Broad + creative vs an interest stack

“People who like cars” is not targeting. A useful Meta audience for Northfield is a household inside about 25 miles of Frederick that needs a reliable used SUV this month, can finance on approved credit, and will book the 48-hour test drive. You do not find that person by AND-stacking Honda + CR-V + used cars + car shopping + SUVs. That stack looks precise and then starves delivery: each interest fights the others and Meta never sees enough people to learn. Broad inside a tight geo, with a creative that names the CR-V and the test drive, gives Meta a signal it can actually use.

Broad + creative (default): geo Frederick + ~25 miles, age 25–64, no interest pile. The ad does the targeting. Interest probe (optional, one ad set, small money): a single theme such as “used SUVs” or “Honda,” never 12 stacked ANDs. Do-not-run: lookalikes built from 40 cheap Instant Form leads, Advantage+ audience expansion with no conversion, or ASC / Advantage+ Shopping when there is no catalog and no Purchase event. Write the stance in the ad set name so a second buyer can see it Monday.

Advantage+ audience and ASC-style automation need an event Meta can chase that is not “any Lead.” For Northfield that event is Schedule (booked lot visit) or a qualified Lead that already asked budget + timeframe. If those events do not exist yet, stay on broad + manual geo and instrument the pixel first. ASC / Advantage+ Shopping is a catalog product: 55 used cars on a lot is not a catalog feed, and inventing Purchase at $18,400 per form fill is a lie. After you have a week of real Schedule (or qualified Lead) events, you may test Advantage+ expansion on one prospecting ad set — with a written kill rule, not as the whole account.