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New Feature

Claude Can Now
Run Your
Meta Ads

Meta just opened their ads platform up to Claude. It’s called the Meta Ads MCP — you connect your Meta account once, and from there you can create campaigns, manage budgets, and pull performance data just by talking to Claude. The full setup walkthrough plus the first 5 prompts to run.

Why This Is A Big Deal (From Someone Who Used To Work There)

I spent years inside Meta’s ads division, becoming an expert at how to grow and scale businesses through Facebook and Instagram ads. That one skill is the entire reason I was able to leave and start my own business. This connector is a shortcut to a skill that used to take years to build. If you run a business and don’t want to spend $3-5K/month on an agency or six months learning Ads Manager, this is the moment.

What You Can Actually Do With It

• Pull performance data. “What did I spend last week and what did it return?” Claude pulls live numbers from your account, not stale screenshots.
• Create campaigns. Describe the campaign in plain English — Claude builds it: objective, audience, budget, creative brief.
• Manage budgets. Scale winners, pause losers, shift spend — all from chat.
• Audit catalogs & signals. Find broken pixels, fix product feed issues, surface tracking problems.

It’s called Meta Ads AI Connectors, launched April 29, 2026 in open beta. The setup takes 5 minutes if your account’s eligible. Here’s the exact path.

Setup Connect Claude To Meta Ads (5 Minutes)
One-time setupOpen beta — some accounts not yet enabled

You’ll need: A Meta Business account with admin access to at least one ad account, and Claude (web at claude.ai or the desktop app). No code. No Meta developer app.

  1. Get the official Meta MCP server URL

    Go to Meta’s Business Help Center page: Manage Ads from an AI Agent with Meta Ads AI Connectors. Copy the official MCP server URL Meta publishes there. (Meta hosts and maintains it — you’re not running anything yourself.)

  2. Open Claude → Settings → Connectors

    In Claude.ai (web) or the desktop app, click your name in the bottom-left, choose Settings, then go to the Connectors tab. Click Add custom connector.

  3. Paste the MCP URL

    Drop the URL from Step 1 into the connector field. Give it a name like Meta Ads. Click Connect.

  4. Authorize with Facebook

    A Facebook OAuth window opens. Sign in with the Facebook profile that has admin access to your ad account(s). Approve the permissions: ads_read, ads_management, read_insights, business_management.

  5. Pick which ad accounts Claude can touch

    Meta will ask which ad accounts to grant access to. Pick only the ones you actually want Claude to manage. If you have personal + client accounts, keep client accounts off this list unless you’re cleared to.

  6. Test the connection (read-only first)

    Open a new chat and type: “What ad accounts do I have connected, and what was my total spend in the last 7 days?” If Claude returns live numbers, you’re in. If it says the connector is disabled, see the next callout.

If Claude Says The Connector Is “Disabled”

Meta’s MCP is in open beta and isn’t enabled on every ad account yet. If you hit this:

  • Check that you’re signed into the Facebook profile that has admin (not advertiser or analyst) access on the ad account
  • Try a different ad account in your Business Manager — some accounts get rolled in before others
  • While you wait, you can use a managed third-party MCP (Pipeboard, Adzviser, or Ryze) that wraps the same Meta APIs — setup takes about 5 minutes and works while Meta’s rollout completes

Before You Give Claude Write Access

Read this if you’ve never run Meta Ads: Claude can change budgets, pause campaigns, and create new campaigns once it’s connected with ads_management. That means it can also spend your money in ways you didn’t intend if your prompt is vague. Always:

  • Ask Claude to show you the change first before it writes anything (“preview, don’t apply”)
  • Set account-level daily spend limits in Meta Ads Manager before connecting — that’s your safety net
  • Start with read-only prompts (Prompts 1 + 5 below) for the first week. Don’t let it touch budgets until you trust it

Prompt 1 The 30-Second Account Audit
Run this firstRead-only — safe to start with

The single most valuable first prompt. Claude pulls last 30 days, scores every campaign, and tells you what to kill, what to scale, and what to fix — in one shot.

