TL;DR: Creating Facebook ads correctly starts with a campaign skeleton, not a settings deep-dive. This post covers the exact setup for three campaign types (awareness, traffic, and leads) from a Creekside Marketing tutorial. Set up the skeleton first, then fine-tune every parameter through the audit process. Most campaign skeletons go live in under 30 minutes.

How to Create Facebook Ads Campaigns: The Skeleton Setup We Use Before Touching a Single Parameter

If you want to know how to create Facebook ads without spending three hours lost in Ads Manager, the answer is simpler than most tutorials make it look. The issue with most walkthroughs is that they try to show you every setting at once. That approach buries the actual campaign structure under a pile of configuration details you do not need on day one.

At Creekside Marketing, we build the campaign skeleton first. The skeleton gets the campaign live with the right structure. The audit process comes after, and it is what tells you how to configure every parameter that actually drives performance. This post walks through how to create Facebook ads across the three campaign types you will use most: awareness, traffic, and leads. It is based on a video Peterson published on the Creekside Marketing YouTube channel: How To Create Facebook Ads.

The Right Way to Create Facebook Ads: Build the Skeleton First

The skeleton is the minimum structure required for a campaign to exist and be publishable. It covers three levels, campaign, ad set, and ad, but only the decisions that have to be made right now. Every other setting, the parameters that control performance, gets handled in a separate audit pass after the skeleton is live.

This two-phase approach matters for a practical reason. When you try to configure everything at once, campaign builds drag on, decisions get made without enough data, and structural mistakes get buried under layers of settings. The skeleton-first approach keeps the build fast and the optimization pass systematic. Here is what each level of the skeleton includes:

Campaign level: Select the objective, name the campaign.

Ad set level: Select the Facebook page, set the budget type, name the ad set.

Ad level: Choose the format, add creative, set the URL, publish.

That is it. Everything else is audit territory. You basically make this skeleton and then audit through everything to make sure you have everything set up correctly.

How to Create a Facebook Awareness Campaign

An awareness campaign is the top-of-funnel layer in a full account structure. The skeleton takes less than 10 minutes to build. In Ads Manager, select the Awareness objective, name the campaign with the date and objective (the naming convention matters more than most advertisers realize), then set up one ad set with the correct Facebook page selected, and create one ad in your chosen format.

In Ads Manager, click to create a new campaign and select the Awareness objective. Name the campaign something you will remember. The naming convention we use is date plus type: “April 2025 Awareness” tells anyone looking at the account exactly what this campaign is and when it was created. That matters at scale.

At the ad set level, name the ad set the same way you named the campaign. Select the correct Facebook page for the account you are managing. Targeting, scheduling, placement selection, and other parameters are configured through the audit process, not during the skeleton build.

At the ad level, select your format. A single image ad is the simplest starting point. A video ad works if the creative is ready. Pick the format, upload the creative, and publish. That is the awareness campaign skeleton.

The reason we keep the skeleton separate from the audit is deliberate. Trying to set auction type, placements, audiences, and creative all in one session is how campaigns sit in draft for days. The skeleton gets it live. The audit makes it perform.

How to Create a Traffic Campaign on Facebook

A traffic campaign is designed to send people to a landing page. The carousel format is one of the most common formats for traffic because it lets you show multiple angles or products in a single ad unit. The skeleton for a traffic campaign adds one critical decision that awareness does not: you must confirm the correct landing page URL before publishing.

Create a new campaign and select the Traffic objective. Name it with the same date-plus-type convention. At the ad set level, you are optimizing to maximize the number of link clicks. The important part of a link click campaign is making sure you are directing people to the correct landing page. Get that URL right before you build anything else, because in a carousel, that URL attaches to every single card.

For the carousel format:

Select Carousel as your ad type at the ad level
Add your base URL (it will carry through to every card)
Upload your images. We recommend a minimum of five. You can add up to ten.
Write the headline for each card
Confirm the URL is correct

Each carousel card shows a separate image with its own headline, but all cards typically link to the same destination in a standard traffic campaign. Once the creative is loaded and the URL is verified, publish it.

One broader context point here: Facebook ads and Google Ads are not interchangeable tools. If you are still deciding which platform makes sense for your business, the comparison of Google Ads vs Facebook Ads comes down to your sales cycle and where your buyers are in the purchase decision. Interrupt-driven buying (Facebook) and active search intent (Google) produce different results for different business types. Most of our clients run both.

How to Create a Facebook Leads Campaign

A leads campaign is the most common campaign type for service-based businesses running direct response advertising on Meta. The skeleton has a few more decisions than the other two types, but none of them are complicated. The key structural choices are budget level, conversion type, and conversion event.

Create a new campaign and select the Leads objective. At the ad set level, you face a choice between two conversion types: instant forms (a form that stays inside Facebook) or website conversions (sending traffic to your own landing page). For most accounts, website conversions are the better starting point. Select “Website” and choose to maximize the number of conversions.

