Meta Ads: programs & partnership ads

The Meta Ads suite turns the TikTok videos that already sell into Instagram and Facebook ads. Creators join a program through a link, which licenses their TikTok content to your brand — then you push any of their videos into Meta ad sets in bulk, run them as partnership ads (or plain brand ads), and pay creators on the commission terms you set.

You'll find it at Dashboard → Ads → Meta Ads. The suite has its own workspace with five sections: Overview, Programs, Licensed content, Ads, and Payouts.

Connecting Meta

The whole suite sits behind one connection: click Connect Meta and authorize the Meta account that manages your Facebook Page and Instagram business account. If your token expires or permissions are missing, the suite tells you exactly what to reconnect or update — nothing else works until then.

The bar across the top of the Overview manages the rest of the setup:

• Ad account — pick which of your Meta ad accounts the suite uses. Switching it changes what every page shows.
• Pages — connect the Facebook Pages your ads can run as. Each Page's linked Instagram account is the brand side of a partnership ad. A Page without a linked Instagram can still run ads — Facebook placements only, as the Page. Set one Page as the default; you can still pick a different one on every push.
• An Ads Manager deep link, for when you want to work on Meta's side.

Programs

A program is a joinable offer for creators: commission terms, a payout schedule, and a license agreement, wrapped in a branded join page hosted on Cruva Creators. Once a creator joins (and, if you require approval, you approve them), all of their TikTok content for your shop becomes pushable to Meta ads.

Creating a program

Go to Programs → Create program. The configurator has two tabs and a live phone preview of exactly what creators will see on the join page.

Branding — colors, fonts, logo, and an optional header banner (1080 × 720 px, with a brightness slider). New programs inherit your Brand Hub's branding automatically. If your Discord is connected, you can generate a server invite link that shows as a button on the join page.

Details — the substance:

• Name and description. The description defaults to a standard license explainer (Cruva pulls the creator's TikTok content for your brand; the brand may use it within the program) — edit it freely.
• Require approval to join — off by default, so creators are auto-approved the moment they join. Turn it on to review each creator first.
• Review uploads before they're added — off by default, so a video a creator uploads joins the program's content right away. Turn it on to approve each uploaded video first (see Reviewing uploaded videos below). TikTok links aren't affected.
• Make this program private — off by default. Turn it on for an invite-only program: under Visible to, add the creators (by TikTok handle, from your CRM, a saved list, or a CSV) who are allowed in. Only a creator signed in with a handle on that list sees the commission rates and gets the Join program / Request to join button; everyone else — including anyone signed out — sees an invite-only notice on the same page, and the hub card hides the rates. The link still works, so you can share it freely. A private program needs at least one creator on the list.
• Cruva Creators discovery — on by default: the program is listed on the Cruva Creators Earn tab, where creators can find it and request to join. Pick a category before launching (creators filter by it), or turn the listing off. Showing campaign GMV publicly is a separate opt-in, off by default. Private programs are never listed, whatever this is set to.
• Payout trigger — how often payout rows are generated: weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly. The schedule queues payouts and each one waits for your approval, unless you turn on Auto pay (see Payouts below).
• Commission rules — how creators earn. Rules stack, up to one of each type:
  • % of GMV (Meta sales) — the recommended default: the creator earns a share of the sales their pushed content drives on Meta.
  • Flat $ per order — a fixed amount for every order attributed to ads running their content.
  • Flat $ per approved submission — a fixed amount each time one of their videos is pushed to Meta from the program.
  • Flat $ per creator — a one-time amount when the creator joins.
  • % of Meta ad spend — usage-based: a share of the ad spend on ads running their content, paid whether or not the ads convert.
• Page sections — optional rich-text blocks on the join page (guidelines, FAQs, examples — up to 10).
• Agreements — the usage-rights & whitelisting license creators accept when joining. You can paste text, plus either a PDF (Word files convert automatically) or a Contract to sign: one of your published Creator Contracts that creators e-sign when joining. Agreements are versioned and append-only: publishing a new version applies to new joiners, while existing creators keep the version they signed.

Click Launch program. Before anything is created you review the terms and agree to Cruva's 1.25% platform fee on the ad spend behind each creator's pushed content (plus payment-processing fees). The fee is based on ad spend, not on the sales the ads drive. On launch the join link is copied to your clipboard and you're offered the invite dialog right away.

