Facebook Introduces ‘Learning Phase’ For Ads Manager
As complex and difficult Facebook has been to get started for businesses of all sizes, Facebook revealed an exciting, new addition to their ad platform (no, it’s not another profile photo change). The change, called the ‘Learning Phase’, is now an ads status within Facebook Ads Manager that helps the advertiser identify when the campaign is fully optimized.
This Learning Phase of an ad launch is a small, but enormous update to help advertisers keep a bit of their sanity. Now we know we’re not just looking for 15 to 25 purchases, but Facebook will actually list this status to indicate that an ad or campaign is fully optimized to deliver the results for your campaign objective. Learning Phase shows on the Ad Set view next to the Delivery Status where the ad typically says Active, however the ad will now say “Active (learning)”.
When we start delivering your ad set, whether at the start of a campaign or after you make a significant edit, we don’t have all the data necessary to deliver it as stably as possible. In order to get that data, we have to show ads to different types of people to learn who is most likely to take the action you’re optimizing for (your “Optimization for Ad Delivery” choice). This process is called the “learning phase.”
Once we have the data we need, the learning phase ends and your ad set should experience fewer performance fluctuations. (That said, it’s useful to keep in mind that delivery will get even more stable as we collect more data beyond the learning phase.) At this point, you can make an informed decision about your ad set. If you’re satisfied with your results, you can let it keep running or increase its budget. If you’re unsatisfied, you can edit the ad set to try to improve its performance, or pause it.
According to the new delivery status, Facebook shows the learning phase needs 50 purchases instead of the recommended 15-25 in the past. However, this is nothing new, as we all know the more purchases your campaign gets the more optimized your ads become. One early bug we’ve found shows that even with old ads running up until today, the learning phase needs more data even with a well-oiled campaign (second screenshot to the right) that has 474 purchases. Its important to note that any changes to an active campaign will reset this learning phase.
Clearly, there’s pain points in Facebook Ads Manager that make optimization difficult or even making the right call on shutting down the ad. Facebook advertisers will surely see this as a great step towards better decision making within their campaigns. As Facebook officially states there’s no change in their algorithm or how Facebook Ads work:
Important: The learning phase is a normal part of the lifecycle of an ad set. It’s always existed, we’re now just letting you know it’s happening. It doesn’t indicate that your ad set is experiencing any sort of unusual performance issue.
Will this help you better manage your campaigns?
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Excellent breakdown Brendan.
I just noticed the “learning phase” upgrade thanks
to one of my friend’s posting a jpeg on it and this
article gave me the exact info I was looking for.
Thanks partner.
Glad to could help John!
Ugh, this so called “Learning Phase” appears to be stalling several of my FB ads from doing ANYTHING. I’ve never known FB not to spend (or at least get close to spending) a set daily budget, and right now it’s spending virtually nothing and serving ads to almost no one.
Sorry to hear Ryan! According to Facebook, there’s nothing new happening in terms of the optimization, but it does give the appearance of ads going back into a learning phase just looking at the notification. I’m surprised it gave 50 conversions as the optimization. Definitely reach out to Facebook directly and get it resolved on their end if a change is stalling ads.
Did you have any luck reaching out to FB about the ads stalling? My ads are also stalling for HOURS in the learning phase and making my page look very unbalanced compared to engagement of previous posts.
Hi Brendan. Thanks for the article. For some reason all of my ads still (more than only month old to ones created mere hours ago), still only shows active, and not the Learning part. Any idea what I can do to see the status?
Hi Johan – It looks like this is being rolled out as we’re only seeing it under some of our accounts, just the same as we’re seeing pieces of Power Editor moved into the new Ads Manager. Be patient, it will come! 🙂
Great article!
Our account had the learning phase and the learning phases status bar, but we just recently noticed that it went away!
Anyone know what happened?
Hi Guys! It is not necessary that you get 50 Purchases in 7 days, if this number is hard for you to reach just edit your add and choose Initial CheckOut instead Purchase! This also count as a conversion! Your ad can get to 50 and get the learning phase in less than 7 days! Also you will get your Ad optimization faster!
