follow these steps:
Step 1: Log in to your Facebook Business account, then go to Ads Manager.
Step 2: In the Ads Manager interface, go to the campaigns section to see a list of all running campaigns. Select a campaign you want to pause or delete.
Step 3: Turn off or permanently delete a campaign.
- Click the edit button and select turn off. This will temporarily stop the campaign, and you can turn it back on at any time by toggling the switch.
- If you select the trash can icon, the campaign will be completely deleted.
Note: Once deleted, you cannot restore or rerun the campaign. Therefore, we often recommend that you temporarily turn off campaigns instead of deleting them to retain data for analysis.
Deleting or pausing ads on Facebook may seem simple, but if you understand how to control Advantage+ Creative and know when to turn them off and when to delete them, you can preserve data, optimize effectiveness, and avoid wasting budget. As smart advertisers, we need to take control instead of leaving it up to the algorithm.
Frequently asked questions
No, when you just turn off the ad, the data is still saved and can be reactivated at any time. However, if you delete it, the campaign will disappear permanently and cannot be restored.
Yes, you can. You can absolutely turn off the ad to edit the creative, targeting, or budget. After making adjustments, simply reactivate the campaign, and the ad will resume normal delivery.
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