Share your Meta Business account with an agency

This is the starting point. Many people run their Page from their Facebook profile, with no business portfolio. Creating that portfolio is free, takes 5 minutes, and unlocks everything else.

A word on the vocabulary, because it has changed. What Meta used to call Business Manager is now called the business portfolio. It is the same space with a new name. Both terms are still going around depending on the screen and the tutorial, so do not let it throw you.

Open business.facebook.com.

• If you land on a dashboard in your company's name, all is well, move on to the next step.
• If the site offers to create an account, follow the wizard. Company name, your name, your work email, then attach your Facebook business Page. The whole wizard is set out in our guide on how to create your Meta ad account, payment method included.

Then switch on two-factor authentication from the security centre. That is the confirmation by text message or by app when you log in. Meta asks for it before you can delegate access, and it protects your account along the way.

This job is done on a computer. The portfolio settings have no complete equivalent in the mobile app. If you only have a phone, open business.facebook.com/settings in your browser and request the desktop version of the site. Everything works, it is just a bit smaller.

The shortcut that lands you exactly on the right screen is business.facebook.com/settings/partners. That is the address to remember, it avoids every detour.

Otherwise, open the portfolio settings, then in the left-hand menu, Users then Partners. A useful marker, the cog in Meta Business Suite leads somewhere else, to publishing settings. If you cannot see a Partners tab, that is the point to check.

Go through Partners, not through the People tab. Delegation between businesses is the right method, and it leaves you the owner of everything.

• Click Add, then Give a partner access to your assets.
• In the ID field, paste our business ID. It starts with 32497801161, followed by 4 digits that we do not publish here. Ask us for them and we will give them to you straight away. This is the only step where you need us, the rest is done without us.
• Select the assets to share. Your Facebook Page, your Instagram account and your ad account.

If the labels are not exactly those. Meta renames its screens several times a year, and Partners has already carried other names. Trust the meaning of the action, granting access to another business, and use the settings search bar with the word partner. The feature is still there.

This is the most important step on the page. 1 click settles it, so take 30 seconds to put it in the right place. Meta offers 2 levels, and their names are a little misleading.

• Partial access. It covers content, messages, community activity, ads and insights. It sounds more than enough. In reality it does not open up the reading of lead forms, the small forms your customers fill in from an ad.
• Full control. This is the level that lets you retrieve those enquiries and genuinely run your campaigns. It is the one to choose.

For smooth advertising management, switch on Full control on the Facebook Page, and Manage campaigns on the ad account, so we can create and optimise the ads.

Why we press the point. With partial access, everything appears to work, and the enquiries left by your customers stay at Meta. Nothing flags it up. Sorted on day one, this point never comes up again, and every enquiry reaches you.

If the 2 levels carry other names. Meta has already renamed them. Remember the meaning rather than the word, and take the broader of the 2, the one that includes lead management.