Use case: Ad spend leaks
Catch paid traffic going to places customers can’t buy.
A product sells out, a page breaks, or a redirect lands somewhere else, and the ads pointing there keep spending. AdFence checks where live ads send people and, where a supported source is connected, whether they can buy when they arrive.
The destination check runs on connected ad accounts, subject to permissions and plan. Stock and checkout signals need a supported store or catalogue source, connected and mapped.
Trail Jacket
6 of 240 variants shownS, Black
In stock
M, Black
0 in stock
L, Black
In stock
S, Navy
In stock
M, Navy
In stock
L, Navy
In stock
Live ads still send traffic to M, Black
- Active ads pointing at this variant
- 3 of 48
- Recorded spend since stock hit zero
- $312
- Rest of the catalogue
- Selling normally
Sample. Store, product, and figures are invented.
Changed evidence
Three checks converge on one sold-out variant.
An otherwise healthy catalogue, one variant at zero stock, and three active ads still sending traffic to it. Each check reports separately; together they point at the same place.
Sample scenario. Store, product, and figures are invented.
Destination check
On connected ad accounts, subject to permissions and plan.
Product page
New200 OK
Buy control
Add to cartchanged to Sold out
The page loads, so a plain uptime check passes. The buy control on it does not.
Stock source
Where a supported store or catalogue source is connected and mapped.
Trail Jacket, M, Black
14 in stockchanged to 0 in stock
Other variants
NewIn stock
The connected store reports one variant at zero while its siblings stay in stock.
Checkout signal
Where the connected source reports checkout outcomes.
Checkout payment failures
0changed to 6 in 2 hours
Payment attempts for the variant fail at checkout once the stock hit zero.
Converges on
Trail Jacket, size M, Black
One variant in a catalogue of 240. Everything else sells normally.
Relevant ad review
Active ads pointing at this variant
New3 of 48
Recorded spend since stock hit zero
New$312
Scope of the review
NewThese 3 ads only
No blanket stop. The other 45 ads keep running; your team decides what to do with these three.
The destination check runs on connected ad accounts, subject to permissions and plan. The stock and checkout signals exist only where a supported store or catalogue source is connected and mapped to the ad destinations, so the lower two rows of this sample are conditional.
AdFence reviews the ads that send traffic to the affected place. It does not recommend stopping the account, and it does not change an ad on its own.
Coverage
Which checks run depends on what is connected.
The destination check needs a connected ad account, subject to permissions and plan. Stock and checkout signals need a source that knows the catalogue, connected and mapped to where the ads send people.
What each check needs
- 01
A connected ad account
Unlocks the destination check: whether the page live ads point at loads, redirects, or changes state.
- 02
A supported store, catalogue, or feed source, connected and mapped
Unlocks stock and availability signals for the products those destinations sell.
- 03
Checkout outcomes from that source, where it reports them
Unlocks the payment-failure signal for a specific product.
Without a source, the review is limited to what the destination itself shows. Which sources are supported, and what they report, varies by platform, integration, and plan.
What Meta, Google, and TikTok already catch
Each platform runs its own destination checks and can flag or disapprove some problems on its own. Those checks are real; the gaps are timing, coverage, and mismatch.
- Timing: platform notices arrive on the platform's schedule, while the ads keep spending in between.
- Coverage: a page that loads but cannot sell passes most reachability checks.
- Mismatch: a catalogue that still says in stock is only caught when it is compared with the store.
Impact
The places paid traffic lands without a sale.
A leak is almost always local: one variant, one page, one link. Grouping the failures by what the customer runs into makes it easier to see which check would have caught it.
Sold out or unavailable
The page works; the product does not.
- Variant at zero stock while its ads run
- Product hidden or unpublished after a catalogue update
- The size or color the ad promises is gone
Broken or redirected
The destination itself changed.
- Page returns an error or times out
- Redirect lands on a collection or home page
- Link points at the wrong product or an unfamiliar domain
Cannot pay
The customer gets to checkout and stops there.
- Checkout payment failures on one product
- Checkout unavailable for the country the ad targets
- A payment step that fails after the stock hit zero
Review and response
What AdFence surfaces, and what stays with your team.
The review is scoped to the ads that send traffic to the affected destination. Everything else in the account keeps running unless your team decides otherwise.
What AdFence surfaces
- Which live ads point at the affected destination
- What the destination check found, and when it changed
- Stock and checkout signals, where a connected source reports them
- Recorded spend against the affected ads since the change
What stays with your team
- Whether to pause, edit, or leave the affected ads
- Restocking, fixing the page, or changing the destination
- Whether the rest of the account keeps running, which it usually should
- Any change to an ad, made by your team in the platform or through an automation you explicitly configured and pre-approved
How AdFence behaves
- Supported checks start after connection and run every 15 minutes.
- Read-only by default. Monitoring never edits an ad account on its own.
- Coverage varies by platform, permissions, integrations, configuration, and plan.
- Automatic actions run only when they are explicitly configured and pre-approved.
- No guarantee of prevention, recovery, refund, or reinstatement.
Retain the record
Know where the money went, and since when.
AdFence keeps the timeline of what each check found and the spend recorded against the affected ads, so a leak is a dated finding rather than a guess in a spend review.
What the record can support
- Client reporting
- Spend reviews
- Merchandising handoffs
- Internal reviews
The record covers activity recorded after the ad account, and any source, was connected. It shows where paid traffic went and what the checks found. It does not measure lost sales, and it does not guarantee a refund from any platform.
Leak timeline
Sample scenario. Store, product, and figures are invented.
- 09:10Stock reached zeroTrail Jacket, M, Black
- 09:25Destination checkBuy control: Sold out
- 09:40Checkout failures6 in 2 hours
- 11:12Ads still active3 of 48
- 11:12Recorded spend since stock hit zero$312
- 11:12Alert sentSlack, email
Questions, answered
What teams ask before connecting.
Does AdFence know when a product sells out?
Only where a supported store, catalogue, or feed source is connected and mapped to the ad destinations. Without one, AdFence checks the destination itself: whether the page loads, redirects, or changes state.
Do Meta, Google, and TikTok already flag broken destinations?
Partly. Each platform runs its own destination checks and can flag or disapprove some problems. The gaps are timing, coverage, and mismatch: a page that loads but cannot sell passes most checks, and a catalogue that still says in stock is only caught when it is compared with the store. AdFence adds the comparison and the timing; it does not replace the platform's checks.
Should every campaign be paused when a leak is found?
Usually not. A leak is typically one destination. AdFence points at the ads that send traffic there, and the rest of the account keeps running unless your team decides otherwise.
Will AdFence pause the affected ads for us?
Not by default. Monitoring is read-only. An automatic action runs only when your team explicitly configured and pre-approved it in advance, and only for the accounts it covers.
Can AdFence tell us how much revenue we lost?
No. It records where paid traffic went, what the checks found, and the spend recorded against the affected ads. Lost sales depend on data AdFence does not hold.
Start protecting
Find the ads pointing where customers cannot buy.
Read-only by default. A sold-out variant becomes a dated finding, with the ads that point at it. Stock and checkout checks depend on the sources you connect.
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