Meta introduced improvements to its suite of lead generation tools with a focus on the often-overlooked post-holiday period.
Meta refers to the period from just after Christmas into January as “Q5.” While many advertisers pull back their spend during this time, Meta says advertisers who ran campaigns on its platform and used its instant form conversion leads performance goal in the first week of January 2024 saw a 25% lower median CPM, a 5.4% higher median conversion rate and a 26% lower cost per qualified lead compared to rates from the first week of October 2024.
Among Meta’s lead generation product updates announced this week:
Easier CRM connections to the Conversions API
Meta advertisers who integrate their CRM with Zapier can now send up to 100,000 lead events to the Conversions API for free. Beginning in November 2025, advertisers using Salesforce Sales Cloud will be able to directly send lead events from their CRM via the Conversions API.
Meta also announced it streamlined the onboarding process in its Events Manager. Previously, advertisers had to complete a multi-step setup to integrate their CRM with the Conversions API. This included manually mapping the entire sales process, from lead capture to conversion; labeling each stage of the sales cycle; identifying what to track; and determining which stage was most important before running an ad.
Now, advertisers will be able to optimize for a single conversion event directly in the ad creation flow. This allows them to select the one conversion event that matters most, such as a sale or booking, and guides the system to optimize for that outcome.
Meta introduced additional verification and lead nurturing tools, available with or without a Conversions API CRM integration. These include:
SMS phone number, work email and address verification
To help reduce bad form submissions and confirm contact information, advertisers can require prospective leads to verify their phone number using a new SMS verification feature. Campaigns using the “require work email” feature will require a valid corporate email before submitting an instant form (available on Instagram or via the Marketing API).
Automated Messenger follow-up
Meta is testing an automated lead generation agent that allows advertisers to quickly engage leads via Messenger. The automated agent can perform tasks such as collecting a lead’s availability for a follow-up phone call.
Integration with third-party lead nurturing templates
Meta is also testing integrations that allow advertisers to use existing third-party messaging templates in lead ads campaigns. Platforms like Manychat and Botcake support automation and personalization at scale using rich text, images and customized actions.
Advantage+ lead campaigns now for website and forms
Advantage+ lead campaigns are Meta’s automated solution for advertisers seeking high-quality leads. The campaigns leverage Meta’s AI to optimize audience targeting, placements and budget, giving the platform more flexibility to find cost-effective leads at scale.
Advertisers can now use one campaign to generate leads through both website and instant forms, which Meta says results in 14%–24% percent lower cost per lead compared to using website forms alone. This feature lets a single ad set dynamically serve instant forms to users seeking a fast submission path and website forms to those who prefer more context before sharing information.
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