Connect Ads lets you publish catalog ads on Meta using the templates you've built in Hunch. You'll find it as a section inside each of your Hunch catalogs.
Connect Ads works by inserting new ads into campaigns and ad sets that already exist in your Meta ad account. It doesn't create campaigns or ad sets, so set those up in Meta Ads Manager first and then add your Hunch ads to them.
Before you start
Connect Ads becomes available once all five of these are in place.
Requirement | Why it's needed | Where to set it up |
Your team is authorised with Meta | Grants Hunch permission to manage ads on your behalf. | |
Your team is on the Template Collections plan | Connect Ads is part of Template Collections. | |
A Meta business and ad account are connected to your Hunch account | Selects which business and ad account Hunch works in. Authorising only grants access; this step picks the account. | |
Your Hunch catalog has the business connected | The catalog must belong to the same business as the ad account, so your ads can use its products. | |
At least one image template is in a template collection | Your ads use the collection's templates as their creative. |
If any of these is missing, Connect Ads shows what still needs to be done and links you to the place where you can fix it.
Step 1: Prepare your campaign and ad set in Meta
Create or choose a campaign and ad set in the ad account connected to Hunch. If it's a catalog sales campaign with a catalog set at campaign level, it must use the Meta catalog of the template collection you plan to use. If you claimed an existing Meta catalog, that's the catalog to use, and your existing campaigns on it already qualify. Otherwise, the catalog appears in Commerce Manager under the name you gave your template collection. For more on how template collections appear in Meta, see Template collections.
Budget, schedule, audience, and placements stay in Meta. Connect Ads doesn't change them.
Step 2: Open Connect Ads
Go to the Hunch catalog you want to advertise.
Open the Connect Ads section.
Step 3: Choose where the ad goes
Select the campaign.
Select the ad set inside that campaign.
Only campaigns you can insert ads into are listed: campaigns in your connected ad account that either use this catalog at campaign level, or have another objective or no catalog set at campaign level. Campaigns set to a different catalog won't appear.
Step 4: Choose your creative
Select the template collection you want to use. Only collections created in the Hunch catalog you opened Connect Ads from appear.
Select the image template for this ad.
If you have the CPV add-on, also select the video template you want to use.
What's created in Meta: Hunch publishes a single ad. If you've chosen both an image and a video template, they go into the same ad.
Adapt to placement
With Adapt to placement turned on, the ad uses every artboard assigned to your image template, so each placement gets the format that suits it best.
For the best results, your template should have Square, Portrait and Story artboards. If any of these is missing, Meta fills the gap with its own automatic cropping and optimisations, which can zoom in on your products.
CPV
When you select a video template, the ad uses all of that template's artboards by default. We recommend keeping it this way for better performance, especially in Reels placements.
Creative enhancements
Meta's Advantage+ creative enhancements can crop or change your creative, just like automatic cropping. To keep your templates exactly as designed, use Turn off all enhancements in the ad editor.
Step 5: Add the ad details
Fill in the ad details shown on screen, including the ad status: choose whether the ad is created in Meta as active or paused. [Confirm: field list from design, e.g. product set, ad name, primary text, headline, call to action, destination]
Step 6: Review and publish
Check the summary of your ad, including the ad set it's going into, the templates it uses, and the product set, then select Publish.
The new ad is created inside the ad set you chose, alongside any ads already there. Your existing ads aren't changed.
To add more ads, select Create ad in the ad or campaign editor and repeat steps 4–5 for each one.
Ad status: The ad is created in Meta with the status you chose in Step 5. To check your ad before it goes live, publish it as paused.
After you publish
You'll find the ad in Meta Ads Manager under the campaign and ad set you selected, with the name you gave it in Connect Ads.
Delivery is controlled in Meta. The ad follows the budget, schedule, and status of its campaign and ad set.
Products stay up to date while your catalog syncs. Your ad draws its products from your Hunch catalog, so changes reach the ad as the catalog syncs to Meta.
With CPV, videos are created when they're needed. Instead of producing a video for every item in your catalog upfront, Hunch creates each video when it's needed. You don't need to wait for your catalog to render before publishing. See Video ads with CPV.
Managing ads after publishing
Edit ads in Hunch, not in Ads Manager. To edit an ad you've published, select Edit to open it in Connect Ads. We strongly recommend making all changes in Hunch. Changes made directly in Meta Ads Manager aren't sent back to Hunch, so Hunch and Meta will no longer match.
Template updates reach your ads through the catalog. When you update a template, the change shows up in every ad that uses it. The ad itself isn't edited: the new creative comes through your catalog, which the ad already reflects. That means a template update doesn't send the ad back into the learning phase.
Removing a template. A template can only be deleted, or removed from its template collection, when none of the ads using it are delivering. Pause those ads first.
Deleting a template collection. A collection can only be deleted when none of its templates are used in a delivering ad. Deleting a collection doesn't change anything in Meta: your ads stay as they are. Hunch simply stops syncing the collection. A deleted collection can't be used in ads again, and ads created with it can no longer be edited in Connect Ads.
Switching from Template Collections to Enriched Feeds. Works the same way: Hunch stops syncing your template collections at the end of your billing period. Nothing happens to your ads in Meta, but their product data, such as prices and availability, is no longer updated. See How downgrades work.
Troubleshooting
What you see | What to do |
Connect Ads isn't available | Check the five requirements in Before you start. |
My campaign or ad set isn't listed | Make sure it was created in the ad account connected to Hunch and, if a catalog is set at campaign level, that it's the catalog of the template collection you want to use. If you created it just now, reopen Connect Ads to refresh the list. |
My template collection isn't listed | Collections only appear when you open Connect Ads from the Hunch catalog they were created in. |
My collection is listed but has no templates to pick | The collection needs at least one image template. |
I don't see my template in the template selection | Wait for the catalog to finish syncing, then check again. |
I selected my template but the ad preview doesn't show it | The preview isn't always reliable. Publish the ad as paused and check it with the Show ad feature. If you added the template recently, Meta may still be collecting the new images and videos. Give it some time and keep checking with Show ad. |
Publishing failed | [Confirm: where the error is shown, common causes (permissions, catalog mismatch, ad set setup), and whether anything was partly created in Meta.] If you can't resolve it, email us at [email protected]. |
Changes I made in Ads Manager don't show in Hunch | Changes made in Meta aren't sent back to Hunch. Make edits in Connect Ads instead. |
Connect Ads is view-only | Your Template Collections plan has ended. See Cancelling your subscription. |
Common questions
Can I create a new campaign or ad set from Hunch? No. Connect Ads only inserts ads into campaigns and ad sets that already exist. Create them in Meta Ads Manager first, then come back to Connect Ads.
Will publishing change my campaign's budget or targeting? No. Connect Ads only adds the ad. Everything at the campaign and ad set level stays as you set it in Meta.
Can I add more than one ad? Yes. Select Create ad in the ad or campaign editor to add more ads, and you can come back and add more to the same campaign as many times as you need.
What happens to my ads if I move off Template Collections? At the end of your billing period, Connect Ads becomes view-only and Template Collection catalogs stop syncing. Nothing happens to your ads in Meta. See Why is syncing paused?, How downgrades work and Cancelling your subscription.