Prompt 1 — 30-Second Account Audit
Pull the last 30 days of performance from my Meta Ads account. Then audit every active campaign against these benchmarks for [E-COMMERCE / LEAD GEN / APP / LOCAL SERVICE — pick one] and give me a verdict on each. STEP 1: PULL THE NUMBERS For every active campaign, table: | Campaign | Objective | Spend | Results | Cost per Result | ROAS | Frequency | Status | STEP 2: SCORE EACH CAMPAIGN Tag each one as: - SCALE — ROAS > 2.5x and spend headroom available - OPTIMIZE — profitable but underperforming on creative or audience - FIX — broken pixel, frequency too high, learning phase stuck, audience overlap - KILL — ROAS below 1.5x for 14+ days with no clear path to fix Explain your reasoning in one sentence per campaign. STEP 3: FLAG THE 3 BIGGEST ISSUES - Where I’m wasting the most money right now - Where I have the biggest unrealized upside - Anything technically broken (pixel, catalog, signal quality) STEP 4: THE 3 MOVES Three specific actions, in priority order: 1. The one campaign to pause TODAY 2. The one campaign to scale (and by how much — 20%? 50%? Stage it.) 3. The one creative or audience test to launch this week RULES - Use real data from my account. Don’t make up numbers. - Don’t recommend changes. Just surface and recommend — I’ll approve before anything is applied. - If a campaign is in learning phase or has <7 days of data, say so — don’t kill prematurely.
Prompt 2 The Wasted Budget Killer
Run weeklyQuickest ROI of any prompt

Find every dollar going nowhere. This is the prompt that pays for itself in the first week — most accounts have 15-30% of spend leaking into ad sets, audiences, or placements that don’t convert.

Prompt 2 — Wasted Budget Killer
Audit my Meta Ads account for wasted spend over the last 30 days. I want to find money that’s going nowhere. FIND 1. Ad sets that have spent >$100 with zero conversions — list them with spend total 2. Audiences that are converting at 2x+ my CPA target — the ones costing the most per result 3. Placements that are eating budget but not converting (Audience Network, Reels, Stories — whichever is underperforming) 4. Ad creatives with frequency above 3.5 that aren’t performing — ad fatigue 5. Overlapping audiences (same interest in multiple ad sets driving up CPMs) 6. Campaigns stuck in learning phase >14 days — usually means the audience is too narrow or budget too low OUTPUT A prioritized table: | What | Where (campaign/ad set/ad) | Wasted spend | What to do | Estimated savings | Sort by wasted spend, biggest first. THEN Total it up: “You’re losing approximately $X per month to fixable waste. The top 3 actions would recover $Y.” RULES - Be specific. “Ad set 7” isn’t useful — give me names. - Don’t recommend pausing campaigns still in learning phase - For overlapping audiences, tell me which ad set to consolidate INTO, not just that there’s overlap - Show your work — what data you used to reach each conclusion
Prompt 3 The Winner Scaler
Use after Prompt 1Pour gas on what works

Most people scale wrong — they double a winning campaign’s budget overnight and watch CPA explode. This prompt scales the way Meta’s algorithm wants you to: gradually, with the right structure.

Prompt 3 — Winner Scaler
Identify my top-performing campaigns over the last 30 days and build me a scaling plan that won’t blow up CPA. STEP 1: PICK THE WINNERS Top 3 campaigns by: - ROAS (must be above my target — ask me if you don’t know it) - Volume of conversions (enough data to trust) - Stable performance over the last 14 days (not a 1-day spike) STEP 2: DIAGNOSE WHY THEY WORK For each winner: - The audience that’s driving the result - The creative format and message that’s carrying it - The placement that’s most efficient - Any time-of-day or day-of-week pattern in the data STEP 3: BUILD THE SCALING PLAN For each winner, recommend: - Vertical scale: budget increase % (max 20% every 3 days — tell me the day-by-day plan for the next 14 days) - Horizontal scale: 2-3 new ad sets to duplicate the winner into (different lookalikes, different interests, broad) - Creative scale: 2-3 creative angles to test using the winning message as the base - Geographic / placement expansion: where the winner could extend without dilution STEP 4: THE TIMELINE A 14-day calendar: - Day 1-3: First budget bump + horizontal duplicates launched - Day 4-7: Evaluate, second bump if CPA holds - Day 8-14: Creative tests, third bump RULES - Don’t recommend more than 20% budget increase in a single bump — algorithmic learning resets above that - Show me the change before you apply it. I’ll approve each one. - If a winner has only 7 days of data, say “wait one more week” before scaling - Flag if scaling would push us past Meta’s recommended audience size for the objective
Prompt 4 The First Campaign Builder
For never-ran-ads-beforeBuilds the campaign for you

If you’ve never run Meta Ads, this is the prompt. Tell Claude what you sell and who you’re selling to. It builds the whole campaign — objective, audience, budget, creative brief — the way someone with 5 years of experience would.

