Hi there,
Thanks for reaching out! Happy to give you some of my thoughts on the Lookalike audience issue you're having. It's a really common frustration, and the reason why it happens isn't what most people think.
The short answer is that Facebook's "100 users" rule is a bit of a lie, or at least it's misleading. It's not about the number of *events* you have, but the number of *unique, matched users in a single country* that Facebook can identify from those events. I'll walk you through why this is happening and give you a proper strategy to fix it and build audiences that actually work.
TLDR;
- The "insufficient data" error for Lookalikes isn't about total events (e.g., 500 view contents). It's about having at least 100 unique, matched users from a single country. Your 500 events might come from fewer than 100 unique people, or people Facebook can't match to a profile.
- Stop trying to build Lookalikes from low-quality events like 'View Content'. Prioritise building audiences from high-intent actions like 'Purchase', 'Initiate Checkout', and 'Add to Cart'. Quality over quantity is everything.
- This letter includes a Lookalike Readiness Calculator to help you estimate your actual unique matched users and see why you might be falling short.
- The most important advice is to restructure your campaigns around a proper funnel (ToFu, MoFu, BoFu). This approach systematically builds the high-quality data you need for powerful Lookalikes and effective retargeting.
- Focus on getting more 'Purchase' data first. Even if it takes longer, a Lookalike of your actual buyers will always outperform a Lookalike of people who just browsed a page.
So, what's really going on with your Lookalike Audience?
Right, let's get this sorted. You're seeing hundreds of pixel events, but Facebook is telling you there's not enough data. It feels like the platform is broken, but it's actually working as designed, it's just not explained well at all.
The problem is the difference between 'events' and 'unique matched users'.
Imagine one super-keen customer visits your site 10 times in a week and views 20 different products. That's 20 'View Content' events right there, but it's only from one person. Facebook needs a seed audience of at least 100 *different people* to build a reliable Lookalike.
Then there's the 'match rate'. Not every person who visits your website is logged into Facebook or Instagram on that browser. Or they might be using ad blockers, or iOS14 privacy settings might be kicking in. Facebook can only use the data from people it can confidently match to a profile on its platform. A typical match rate might be anywhere from 50-80%. So even if you have 120 unique visitors, you might only have 60-90 matched users.
And the final kicker: the 100 unique, matched users must all come from the same country. If your 500 'View Content' events are from 80 people in the UK, 20 in the US, and 15 in Canada, you can't create a Lookalike for any of those countries because none of them hit the 100-user threshold on their own.
This is why you see the "insufficient data" error. It's almost never about the total event count. It's a user count, match rate, and geography problem. You can use the calculator below to get a feel for how quickly your numbers can shrink.
Lookalike Audience Readiness Calculator
I'd say you need to forget 'View Content' and build a proper audience hierarchy
Here's the most important bit of advice I can give you: stop worrying about 'View Content'. It's a garbage metric for building high-quality audiences. It tells you someone landed on a page, that's it. It says nothing about their intent to buy.
You need to think like a sales funnel. Someone who buys is infinitely more valuable than someone who just looks. Someone who adds a product to their cart is far more valuable than someone who just views the page. Your audience strategy needs to reflect this reality.
When we take on a new eCommerce account, we build out the campaign structure based on this funnel. We call it ToFu, MoFu, and BoFu (Top, Middle, and Bottom of Funnel). Your goal should be to get enough data at the BoFu level ('Purchase') to build your most powerful audiences.
Top of Funnel (ToFu)
Goal: Find new people. These are your cold audiences.
- Detailed Targeting (Interests)
- Broad Targeting (Once pixel is mature)
- Lookalikes of HIGH-QUALITY sources (e.g., Purchasers)
Middle of Funnel (MoFu)
Goal: Re-engage people who've shown some interest but haven't taken a key action.
- All Website Visitors (last 30-90 days)
- Video Viewers (e.g., 50%+)
- Social Media Engagers
Bottom of Funnel (BoFu)
Goal: Convert people who are close to buying. Your warmest audiences.
- Viewed Cart / Added to Cart
- Initiated Checkout
- Added Payment Info
The audiences on the right (BoFu) are your goldmine. These are the people who have shown the strongest signals that they want to buy from you. Your first priority with ads should be to get more people into this BoFu bucket, specifically getting more 'Purchase' events. The more purchase data your pixel has, the smarter it gets, and the better your future cold-traffic campaigns will perform.
