How to Build a Competitor Ad Spy Workflow With Meta and SimilarWeb

This guide teaches you how to build a structured, repeatable competitor ad intelligence workflow using the Meta Ad Library, SimilarWeb, and a Notion tracking board. You will finish with a living system that surfaces competitor creative trends, landing page strategies, and channel mix shifts on a weekly basis. Most teams can complete the initial setup in under two hours.

What You'll Build

• A structured competitor watchlist in Notion with tracked ad creative, copy angles, and landing page patterns
• A weekly Meta Ad Library pull routine that captures new competitor ads before they go stale
• A SimilarWeb channel mix snapshot for each competitor, updated monthly
• A tagging taxonomy that lets you spot creative and messaging trends across your competitive set
• A repeatable two-hour monthly review process your team can run without an analyst

What You'll Need

• A free Meta Ad Library account (facebook.com/ads/library)
• SimilarWeb free tier or Pro account (Pro gives 6 months of traffic history vs 1 month on free)
• A Notion workspace (free tier is sufficient)
• A list of 5 to 10 direct competitors with active paid social presence
• Around 2 hours for initial setup, then 45 to 60 minutes per week to maintain

Step 1: Build Your Competitor Watchlist in Notion

Open Notion and create a new database called Competitor Ad Intelligence. Set the view to a Table layout.

Add the following properties to each row:

• Competitor Name (Title field)
• Meta Page URL (URL field)
• SimilarWeb Domain (Text field)
• Primary Market (Select: AU / SG / CA / US / Global)
• Channel Mix Last Updated (Date field)
• Active Ad Count (Number field)
• Notes (Text field)

Fill in one row per competitor. You should have between 5 and 10 rows before you move to Step 2. Fewer than 5 gives you too narrow a signal. More than 10 creates review fatigue and the workflow breaks down.

What if a competitor has no Meta Page?

Some B2B brands run ads through LinkedIn rather than Meta. If a competitor has zero active ads in the Meta Ad Library, note that in the Notes field and substitute LinkedIn Ad Library instead. The rest of the workflow applies identically.

Step 2: Pull Active Ads From the Meta Ad Library

Go to facebook.com/ads/library. Select your target country and set the Ad Category to All Ads.

Search for the first competitor by their Facebook Page name. Filter by Active status only. This removes paused and completed campaigns that no longer reflect current strategy.

For each competitor, record the following in a new Notion page linked to their watchlist row:

• Number of active ads currently running
• Date the oldest active ad started (this tells you minimum campaign duration)
• The top 3 creative formats being used (static image, video, carousel)
• The primary headline angle (discount, social proof, problem-agitate-solve, curiosity)
• Any recurring visual elements (faces vs product, UGC vs studio, text-heavy vs minimal)

Screenshot or use the Meta Ad Library's built-in export where available. As of September 2026, Meta provides a CSV export for the EU market under DSA transparency rules. For AU, SG, CA, and US markets, manual screenshots remain the most reliable capture method.

Why does tracking the oldest active ad matter?

An ad running for 60 or more days is almost certainly profitable. Advertisers do not keep losing ads alive. A long-running ad tells you which creative angle is working well enough to justify continued spend, which makes it the single most useful data point in this whole pull.

Common pitfall: Do not record every ad you see. Record patterns. If a competitor is running 40 ads, look for the 3 to 4 creative themes that repeat. Documenting every ad creates noise and adds hours to your review time.

Step 3: Tag Every Ad Entry With a Creative Taxonomy

Create a second Notion database called Ad Creative Log. Link it to your Competitor Watchlist via a Relation property.

Each row in the Ad Creative Log represents a single ad or ad theme. Add these tag properties:

• Creative Format (Multi-select: Static / Video / Carousel / Story)
• Copy Angle (Multi-select: Discount / Urgency / Social Proof / Problem-Solve / Feature / Lifestyle)
• CTA Type (Multi-select: Shop Now / Learn More / Book / Sign Up / Get Quote)
• Visual Style (Multi-select: UGC / Studio / Illustrated / Text-Only / Mixed)
• Landing Page Type (Multi-select: Homepage / Product Page / Dedicated LP / Quiz / Booking)
• First Seen Date (Date)

Once you have tagged 3 to 4 weeks of competitor ads, sort this database by Copy Angle or Creative Format. You will start seeing which combinations your competitors are betting on. That is the signal worth acting on.

