Solved: Engagement Campaign on Facebook Getting Bad Leads

Hi there,

Thanks for reaching out. I had a look at your situation with the Facebook engagement campaign and the trouble with lead quality. It's a really common problem, so don't feel like you're alone in this. It's frustrating when you're spending money and getting tyre-kickers instead of genuine prospects, especially when you're targeting an affluent audience. I'm happy to give you some of my initial thoughts and a bit of guidance based on what we've seen work for our clients.

The good news is that this is almost certainly fixable, but it'll require a bit of a rethink of your overall approach. Let's get into it.

First off, let's talk about your campaign objective...

The absolute biggest issue I can see right away is that your running an 'Engagement' campaign but your goal is to get high-quality leads. This is the core of the problem, and it's a fundamental mismatch between your goal and the instructions your giving to Meta's algorithm.

When you choose 'Engagement' as your objective, you are literally telling Facebook "Go and find me people who are most likely to like, comment, share, or click on my ad". The algorithm is incredibly good at doing exactly what you tell it to do. So it goes and finds the 'clicky' people, the people who engage with lots of content. These people are very rarely the same people who are serious buyers, especially in the affluent market. They're bored browsers, not high-intent prospects. This is why you're getting bad leads. The campaign is optimised to do exactly that.

You can't really train an engagement campaign to find good leads with offline conversion data, because its primary goal isn't lead generation. It's like trying to teach a fish to climb a tree. You're giving it the wrong task to begin with. The data you upload is telling the system about a 'good lead', but the campaign objective is still telling it to prioritise 'engagers'. The two instructions are in direct conflict.

I'd say you need to switch to a 'Leads' or 'Sales' campaign...

To fix this, you need to change your campaign objective to one that aligns with your actual business goal. That means using either the 'Leads' or 'Sales' (previously called 'Conversions') objective. By doing this, you're telling Meta: "Ignore the people who just like and share. Go and find me people who are likely to take a specific action, like filling out a form or making a purchase." This is a massive shift and will make all the differnce.

Now, within a 'Leads' campaign, you have a couple of options. You're currently sending people to WhatsApp, which is a very low-friction action. For an affluent audience, this might feel a bit too informal and can attract a lot of time-wasters. I'd strongly suggest moving away from this for your cold traffic.

Instead, you have two main paths:

1. Meta Lead Gen Forms: These are the forms that pop up directly within Facebook or Instagram. They're easy for users to fill out because they pre-populate with their profile information. The upside is you'll get a lower cost per lead (CPL). The downside is the lead quality is often still not great because it's so easy to submit a form without much thought. It's a step up from a WhatsApp message, but maybe not the best for your specific audience.

2. Landing Page Conversions: This is where you send ad traffic to a dedicated page on your website with a contact form. This is almost definately the route I would recommend for you. Why? Because it asks for more commitment from the prospect. They have to leave the social media app, read your landing page, be persuaded by your copy and offer, and then manually type in their details. This process naturally filters out the people who aren't serious. Your cost per lead will be higher, but the quality of those leads will be ten times better. For a high-ticket service targeting the wealthy, quality is far more important than quantity.

I remember one client selling high-ticket industrial products, which is a tough B2B sell. We focused on a dedicated landing page rather than easier lead gen options. This helped us generate highly qualified leads because only the most interested prospects made it through the funnel.

You probably should rethink your targeting...

Once your campaign structure is correct, we can look at targeting. Targeting affluent individuals on Meta is tricky but doable. Your instinct to target a narrow audience is correct, but how you narrow it is what matters.

Simply targeting an interest like "Luxury Goods" is a common mistake. Who does that target? It targets people who aspire to own luxury goods just as much as it targets people who actually buy them. You get the dreamers, not the buyers.

You need to get more creative and use layering. This means you tell Meta to target people who match Interest A AND Interest B AND Interest C. This creates a much more specific and qualified audience pool. Here's a thought process you could follow:

You'd create an audience that must be interested in, for example, 'First Class travel' AND 'The Economist'. This immediately refines your audience. Test a few different combinations of these layered interests in seperate ad sets to see which performs best.

You'll need a solid data feedback loop...

Now we can finally talk about your original question: offline conversions. This is where it all comes together, but only once you have the right campaign objective.

With a 'Leads' or 'Sales' campaign running to a landing page, you'll start generating leads. Let's say you get 20 leads in a week. You then go through those leads and identify the 3 that are genuinely high-quality prospects. You would then put the details of those 3 people into a CSV file and upload it to Meta as an offline conversion event (e.g., 'Qualified Lead').

By doing this, you are giving the algorithm a powerful signal. You're telling it: "Of all the people who converted, these specific ones are the type I want more of. Go find more people who look and behave like them." Over time, the algorithm gets smarter and better at finding your ideal customer profile.

To answer your question on frequency: start with weekly uploads. Daily is usually unnecessary unless you have a very high volume of leads coming in every single day. Weekly gives the system enough data to learn from without you having to manage uploads constantly. The goal is to feed it a steady diet of quality data so it can optimise performance effectively.

And don't forget your ads and your offer...

A final, but equally important, point. Your ad creative and copy must speak to an affluent audience. If your ads look cheap, your leads will be cheap. This means:

• -> High-End Visuals: Professional photography and videography are non-negotiable. No stock photos. Everything should look polished, exclusive, and high-value. I remember one luxury brand launch where the focus on cinematic-quality visuals resulted in over 10 million views and established a premium perception from day one.
• -> Sophisticated Copy: The language you use matters. Avoid hype, aggressive sales tactics, and fake scarcity. Focus on benefits that resonate with the wealthy: exclusivity, saving time, quality, craftsmanship, status, peace of mind. Your copy should be confident and understated.
• -> A Qualifying Offer: Your offer itself can act as a filter. Instead of just "Contact Us", maybe it's "Request a Private Consultation" or "Schedule a Discovery Call". The language implies a more significant, higher-value interaction.

Bringing all these elements together—the right objective, a qualifying funnel, specific layered targeting, a strong data feedback loop, and premium creative—is how you solve the lead quality problem.

This is the main advice I have for you:

I know this is a lot to take in, and implementing it correctly can be a complex process with a lot of testing involved. It's not just about flipping a few switches; its about building a coherent strategy where every part works together. Getting it right can be the difference between wasting your ad budget and building a reliable engine for generating high-value clients.

If you feel like you could use an expert hand to guide you through this process and get it set up for success, we offer a free, no-obligation initial consultation. We can take a deeper look at your specific situation and map out a more detailed action plan together. It often helps to have a second pair of expert eyes on things.

Hope this helps give you a much clearer path forward!

Regards,
Team @ Lukas Holschuh