NB: Leave your ad at least running for 24 hours before making any changes again!
Hello, I am experiencing the same issue as Ryan with recent campaign ads not performing at all due to this new “learning phase”. Very frustrated at this point!
I’m also having the same issue. I started a new campaign, ad set, and ad for a client almost 24 hours ago. The ad set is still “learning” and the ad has reached 0 people! Now I’m starting to get nervous!
Hi Jen / Lisa – Hopefully your ads have started running by now. 🙂 But if not, make sure you’re looking at today’s data. If you’re seeing that you have budget and it should be spending, check your relevance score. If you’re well-versed in Facebook ads and have gone through all of the checks, I’ve seen campaigns not perform when the pixel is not installed properly. If all else fails send Facebook a note and they should have an answer for any issues on their end. Sorry to hear you’re running into trouble!
Would I be correct to assume that changing the ad would reset the learning phase for that ad set? I feel that switching the active ad would be considered a ‘significant edit’ to the ad set. Thanks!
Yes – that’s correct! Any creative change completely resets the ad, and its learning phase, even to an existing adset. An adset is nothing without its ads :). Thanks for your question!
Nice Article, I am Facing the Same problem, When it appears in my Ads, I Thought it Was Some Kind of Caping by Facebook. Thanks For sharing this Article.
Thanks for this news.
I am running lead generation campaign and after this learning phase update my campaign becomes stuck now I am getting very less leads from campaign according to past month. can u suggest me why it’s happening to me and what should i do???
Hello – depending on your targeting, how quickly you’ve reached that target and how likely they are to convert are all things that factor into your cost per lead. The learning phase has less to do with your performance and more about your target audience and one-week performance.
Is the “Learning Phase” comment still being used? I don’t see where it says Learning Phase like your picture above.
Hi Don – yes, its still active for any ad accounts we’re serving here in the U.S. Learning Phase is just more visible with this update, its something that’s always existed, just made more apparent for user-friendliness. You should still focus on getting 15-25 conversions in your first week. Cheers!
Hello Brendan, thank you for the informative article. I am facing the same issues with Jordan as I can’t seem to find this feature on my ad account. Is this perhaps only for USA facebook accounts? I am a Canadian.
Thank you.
Hi Eric – I do know there are different features rolled out in Canada so I cannot guarantee its been active yet. There are also different “products” or abilities within business manager as assigned by Facebook but the general capabilities are no different for you or anyone in the US. Best of luck!
Must I let my ad run for 7days to get 50 conversion.
Can I instead do a 1day conversion window and reach the learning phase faster, by spending $125 and let in run for one day, because I usually get 2 conversions @ $5 , when I use leads conversion objective.
You’ll likely get more attribution with a 7-day window. No need to wait a week for 50 conversions as that’s the max amount of time it should take. The sooner you reach it, the sooner your ad is optimized! But really, if you’re getting good results, you may not need to reach the full 50 conversions. Sometimes 25 is enough. Good luck!
If we create a new ad manager account and then share the pixel and custom audience b/w them, do you think this learning process will have to happen for the ads you create? The ads I am talking about here are the ones we export from the other Facebook Ad account.
Hi Rahul,
Yes, the learning phase is based on adsets from their last change. This means either the beginning of your campaign or changing an audience within your adset. Even though you are sharing the pixel, with another business manager you’ll still need to reach that threshold within the adset.
Hope this helps!
Great information!
So let’s say I start an ad for $5 a day and its in the “learning phase” should i not scale that ad until its out of the learning phase?
-How do you personally scale a winning ad set? Everyone i’ve talked to says something different.
Hi Justin,
Glad this helped! Learning phase is more about your adset learning until its reached enough data points to be optimized. Your spend should reflect getting your campaign optimized quickly. Depending on your conversion goal and what you’ve found works or not works, put your confidence behind your budget. If you’re early on running ads with an ad account, I wouldn’t scale as drastically as you don’t have anything to base your confidence on.
