How much of a Facebook ads package should reach Meta?

You need the split in writing. The seller's fee and the budget Meta spends are different. A single £300 figure can hide a small ad budget under a large fee. Ask for the amount spent inside the ad account last month.

Should my web company own my Facebook ad account?

No. Create the ad account in your own Meta business portfolio and give the company partner access. Do not give them your personal password. If the account already sits in their portfolio, get in writing what happens to it when you leave, and take them off your Page.

Are guaranteed Facebook leads for tradespeople reliable?

Only when the contract says what a lead is, where the person is, and what happens if the number is missed. A spoken guarantee of leads, with no definition, is a sales line. The ASA expects a guarantee to be real, and a significant limit to be stated.

Do Facebook ads work for emergency plumbers and electricians?

Poorly, compared with a Google Business Profile and search. People with a burst pipe are searching, not scrolling. Facebook is a better fit for planned work such as bathrooms, rewires and boiler replacements, with a tight radius around the area you actually cover.

Facebook ad packages that take advantage of tradespeople

Key takeaways

Ask for two numbers: the fee you pay the seller, and the budget that reaches Meta or Google.
The ad account should sit in a business portfolio you control. Partner access is normal. Your password is not.
A guaranteed number of leads is a claim. If it is not in the contract, with what counts as a lead, it is a pitch.
Ads for emergency call-outs usually lose to a Google Business Profile and a site people can ring. Facebook is a better fit for planned work.

The fee and the ad budget are different bills

A tradesperson paying £300 a month for "Facebook ads" needs the split in writing. One number is the seller's fee for writing the ads and checking them. The other is the budget Meta or Google actually spends. If you only have one number, you cannot tell whether you bought advertising or a retainer.

A small trade business testing Meta can learn something from a few pounds a day of real ad spend, in an account it can open. An agency on top of that spend can be worth it when you can see the campaigns. It is a poor deal when £300 is almost all fee and the ads run on a budget too small to learn anything.

Ask for last month's Meta or Google receipt, or a screen you can log into, showing amount spent. A PDF of "results" with no spend next to it is not that receipt.

You should be able to open the ad account

Log in yourself at Meta Business Suite or Google Ads. Do not use a login the seller emailed you and told you not to change. You want your own user, with admin on the ad account, and the card on the account to be yours or a card you can see.

Partner access is the ordinary way an agency works. They request access to an account your business owns. They do not need your personal Facebook password, and you should not hand it over. A password hand-over means they can lock you out, message customers as you, and keep the history.

Check which business owns the ad account in Meta Business Settings, under Ad accounts. If the owner is the agency, treat "we will transfer it when you leave" as a claim to get in writing before you pay. Ad accounts are awkward to move once they have been created inside someone else's business portfolio, which is why the account should be created in yours. Google Ads has the same shape: your account, their manager access, not an account that only exists inside their manager login.

If you part ways and the account was theirs, remove them from your Facebook Page so they cannot keep posting or advertising as you. The old campaign history may stay with them. Future spend goes on a new account you own.

Sources: Meta Business Help Centre, Google Ads Help: about manager (MCC) accounts

Guaranteed leads and a wide map

A guarantee has to say what is being guaranteed. "Twenty leads a month" means nothing until you know whether a lead is a phone call, a form, a message, or a person who lives in your area and wants the work you do. The ASA's position on guarantees is that a marketer who cannot guarantee a result should not imply that they can, and a significant limit has to be stated.

Watch the map. An electrician who works 15 miles from home does not want ads shown 40 miles away. Ask for the location targeting in the account, not in a sentence on the proposal. If the seller will not show it, assume it is wider than your van will travel, because a wider map makes the "reach" number look better.

Facebook is a poor place to buy emergency call-outs. Someone scrolling is not searching "boiler leaking now". Planned work, a boiler replacement, a bathroom, a rewire, a roof, is where a feed advert can earn its place. Emergency work belongs on Google Business Profile and, if you pay Google, on ads that catch a search. A seller who promises emergency leads from boosted Facebook posts is selling the wrong shelf.

Sources: ASA: guarantees and warranties, GOV.UK: marketing and advertising, the law

The landing page, the contract, and the photos

Open the advert on your phone and tap it. It should land on your site, your number, or a form that arrives in your inbox. If it lands on a page the agency owns, with a number that is not yours, the enquiries are theirs to pass on, and they stop when you stop paying.

The photos should be your jobs. Stock photos of an American van, or a boiler you do not fit, train the wrong customer and fall over the moment someone asks "is that your work?"

Read the term the same way you would a website contract: minimum months, what you owe if you leave, and whether the ads keep running on your card after you have asked them to stop. A term you cannot cancel, or an exit fee equal to every month left, is a reason to refuse. You do not have to take it because the person on the phone says the price expires today. Business-to-business marketing still has to be truthful. It often does not come with a consumer cooling-off period, which is why the time to say no is before the direct debit.

Sources: Business Companion: business-to-business marketing, GOV.UK: marketing and advertising, the law

A fair ads arrangement

You own the ad account and the Facebook Page. They have partner access. Your card pays Meta or Google, and their invoice is only their fee. You can see spend, the map, and the leads. The contract is month to month, or a short first term with a written notice period. They can explain, in one paragraph, who the ads are aimed at and what a lead means.

If any of those is missing, do not start the direct debit to "see how the first month goes". The first month is when the account gets created in the wrong place.

Tradehand does not run a Facebook ads retainer and does not sell a lead guarantee. The alternative to renting enquiries is a page and a phone line you control. The assistant publishes your services and answers the person who calls, texts or messages.

If you are already in a package

Change the password on your own Facebook and Google logins, and turn on two-factor, if they ever had those passwords. Then open the ad account and the payment method. Pause anything you do not recognise before you argue about the contract.

Send cancellation the way the terms require, and keep the advert that promised a lead count or a ranking. A misleading advert can be complained about to the Advertising Standards Authority. If money has gone and no ads were run, report it to Action Fraud. Read the remaining term before you cancel the direct debit, so you do not create a debt on top of a bad campaign.

Sources: Advertising Standards Authority: make a complaint, Action Fraud