Reviewing uploaded videos

With Review uploads before they're added on, a creator's uploaded video is a draft until you decide. Drafts waiting for you appear on the program's Reviews tab, oldest first, with a count on the tab.

Open one to watch it, leave comments (pinned to a moment in the video if you like), and decide:

• Approve adds the video to the program's Content, where you can push it to Meta like any other upload.
• Request changes sends it back with your note. The creator uploads a new version and sends it again; earlier versions stay one click away so you can compare.

The creator is told in your chat thread and by push notification. TikTok links creators submit are posts, not drafts, so they go straight to Content as before. Switching review off doesn't remove anything: drafts still waiting stay on the Reviews tab until you decide.

What the creator does

The join page walks the creator through everything — you don't have to explain the Meta side:

1. Sign in on Cruva Creators and tap Join program (they accept your license agreement here, and sign it if it's a contract). As with campaigns, their TikTok account must be verified first — an unverified creator is sent to verify TikTok and the join continues when they come back.
2. Link their Instagram account — the one that runs as paid partner.
3. Approve your Partnership Ads permission request in the Instagram app.
4. Connect Stripe for payouts.

After that they earn on autopilot as their content runs. A creator can only be in one program per brand at a time — if you approve someone who's already in another of your programs, Cruva asks to transfer them (existing content keeps its old terms; new content uses the new program's terms).

Inviting creators

Click Invite on any program (it also pops up right after launch). The dialog searches your community creators, with min/max GMV filters and sorting by GMV, posts, or campaigns — the same targeting knobs the outreach bots use. Select creators, and each one gets a per-channel picker showing where they're actually reachable: Cruva message and/or email. The message is editable and the join link is always included.

The join link is public — you don't have to use the dialog. Copy it and distribute it through Automations, email campaigns, DMs, or anywhere else you reach creators. Pausing a program closes the link (nothing already running is touched); deleting a program kills the link but keeps existing members, their ads, content, and payout history.

Whitelisting (Partnership Ads permission)

Partnership ads show the creator's handle with your brand as paid partner, and Meta requires the creator to grant your brand permission first. Cruva tracks this per creator:

• On a program's Creators tab, every member shows a Whitelisting column: Approved, Pending, Revoked, or Not requested. Use Request whitelisting to send the Meta permission request to their linked Instagram — the creator accepts it in the Instagram app.
• The shop-wide view lives at Programs → Creator permissions, where you can also revoke a permission.

Whitelisting isn't required to push — it's required for the partnership identity. Videos from creators without it can still run as regular ads from your Page (see below). Meta enforces the requirement at push time, so an unauthorized partnership push fails per video rather than blocking the batch.

Pushing TikTok content to Meta

Licensed content (suite-wide) and each program's Content tab list every TikTok post from your approved program creators, with GMV, views, likes, comments, and post date. Filter by title, handle, posted-date window, or pushed status — then select videos (selection survives paging) and click Push to Meta.

The push dialog is one top-to-bottom flow:

1. Videos — confirm the selection. Videos whose creator has no linked Instagram are flagged: they'll run as your Page, without a partnership tag.
2. Run ads as — pick the Facebook Page (and its linked Instagram) the ads run from. Pages you haven't connected yet can be connected right from the picker; Refresh Pages from Meta pulls in newly created Pages.
3. Destination — one of three:
   • This program's ad sets — append to an ad set the program has pushed into before.
   • Any existing campaign in your ad account, pulled live from Meta — append to one of its ad sets or create a new ad set under it.
   • New campaign… — created on the spot: name, objective (Traffic, Sales, Engagement, Awareness), budget per ad set or campaign-level, optional spend cap and special ad categories.
4. Ad set — for a new ad set you configure budget (daily or lifetime), countries, age range, gender, placements (Instagram/Facebook Reels, Stories, Feed — TikTok video is 9:16, so feed placements letterbox it), optimization goal, bid strategy, and schedule. This is set once at creation; videos appended later inherit it. When appending, the dialog shows the ad set's live settings from Meta — any change you make updates the ad set itself.
5. Ad creative — destination link (required), call-to-action, primary text, and the identity:
   • Your brand — runs from your Page/Instagram.
   • Each creator (if authorized) — a true partnership ad from the creator's handle with your brand as paid partner. Needs their linked Instagram and approved whitelisting; videos missing either fall back to running as your Page.
   • Brand page only — a regular ad, no creator tag, no authorization needed. Advanced options cover headline, link description, and URL tags (UTMs).