Scaling is the golden goose – every scenario is different, but I’ll say that if your results are phenomenal, then I’m more likely to drastically increase budget. Remember – your adset is optimized for your spend, so any changes can alter it. This is why I recommend starting your budget based on past behavior.
Good luck!
Hi Brandon, I started a FB Lead Generation campaign 2 days ago. The first day (only a half day b/c I started it in the afternoon) it got 5 leads in an hour. But the 2nd day it only got 2 leads the whole day. Is this due to the ad being in the learning phase and Facebook is putting the ad in front of different audiences? It sucks wasting money on audiences that aren’t converting when they clearly had it right for an hour but then switched to a less converting audience.
Hi Joseph,
It can definitely be frustrating. In the beginning of any campaign, Facebook will try to optimize your campaign quicker by reaching the most likely people. Depending on your seed audience, it also likely went after the lowest hanging fruit. Remember, you need much more than 5 leads to optimize your campaign, so keep your eye on the prize and think long-term.
Cheers,
Brendan
Hi Brendan,
I cannot see any data under the results column. Can you help me out on the reason behind such behaviour?
Thanks,
Poonam
Poonam,
Make sure you are in the ADSET view and not campaign view. In campaign view, if you have different objectives like initiate checkout, purchase, add to cart, the results on the campaign level will show a “-“. Drill down one level and you’ll see it! If you’re still not seeing data on the adset level, make sure you have the correct dates set. Otherwise, open a ticket with FB as this is not something I’ve seen otherwise.
Cheers!
Hi Brandon! Thank you for this article!
So my problem with the learning phase is that one day the cost per purchase on one ad set is 6$ and the ad set is doing amazing, yet another day it goes to 50$ cost per purchase and it just spends my daily budget to generate like 1 – 2 sales. And then also the next day drops to 9$ cost per purchase and then two days in a row over 30$. This is all in the learning phase.
How is this possible if I had not made any changes in my ad set, i left it alone, maybe raised the daily budget but not by a lot.
It’s frustrating because I can’t decide whether the ad set is “killing” it, or just spending money for nothing :/
Hopefully you can help me with this one.
Thank you very much
Josh
Hi Josh,
I would adjust your budget only after 4 days or more. Adding budget means Facebook needs to optimize that spend as well. increasing spend will always throws optimization off as more budget means more reach which increases your competition to serve more impressions. I’ve consistently found my results even out after the learning phase is done (except around end of month and holidays). Hope this helps!
Brendan
Hi My Instagram Ad still showing the Learning phase process and still not yet get the CPC, But the Reach, Impression and the amount also spending. Please guide me the how to resolve the ad and get performance well.
Hi, really nice and helpful article!
I have a question, if i schedule my add to don’t be running between 3 am and 5 am, after this “STOP” period is the add going to start learning again every morning?
Thank you!
Hi Clara,
It will continue to learn as long as no changes are made to the ad creative itself. Starting/stopping or day-parting will not affect the learning phase.
Cheers,
Brendan
Really nice and helpful article!
I have a question, if i schedule my add to don’t be running between 3 am and 5 am, after this “STOP” period is the add going to start learning again every morning?
Thank you!
Hi brendan,
I have some issue about my ads it say active (learning) and the other 2 ads initial completed more that a week now no impression at all it so frustrating for me it used to be my winning ad it give me leads everyday and then all of the sudden it stop. And the i create new ad but still the same learning phase and no impresison at all,
Hi Riza,
This depends on your setup and how many ads you have competing against each other. If its not getting a shot at all, I would consider setting up an “experiment” and force an A/B test through, then keep the winning ad active once the test is complete. The other side of this is based on your delivery and relevance scores. I’ve never seen an ad get no delivery unless there’s a technical error, so I would open up a ticket with Facebook. Good luck!
Best,
Brendan
Hello,
I have one ad account that created in March 2022 have learning phase feature but now when I created a new ad account on Late April 2022 in this ad account learning phase feature not available and campaign directly going to Active phase. Has Facebook rolled out its Learning Phase feature or there is any specific criteria required for ad accounts to avail this feature. Please Guide.