Before we can run a single ad for a brand, we have to get the plumbing right.

The business portfolio. The Facebook Page. The Instagram connection. The ad account. The pixel. Shopify.

None of it is sexy. All of it is necessary. And if it's set up wrong, it will come back to bite you the moment you try to scale.

I just walked a founder through this entire setup on a screen share. Start to finish, it took about 45 minutes.

Here's the exact step-by-step process we followed together…

First time reading the New Edition Newsletter?

👋 Hey, I’m Brandon Blum. I’m the Founder and Managing Partner at New Edition - a Brooklyn-based creative agency for emerging consumer brands like GreenFi, Happier Grocery, Alice Mushrooms and many more.

📅 Subscribe to New Edition Events Calendar here.

​​​Want to partner on an event? Respond directly to this email and let’s chat.

Think of your Meta business portfolio as the umbrella. Everything sits underneath your business portfolio. Your Facebook Page, your Instagram account, your ad account, your pixel.

Here's the most important part: YOU should own all of it. Not a founder's personal profile. Not a freelancer. Not your agency.

When you work with an agency (including us), they should get partner access to your accounts. You can add them, and you can remove them. But the accounts should be yours.

Have these handy before you open a single tab. It'll save you a lot of back-and-forth:

This is where you create everything inside Meta. Start at business.facebook.com.

Click Continue with Facebook and log in with your personal profile. From there, create a new business portfolio.

Name it something like [Brand Name] Business Portfolio. What you call it doesn't really matter.

For the email, use a generic brand address (hello@, team@, etc.) instead of your personal inbox.

Why? If you ever get locked out, that inbox is how you get back in. Confirm your email with the link Meta sends you, and you're in.

Before you do anything else, invite a second person to the portfolio. If something gets weird with your login, you don't want to be the only person with the keys.

Invite them with zero assets for now. You can assign assets once they're created.

Even if you're Instagram-first, you need a Facebook Page tied to your business. Go to Accounts → Pages → Add → Create a new Facebook Page.

Add your brand name, pick a category (Shopping & Retail works fine for most consumer brands), and hit Create.

Click View on Facebook and you'll see a basically blank page. That's fine. You can build it out later. Right now, you just need it to exist.

Go to Accounts → Instagram accounts → Add and log in with your brand's Instagram account, not a founder's personal account.

What you're doing here is claiming these accounts under your business portfolio. They now officially belong to the brand.

Go to Business info in your portfolio settings. Upload your logo and set your primary Facebook Page.

Quick tip: The primary Page field wants your Page's public URL, not an internal business portfolio link. Open a second tab, go to your Page, click Edit Facebook Page → Manage on Facebook, and copy the URL from there. Paste it in and save.

Go to Accounts → Ad accounts → Add → Create a new ad account. Name it [Brand Name] Ad Account, select My business, agree to the terms, and create it.

You can add a credit card now or later. This is the account all of your ads will run through.

Go to Data sources → Datasets and Pixels → Add. Name it [Brand Name] Pixel. You can skip the category.

Connect it to the ad account you just created, then head to Events Manager to make sure it shows up.

That's the framework. You now have a business portfolio, a Facebook Page, a connected Instagram, an ad account, and a pixel.

Was this email forwarded to you? Subscribe here.

Now we connect your store so Meta can see what's actually happening on your site. Keep your Meta tabs open and open your Shopify admin in a new one.

In Shopify, go to Apps and search for "Facebook" or "Meta." Install the official Facebook & Instagram app.

Hit Get started, then Connect Facebook account at the top. Confirm the account and allow permissions.

From there, the app walks you through connecting:

Accept the terms and submit your shop for review.

Heads up: This part can be finicky. On our call, the Facebook Page wouldn't connect on the first try. If that happens, disconnect and reconnect. If it still won't take, finish the rest of the setup, then go to the app's Settings tab and use Connect Facebook Pages or Instagram profile to try again. Ours worked on the second pass.

Don't assume the pixel is working. Test it.

Open Events Manager. (If you can't find it: Business settings → All tools → Events Manager. It's usually under "Frequently used.")

Select your dataset and click Test events (right next to Overview). Choose Website as the channel, enter your site URL, and it'll open your store in a new tab.

Click around your site. You should see events start coming through. Check the History and Settings tabs to confirm what data you're sharing.

NOTE: SKIP IF YOU’RE NOT WORKING WITH AN AGENCY

Click the gear icon to open Settings. Go to Accounts → Pages and select your Page. Click Assign partner, paste in your agency's Business ID, and choose full or partial access.

Quick tip: Use the Business ID, not the agency's name. Searching by name usually doesn't work.

Same thing. Go to Accounts → Ad accounts → Assign partner, paste the Business ID, and hit done.

Now your agency can build out your Page and run ads through your ad account once you're ready. But if you look at the account on their end, it still says it's owned by your brand. That's exactly how it should be.

Once the technical setup is done, a few things are left on the to-do list:

And then the fun part: creative. The setup is the annoying part. Once it's done, it's done. From there, it's all about getting great content in front of the right people.

If you'd rather not go through this alone, we can do it with you.

This is usually part of our monthly retainer. We're now pulling it out and offering it as a one-time project fee.

When done, you'll have a business portfolio with everything set up correctly: your Facebook Page, Instagram, ad account, pixel, and Shopify, all connected and ready to go.

Here's what's included:

Interested? Respond directly to this email or shoot me a note at [email protected].

Your brand owns everything. Your partners get access (if relevant). That's the framework.

If you have any questions on getting your Meta accounts set up (or want us to set it up with you), respond directly to this email or shoot me a note at [email protected]. I see every email that comes in.

Until next week ✌️

Brandon Blum