For the conversion event, select “Lead” as the standard event. If you have custom events already configured in your pixel, you can select those. For a new account or a new campaign, the standard Lead event is the right starting point because it builds conversion data faster.

One of the more important structural decisions in a leads campaign: use ad set budget, not campaign budget optimization. This is especially important when you plan to run more than one audience. With campaign budget optimization on, Meta controls how budget moves between ad sets based on its own signals. Ad set budgets give you direct control over spend by audience segment, which matters when you are testing different targeting approaches.

We do not recommend Advantage+ Catalog for standard lead generation campaigns. That format is designed for product-based retargeting and e-commerce catalog ads. If it appears as an option in the leads flow, leave it off.

At the ad level, a single image ad is the standard starting point. Add your image, write your headline, add descriptions, and set your call to action. One setting worth noting: turn on Enhancements for single image ads. These allow Meta to algorithmically test small variations in the creative (cropping, brightness adjustments, and similar) to find what performs better. We recommend leaving these on.

Publish it. That is the leads campaign skeleton.

Naming Conventions That Save Hours Later

Naming is one of the fastest ways to create chaos in an ad account, and one of the easiest things to get right from the start. When you have 15 campaigns running across multiple objectives and time periods, campaigns named “Campaign 1” or “New Leads” become unmanageable within a few weeks.

The convention we use at Creekside: date plus campaign type. “April 2025 Awareness.” “April 2025 Traffic.” “Q2 2025 Leads.” Apply the same logic at the ad set level. If you are running multiple audiences, include the audience in the name. If you are running multiple creative formats, include the format. Good naming costs nothing to implement at the start and saves real hours when you are auditing an account, diagnosing performance, or handing work off to another person.

Always name it something that you will remember. That is the full rule.

What Comes After the Skeleton: The Audit Process

The audit process is what tells you whether your campaign skeleton is configured correctly and where to make changes. According to our workflow, after you create the skeleton, you audit through everything with the audit process to make sure you have everything set up correctly. The audit covers auction type, placement configuration, audience layering, budget allocation, creative testing, and conversion event verification.

This is the step that most “how to create Facebook ads” content skips. Setting up a campaign skeleton gets you a campaign that exists. Running it through the audit process gets you a campaign that performs. Those are two different things.

Based on $20M+ in managed Meta ad spend across dozens of industries, the audit process is where the real performance difference lives. Not in whether you selected the Awareness vs Traffic objective correctly, but in whether your placements are excluding low-quality inventory, whether your audiences are sized correctly for your budget, and whether your conversion events are firing on the right actions. For what this produces in practice, see our breakdown of new customer acquisition results on Meta.

The skeleton is not the finished product. It is the starting line.

FAQ

What is the difference between campaign budget optimization and ad set budget on Facebook?

Campaign budget optimization (CBO) lets Meta automatically distribute your total budget across ad sets based on its own performance signals. Ad set budget gives you direct control over how much each ad set spends. For accounts running multiple audience segments, ad set budgets are the recommended structure because they let you allocate spend intentionally rather than ceding that control to the algorithm.

Should I use instant forms or website leads for a Facebook leads campaign?

Website leads generally produce better lead quality than instant forms. Instant forms keep the user inside Facebook, which reduces friction and tends to drive higher volume, but also lower intent. Sending traffic to your landing page filters for more serious prospects. If your landing page conversion rate is low, instant forms may be a short-term workaround while you fix it, but website leads are the better long-term structure.

How many images should a carousel ad have on Facebook?

We recommend a minimum of five images for carousel ads. The platform allows up to ten. More images give Meta more creative combinations to test, which typically improves ad relevance diagnostics over time.

What conversion event should I use for a Facebook leads campaign?

Start with the standard “Lead” event. This is the most common Meta pixel event for lead generation and builds conversion data the fastest. If you have custom conversion events already configured (such as a “Form Complete” or “Consultation Request” event), those can be used once you have enough data to support smart bidding.

What types of campaigns should most service businesses run on Facebook?

For most service-based businesses, the starting point is a leads campaign targeting website conversions. Awareness and traffic campaigns are useful for building an audience and warming cold traffic, but if budget is limited, leads campaigns with ad set budgets and a standard Lead conversion event are where to start.

Want Us to Audit Your Facebook Ads Setup?

Building the skeleton is step one. Knowing whether your setup is actually correct and identifying what to change is what the audit process covers. If you want our team to look at your account and tell you exactly where performance is leaking, the free $10K Profit Audit is where to start.

About the Author

Peterson Rainey is the founder of Creekside Marketing, a paid ads agency managing $20M+ in Google and Meta ad spend. He writes about what is actually working in paid advertising based on real account data across dozens of industries.