You'll need a clear, prioritised plan of action
Okay, so theory is great, but what should you actually do right now? Here's the step-by-step process I'd follow if I was looking at your account.
Step 1: Stop trying to create a 'Purchase' Lookalike for now. It's not ready. Pushing it is a waste of time. Same goes for 'View Content' Lookalikes – they're worthless. Just because you can create one doesn't mean you should.
Step 2: Focus your budget on getting more purchases. Run a campaign with the 'Sales' objective, optimising for 'Purchase' conversions. At the start, you'll need to use broad or interest-based targeting (ToFu). Your main goal here isn't immediate profitability (though that's nice), it's to feed your pixel with high-quality purchase data. You are paying for data as much as you are paying for sales.
Step 3: Build out your retargeting audiences (MoFu/BoFu). As soon as you have 100+ people in your 'Add to Cart' or 'Initiate Checkout' audiences, create a separate retargeting campaign for them. Show them ads that overcome objections, offer a small discount, or show social proof like customer testimonials. These campaigns are often very profitable and help push people over the line to purchase, which in turn feeds your pixel with more of that valuable data.
Step 4: Create Lookalikes from the RIGHT source audiences. Once you *finally* have 100+ unique, matched purchasers in a single country, that is the *first* Lookalike you should create. A 1% Lookalike of your buyers is the holy grail of cold targeting. If that's still too far away, you can work your way up the funnel. Create a Lookalike of 'Initiate Checkout' or 'Add to Cart'. These will almost always perform better than one based on 'Website Visitors' or 'View Content'. The quality of the source audience is everything.
I've detailed my main recommendations for you below:
This is the main advice I have for you. It's a shift in mindset from just "getting enough data" to "getting the right data". Following this structure will solve your current problem and set you up for much more scalable, predictable results in the future.
| Priority | Action | Why It's Important |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Immediate | Change your primary campaign objective to 'Sales' optimising for the 'Purchase' event. | You need to start gathering the most valuable data. This tells Facebook's algorithm exactly who your ideal customers are, which improves all future targeting. |
| 2. Short-Term | Set up a simple BoFu retargeting campaign for 'Add to Cart' and 'Initiate Checkout' (last 14-30 days). | This is your lowest-hanging fruit. It captures high-intent users who got distracted, recovers lost sales, and accelerates the collection of 'Purchase' data. It will probably be your most profitable campaign. |
| 3. Medium-Term | Once you have 100+ 'Purchases' from a single country, create your first 1% Lookalike audience from that source. | This will be your most powerful cold audience. It lets you find new customers who share characteristics with people who have already given you money. It's the foundation for scaling. |
| 4. Ongoing | Systematically test new ToFu audiences (interests, then other Lookalikes like ATC/Checkout) against your winning 'Purchase' Lookalike. | Never rely on one audience. Constant testing is the only way to find new pockets of customers, lower your acquisition costs over time, and prevent ad fatigue from killing your campaigns. |
You probably should consider getting some expert help
As you can probably tell, this stuff gets complicated pretty quick. It's not just about pushing buttons in Ads Manager; it's about having a deep understanding of how the algorithms work and building a solid strategy based on years of experience.
We've worked on tons of eCommerce accounts, and we've seen this exact problem countless times. I remember one client with a subscription box service who came to us with the same issue – lots of traffic but couldn't create good Lookalikes and their ROAS was terrible. By implementing this exact ToFu/MoFu/BoFu structure and focusing on gathering quality data, we were able to get them to a 1000% Return On Ad Spend.
Trying to figure all this out on your own can be a very expensive and slow process of trial and error. You could easily spend thousands on ads that don't work, all while getting more and more frustrated.
Working with an agency or a consultant means you get to skip the painful learning curve and go straight to a strategy that's proven to work. We can do a full audit of your account, build out the proper campaign structures for you, and manage the whole process so you can focus on running your business.
If you'd like, we offer a completely free, no-obligation initial consultation where we can take a proper look at your ad account together and give you some more specific, actionable advice. It's often the quickest way to see where the biggest opportunities are.
Hope this helps!
Regards,
Team @ Lukas Holschuh