How do you capture the landing page type without clicking ads?

Meta Ad Library shows the destination URL in the ad card. Paste it into your browser. You do not need to convert or purchase anything. Just note whether it lands on a generic homepage, a product detail page, or a purpose-built landing page with a single CTA. That distinction tells you how sophisticated their funnel is.

Step 4: Run a SimilarWeb Channel Mix Snapshot

Open SimilarWeb and search for the first competitor domain. Navigate to the Marketing Channels section under Traffic Sources.

Record the following data points in the Notion watchlist row for that competitor:

• Total estimated monthly visits
• Direct traffic percentage
• Organic search percentage
• Paid search percentage
• Social traffic percentage (paid and organic combined)
• Referral traffic percentage
• Top 5 referring domains

Do this for every competitor in your watchlist. Update the Channel Mix Last Updated date field in Notion.

On the SimilarWeb free tier, you see the last 1 month of data. On Pro, you get 6 months. If your competitors are in Australia or Canada, note that SimilarWeb's traffic estimates are strongest in markets with large panel samples. Treat the percentages as directional, not precise.

What does the channel mix actually tell you?

A competitor with 45% paid search and 10% organic is buying growth, not building it. A competitor with 55% organic and 8% paid has invested in SEO. Both patterns suggest different things about their margins and their long-term strategy. If you notice a competitor's paid social share jumping month over month, they are likely scaling a working campaign.

Pro tip: Compare your own channel mix against competitors using the same SimilarWeb view. If your organic share is 20% and the category leader is at 50%, that gap tells you where to invest next. If you want a structured way to measure your overall brand health alongside this data, the Lenka Studio Brand Health Score assessment gives you a free baseline score across visibility, trust, and positioning.

Step 5: Build Your Weekly Review Rhythm

Set a recurring calendar block of 45 minutes every Monday morning. Label it Competitor Ad Intelligence Review.

During that block, follow this exact sequence:

1. Open the Meta Ad Library for each competitor in your watchlist (5 minutes per competitor, capped at 3 competitors per session).
2. Note any new ads that appeared since last week. Add them to the Ad Creative Log with today's date as First Seen Date.
3. Note any ads that disappeared. A disappeared ad usually means it stopped performing or the campaign ended.
4. Update the Active Ad Count field in your watchlist.
5. Write one sentence in the Notes field summarising what changed this week.

Rotate through your full competitor list so every competitor gets reviewed at least once every two weeks. Do not try to review all 10 in a single session. You will rush and miss things.

Run the SimilarWeb snapshot monthly, not weekly. Traffic data lags by 2 to 4 weeks, so weekly SimilarWeb checks add noise rather than signal.

Step 6: Turn Intelligence Into Action Items

Raw data in a Notion database does not help anyone. The final step is a monthly synthesis that converts observations into decisions.

Create a monthly Notion page called Competitor Insight Summary: [Month] [Year]. Answer these four questions in plain text:

1. Which creative format is most competitors increasing this month?
2. Which copy angle appears in the longest-running ads across the competitive set?
3. Are any competitors shifting their channel mix in a way that suggests a new budget priority?
4. What is one thing a competitor is doing that we have not tested yet?

Share this summary with your marketing lead or agency partner before the monthly planning session. The goal is to bring one to two testable ideas from competitor observation into your own content or paid calendar each month.

If you are using a content calendar to plan your own output alongside this intelligence, the Lenka Studio Social Media Toolkit includes a free content calendar template that works well alongside this Notion setup.

Common pitfall: Do not copy competitor ads. Use them as evidence of what the market responds to, then build your own angle. Copying a competitor's exact creative tells the audience nothing new about why they should choose you instead.

Frequently Asked Questions

Next Steps

Start with just three competitors this week. Build the Notion structure, run your first Meta Ad Library pull, and do one SimilarWeb snapshot. A small working system beats a perfect system you have not started yet.

Once the workflow is running, the insight compounds quickly. Within two months you will have enough tagged ad data to spot meaningful creative trends and make more confident decisions about your own paid and organic strategy.

If you want help building a more advanced competitive intelligence system, or want to connect your findings to a broader paid social or SEO strategy, the team at Lenka Studio works with SMBs across Australia, Singapore, Canada, and the US on exactly this kind of growth infrastructure. Get in touch and we can talk through what makes sense for your market and team size.