Publish a Meta Ads campaign paused through the API

Runads creates the whole draft in your ad account through the Marketing API. Every campaign, ad set and ad gets the status PAUSED. Nothing spends until you turn the campaign on in Ads Manager.

Start

Publish paused opens the review screen, Check before the launch, with everything that will be created. The button on that screen starts the run. To find problems before anything is created, use Check in Meta first: see check a draft in Meta.

Order of requests

1. Each file that the ads use is uploaded once to the ad account. An image gets a hash. A video goes in parts; then the builder waits until Meta has processed it, for up to 10 minutes. Files that a passed check uploaded are reused.
2. Each campaign is created with its objective and, if chosen, its budget.
3. The ad sets of that campaign are validated by Meta, then created one by one with their targeting, goal and budget.
4. For each new ad, a creative is created from the page, the file, the text and the link or lead form, then the ad. An ad with an existing creative skips the creative.

Requests run one at a time, and the log shows each one. While a run is going, the draft cannot be edited and a second run cannot start.

The builder never repeats a create request by itself: a repeated request could make a second campaign. One exception is the request limit of the service itself. Such a refusal comes before the request reaches Meta, so the run waits and sends it again.

If a step fails

The run stops at the failed step. The log marks it and shows the explanation Meta gives. Objects made before the error stay in the account, paused.

Fix the cause in the draft and click Continue from the failed step. In the simple mode this button is on the review screen. The builder asks once, then creates only the missing objects in the same campaigns.

Continuing is possible while these stay the same: the ad account, the list of files, the campaign fields, the ad sets, and the ad set and format of each ad. So:

• you can change the ad set or the ad that failed, and the texts;
• if you edit an ad set or a creative that is already made, the run stops and marks it. Undo the edit to continue;
• if you change the campaign, add or remove a file, an ad set or an ad, continuing is off. A warning says that publishing now makes new campaigns. Delete the paused leftovers in Ads Manager.

After a failed run Check in Meta is off until the run continues or starts again. More cases: fix publishing errors.

After publishing

Open in Ads Manager opens the account filtered to the campaigns of this run. Check the preview of each ad, the payment method and the schedule there, then switch the campaigns on.

After a finished run the button of the review screen says Publish as new campaigns. It asks first, because it makes the campaigns a second time.