Hey there, Haveaclue! I’ve been so busy cooking up something new for you (more on that at the end) that I haven’t had time to write here. BUT this is a BIG issue…

I already posted on X and LinkedIn about this, but realized…

Sooooo I couldn’t not send this email!

Here’s the issue:

If you go to EDIT an ad, even just to look at an ad's settings without changing anything, the system automatically adds Related Media.

It won't publish automatically, buuuut, it will queue to publish the next time you publish other changes. Super sneaky.

So this means new ads and duplicated ads will be impacted too. If you're moving quickly and not expecting it, you'll miss it completely.

I've seen this in a few accounts and heard about from many other advertisers.

If you see the green Publish button light up in the bottom right of your edit screen before you made any changes, make sure to smash the DISCARD button before moving if you're not making any changes. If you are making other changes, make sure to remove the related media section before you hit publish.

Before hitting the blue Review and Publish button, ALWAYS check the number of things being published and make sure it adds up to what you changed. Double check other ads aren't being updated unintentionally.

I have flagged this to Meta engineers and they seem to be working on it.

To see if you've been impacted by this related media issue, you can do a breakdown by Creative -> Related Media and see reporting at the campaign, ad set, and ad level. (This isn’t an issue if you want to use that related media function, buuuut it’s a huuuuge issue for all the advertisers who didn’t consent to this.

I found an ad where 96% of spend went to ads OTHER THAN the one I thought it was.

This completely throws off learnings and this renders all reporting virtually useless.

This is NOT ok. Tell your Meta rep, chat support, make sure they know this is NOT OK

This is more than an annoyance, this is a full-blown bug and should be regarded as such. Not acceptable. Talk to your Meta reps and support, this is unexpected behavior and erodes our trust in Meta

2 of my least favorite things in my 18+ years of advertising:

1. Unannounced Ads Manager changes

2. When ad performance dips, something feels off and you ask the team what changed on the website and they swear they didn’t change anything, but then you find something important actually changed…

WELP, if you’re reading this, you probably know that feeling all too well.

And while I don’t have a fix for the Ads Manager changes, I do have a tool to help with website changes…

Someone asked me what’s something I do different/better than 99% of advertisers.

I thought about it for a second and realized:

I screenshot all my ad landing pages and homepages every day.

Most marketers don’t do that because they don’t think it matters, buuuut let me tell you: IT HELPS! I’ve caught so many major or tiny changes that nobody else noticed and have been able to tie that back to ad performance shifts.

Buuut the process for setting up all that is a pain! Gotta build automations, get it to work right, and still need to review the screenshots….

Sooooo I decided to take that painful process, simplify it, streamline it, and offer it to you in one tidy tool, and I think you’ll love it…

(sounds like “you’ll love it!”)

I’ve been cooking up the ultimate website change monitoring tool for marketers, founders, agencies, and anyone responsible for making businesses grow.

I’ll have more to demo and announce about URL Love It in the coming weeks. Smash that link and toss your email in the waitlist to be among the first to get access!

I’ve been using the tool for months while building it and it has saved my ass almost every week.

Initial responses to URL Love It have been extremely positive and I’m so excited for more people to try it and cover their butts with screenshots of their PDP’s, landing pages, homepages, external reviews pages, and even organic search results.

One user said “This is gonna save me so much sleep”

If you made it down this far and REALLY want early access, I’m looking for 5 or so testers. Hit reply and say LOVE IT and I’ll see if I can get you in for an early taste.

Thanks for tuning in, I hope you found this valuable! Keep scaling and have a great weekend!

Hott regards,

Barry Hott

P.S. I recently put out two value-packed videos on YouTube about how to test landing pages the right way and why ad “hit rate” is a useless metric. I have more videos coming soon, so subscribe to my YouTube so you don’t miss em!