Should I use a traffic or leads objective for Meta ads to grow a newsletter?

"If you're trying to get newsletter subscribers, you want to optimize for newsletter subscribers."

It sounds obvious. I've still seen publisher accounts get it wrong.

What goes wrong with a traffic objective?

"If you pick traffic then you'll end up getting all the old people or anybody who's just clicking on everything, because Meta goes and finds those people who click on everything."

Meta gives you exactly what you ask for. Ask for clicks and it finds serial clickers. They don't subscribe.

What about landing page views?

Same problem. When I reviewed one publisher's account, it was optimizing for landing page views. Somebody looked at your page. That doesn't mean they subscribed. You want to be targeting subscribers, not people looking at your landing page.

What should the campaign optimize for?

1. Set up a pixel conversion that fires when someone enters an email and hits subscribe.
2. Choose a leads or conversion-type objective and point it at that event.
3. Confirm the event fires only on a completed signup, not an in-between step.

For lead forms on client campaigns, the same logic applies. On one account we switched optimization from clicks-to-form to actual form submits to improve lead quality, accepting a new learning window to get there.

Why does the objective matter so much?

Because of how Meta works. Its whole system is to replicate people doing what you're asking them to do. Whoever completes your chosen event, Meta goes and finds more people like them. Pick a sloppy event and it gets very good at finding sloppy results.

That's the same reason I avoid one-tap instant lead forms. If the wrong type of people fill out super-easy pre-filled forms, Meta says, let's find you more of those people.

Is this the only right way?

It's what works for me, and my setup depends on my form software. My way isn't necessarily the only right way. But I wouldn't optimize a newsletter campaign for anything other than the subscribe. Setup steps are in how to set up the Meta pixel.