Submitting starts a background job: each video is uploaded to your Meta ad account's media library and becomes a paused partnership ad in the target ad set. You can close the window — the ads keep being created and progress shows per video. Review and activate them in Ads Manager, or straight from the Ads tab.

Tracking performance

Overview is the suite's home: ad spend, Meta sales, ROAS, and creator earnings for any date range (click a tile to chart it), a live activity feed (ads created, creators joining, payouts), and a "where the spend went" ranking by creative or creator.

Ads is the Ads-Manager-style tree — campaigns → ad sets → ads — with spend, impressions, clicks, CTR, purchases, revenue, and ROAS summed over your picked range (synced daily). You can pause/resume and edit daily budgets at every level right from the table, or deep-link into Ads Manager.

One caveat on revenue: the Revenue (Meta) column is Meta-attributed purchase value, which requires your site to send purchase events via the Pixel or Conversions API. TikTok Shop sales don't appear there.

Paying creators

The Payouts section (and each program's Payments tab) is a ledger. Every payout period, each creator gets a row showing their period's Meta-attributed GMV, ad spend, units sold, new creatives, commission, and the computed payout.

With Auto pay off, nothing moves automatically. Each pending row has a Pay button; the confirmation shows the amount and your Community balance, which is what payouts draw from — top it up from the ledger header if it's short. You can optionally text the creator a payment notification. Paid rows show their date; failed rows show the error and can be retried with the same button. The creator receives the money in their Stripe account via Cruva Creators.

The Payouts overview also shows lifetime totals, pending amounts, failed payouts, and one row per program with its next scheduled payout date; programs with nothing pending are collapsed behind a single line.

Auto pay

Turn on Auto pay in the program's configurator and pick a saved payment method (the same cards and US bank accounts as campaign auto pay). Each time a payout period is booked, Cruva charges that method for the period's creator payouts plus the Cruva fee, and pays the creators as soon as the funds clear. The program page and its row on the Payouts overview show one status line at a time: Pending while funds clear, Failed with a Fix method link if the charge was declined, or Paid with a receipt link. Tick Use payout balance first to spend what is already on your Cruva balance before anything is charged; only the difference goes to the method, and nothing is charged when the balance covers the period. It is off by default. A failed charge never retries by itself; fix the method or pay the rows by hand.

Common questions

"My push failed for some videos." The most common causes: the creator hasn't linked their Instagram, or their whitelisting isn't approved yet, while the push used a partnership identity. Failures are marked per video with the reason. Either get the whitelisting approved (Creators tab → Request whitelisting) or re-push with Brand page only.

"Where are the ads Cruva created?" In your ad account, paused, inside the ad set you targeted — the Ads tab links each one to Ads Manager. The videos themselves land in your ad account's media library.

"Can the same video run in more than one ad set?" Yes. "Pushed" is informational, not terminal — push it again to another ad set; the Ads column counts how many ads run it.

"Can I make a program invite-only?" Yes — turn on Make this program private in the configurator and list the creators under Visible to. The join page stays reachable, but only creators on the list (signed in with that TikTok handle) see the rates and can join; everyone else sees an invite-only notice. You can add or remove handles any time; members who already joined are unaffected.

"A creator says they're asked to verify TikTok before joining." Joining a program needs a verified TikTok account, exactly like joining a campaign — the program's content is pulled from that handle. The creator taps Verify TikTok to Join, completes the TikTok login, and lands back on the join page to finish.

"What does pausing a program do?" It only closes the join link. Existing members, live ads, and payouts are untouched. Deleting is similar but permanent for the link — members, ads, content, and payout history are all kept.

"How is this different from usage rights + licensed content?" Usage-rights offers license individual videos one at a time for a flat fee. Programs license everything a member posts, continuously, with ongoing commission — built for running creator content as ads at scale. The older flow is covered in Meta Ads, Spark codes & usage rights.