Facebook (and Instagram) ads are the single biggest growth lever for UK raffle operators — and the single most likely place to get your account banned if you skip the compliance steps. This page walks through advertising raffles on Meta the right way: ad policy, account setup, audience targeting, creative do’s and don’ts, and tracking via Pixel + CAPI.

Step 1 — Understand Meta’s gambling-ads policy

Meta classifies free-entry prize draws and UKGC-licensed raffles differently. Both are advertisable, but only after you complete Meta’s authorisation flow:

• Free entry route (Section 95 of the Gambling Act) — your site is technically a free competition with paid entry as a convenience. Meta treats this as a sweepstake/prize-draw and requires you to apply for permission via Meta’s gambling-ad authorisation.
• UKGC licensed raffles — full gambling category. Meta requires the licence number on your application and tighter creative scrutiny.

Without the authorisation, your ads will run for 24–72 hours then get flagged, your account gets a strike, and a second strike kills the ad account. Apply first.

Step 2 — Configure your Business Manager

1. Set up a Meta Business Managerfor your raffle brand. Don’t use a personal profile.
2. Add your domain and verify it (DNS TXT record). This is required for iOS 14+ aggregated event measurement.
3. Submit your gambling-ad authorisation. Approval takes 1–4 weeks.
4. Once approved, you can run ads from the same ad account.

Step 3 — Install the Pixel + Conversions API

Browser-only Pixel is unreliable in 2026: iOS Mail privacy, Safari ITP, and ad blockers strip 30–60% of events. Meta’s solution is the Conversions API (CAPI), which fires events server-side from your raffle backend.

Open Admin → Integrations → Meta in your raffle admin and paste:

• Pixel ID — found in Events Manager. We inject the pixel script on every page.
• CAPI access token— generate in Events Manager → Settings → “Generate access token”. We sendPurchase, AddToCart, InitiateCheckout, and Lead events server-side, deduplicated against the browser pixel by event ID.

Verify in Events Manager → Test events — you should see both Browser and Serverrows for each purchase, with the same Event ID. That’s the dedup working.

Step 4 — Audiences that work for raffles

• Lookalike of last-90-day purchasers— Meta’s best audience for raffle operators. Upload a customer list (hashed emails) of recent buyers, build a 1–3% lookalike audience for UK, and use it as your cold-traffic primary.
• Engaged Instagram + Facebook profiles (last 90 days) — warm retargeting. Smaller audience, higher CTR.
• Custom audience of site visitors who didn’t buy — retarget the cart abandoners; offer a discount code via a promo code.
• Avoid broad interest targeting.“Cars” or “Gambling” interests perform poorly for raffles — too broad, too much waste. Lookalikes outperform interests 3–4x for this niche.

Step 5 — Creative that doesn’t get rejected

• Always show the prize.A static car/cash/PS5 image with a ticket price overlay is the highest-CTR creative format we’ve seen across 50+ operators.
• Never imply guaranteed wins.Phrases like “You will win”, “Guaranteed prize”, or any false urgency (“Last 10 tickets!” when there are 800) get rejected.
• Show the ticket price. Meta requires transparency on cost — a £2.49/ticket overlay is fine and increases trust.
• UK-only delivery. Geo-restrict to UK in the ad set settings. Targeting outside the UK is a one-way ticket to a shutdown.
• Include the Free Entry Route mention.Even if subtle in the corner of your image — “Free entry available” — it strengthens your compliance posture.

Step 6 — Optimise for purchases, not clicks

Set ad sets to optimise for the Purchase event (CAPI-fed). Click optimisation gets you cheap clicks from click-happy bargain hunters who never buy. Purchase optimisation teaches Meta which lookalike segments actually convert and lowers your CAC over the first 7 days.

Common reasons ads get banned

• Running without authorisation (“Sweepstake content” rejection).
• Targeting under-18s (Meta auto-blocks ages 13–17 for gambling ads but you must also set min age 18+ explicitly).
• Using personal Facebook profile for ads. Always Business Manager.
• Domain not verified. iOS users won’t convert measurably.

Related: UTM Tags & Attribution · Google Analytics 4 · In-depth Meta Ads playbook.