Prompt 4 — First Campaign Builder
I want to launch my first Meta Ads campaign. Build it for me from scratch. Don’t apply anything yet — show me what you’d build, walk me through every choice, and only create it after I approve. STEP 1: ASK ME WHAT YOU NEED Ask me, one question at a time: 1. What am I selling? (Product, service, subscription, lead form?) 2. What does it cost / what’s the average order value? 3. Who’s the customer? (Be specific — not “women 25-45,” tell me a person) 4. What’s my monthly ad budget? 5. What’s my target cost per result (CPA, cost per lead, ROAS)? 6. What creative do I have ready? (Photos, video, UGC, none yet) 7. Where does the click go? (Website? Landing page? Lead form?) 8. Is the Meta pixel installed and firing on my key event? (Purchase, lead, sign-up) STEP 2: PROPOSE THE CAMPAIGN Build a single campaign with: - Objective — the right one for my goal (Sales / Leads / Engagement / Traffic). Explain why, not just what. - Budget — daily budget recommendation, with reasoning tied to my CPA target - Bid strategy — lowest cost vs. cost cap vs. bid cap, with reasoning - Audience(s) — 2-3 ad sets: - Broad (let Meta’s algorithm find them) - Interest-based (the 3-5 strongest interests for my customer) - Lookalike if I have a customer list (1% LAL) - Placements — recommend Advantage+ Placements unless I have a reason to restrict - Creative brief — for each ad set, what creative I should run: hook, format, length, tone, CTA STEP 3: WALK ME THROUGH EVERY CHOICE For each decision, tell me in one sentence why — especially objective, audience, and budget. I want to learn, not just copy. STEP 4: PRE-LAUNCH CHECKLIST Before you’d hit publish: - Pixel firing on the right event? (Confirm) - Daily account spend limit set? - Domain verified? - Creative dimensions correct for placements? - UTM parameters added to the link? STEP 5: ASK FOR APPROVAL Show me the full proposed campaign one more time. Wait for me to say “launch it” before creating anything. RULES - I’ve never run a Meta ad before. Use plain language and explain any acronym the first time. - Don’t over-build. One campaign, 2-3 ad sets, 2-3 ads per ad set max for first launch. - Be honest if my budget is too low to learn anything useful — tell me the floor.
Prompt 5 The Daily Briefing
Save as a scheduled task3 minutes a day

The check-in that replaces logging into Ads Manager every morning. Save as a scheduled task in Claude (every weekday at 8am) and you’ll never miss a problem brewing in your account.

Prompt 5 — Daily Briefing
Run my daily Meta Ads briefing. Pull data from the last 24 hours and the last 7 days. Email me the summary or save it to my workspace. FORMAT (keep it short — this is a 60-second read) YESTERDAY AT A GLANCE - Total spend: $X - Total results: Y (purchases / leads / whatever my objective is) - Average ROAS / CPA: $Z - vs. 7-day average: [+/-%] WHAT’S WORKING The 1-2 campaigns or ad sets driving most of the results. One sentence each. WHAT’S BROKEN OR DRIFTING - Anything where CPA jumped >25% vs. the 7-day average - Anything that hit zero results yesterday despite spending - Any campaign that exited learning phase yesterday (good or bad) - Any frequency above 4.0 (creative fatigue starting) WHAT TO DO TODAY The 1-3 specific actions worth doing today. Each one: - The action - The expected impact - Whether it needs my approval or you can do it (default: needs approval) WEEKLY TREND (every Monday) On Mondays only, add a 7-day vs prior-7-day comparison — spend, results, ROAS, where the shift came from. RULES - Keep it under 200 words on a normal day. I should be able to read it in a minute. - If everything’s steady, just say so — don’t invent action items. - Flag anything weird, even if you’re not sure what it means. Better to over-surface than miss a leak.
Next Run This Order, This Week.

Day 1: Connect the MCP. Run Prompt 1 (the Audit). Don’t change anything yet — just look.

Day 2: Run Prompt 2 (the Wasted Budget Killer). Pause the obvious losers. This is usually where the first $200-2,000/month in savings shows up.

Day 3: Run Prompt 3 (the Winner Scaler) on your best campaign. Stage the budget bumps over 14 days, not all at once.

Day 4: Set Prompt 5 (the Daily Briefing) as a scheduled task in Claude. Now your account runs itself with you in the loop.

One last thing. The reason ad agencies charge $3-5K/month isn’t the labor — it’s the judgment. Claude with this connector handles the labor instantly. The judgment still has to come from you. Don’t let it run write actions until you’ve seen it work in read-only mode for at least a week.

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