How do I troubleshoot common Facebook errors?

This article helps you troubleshoot common errors you might run into with your Facebook profile in Sprout Social.

This article contains the following sections:

• Access token validation error
• API bug
• Deleted Facebook post error
• Blocked messages and content
• Password change
• No Facebook Page Found in Sprout

Administrator error

Error Message: The user must be an administrator of the page in order to impersonate it

Troubleshooting Steps:

This error most likely occurs when the Facebook administrator who connected the page to Sprout Social was removed as an admin by the Facebook page owner. When this occurs, Sprout can't post in the platform. A current Facebook admin must reconnect and reauthorize the page in Sprout. If you are unsure of who connected the page originally, contact Sprout Support.

Note: In order to reconnect a Facebook page, you must be the Sprout Account Owner or have the Manage profiles permission, as well as be an admin for the Facebook Page you want to connect.

User authorization error

Error Message: The user hasn't authorized the application to perform this action or The Application Is Not Authorized.

Troubleshooting Steps:

When you receive this error message, it is most likely because you edited or removed one of the permissions Sprout requires in order to post content to your Facebook page. In order to correct this:

1. Log in to your Facebook page and go to: https://www.facebook.com/settings?tab=business_tools
2. Locate Sprout Social in the list of applications.
3. Select it, and then click Remove.
4. Navigate back into Sprout and reconnect the Facebook profile or Company Page.
5. Complete the authorization process by clicking Okay on all of Facebook's permission prompts.

Access token validation

Error Message: Error validating access token: The user is enrolled in a blocking, logged-in checkpoint

Troubleshooting Steps:

This error indicates that Facebook's security algorithms flagged your account. There are many reasons why your account might have been flagged. The most likely issues include:

• Notice of copyright violation
• An image has been flagged for inappropriate content
• Suspicious login activity
• Suspected compromised account

If you see this error message:

1. Delete history and cookies in your browser.
2. Log into Facebook directly or into your Facebook Business Manager account.
3. Follow the prompts to re-authorize and unblock your account. 

If the prompts do not appear, the prompt modal appears blank or you can't log into Facebook or Business Manager directly, contact Facebook Support through the Facebook Help Center. 

API bug

Error Message: Error: Failed due to a bug in Facebook's API

Troubleshooting Steps:

This error occurs when Sprout tries to post a message on your page, but when Sprout delivered the message to Facebook, Facebook experienced an issue posting the content. Sometimes, Facebook can't deliver messages or updates due to temporary bugs. When this happens, you get an email update, but to fix this, it's best to post the content directly to your Facebook page.

Contact Sprout Support if you experience this problem repeatedly.

Deleted Facebook post

Error Message: The Facebook Post has either been deleted or is no longer visible outside of Facebook.com

Troubleshooting Steps:

There are a few possibilities as to why you received this error message:

• The user who made the post removed the message from Facebook. 
• A page moderator removed the post from Facebook.  
• The user updated their Facebook Privacy settings in a way that prevents third-party systems from interacting with their data. This change happened after Sprout collected the original post. Now as you are responding to the post from Sprout, the privacy setting is blocking you from doing so.

Blocked message responses and content

Private Message responses blocked

Error: I can't send a private message through Sprout.

Troubleshooting Steps:

These are not Sprout errors but instead are received directly from Facebook. Facebook is preventing you from sending a Private Message for one of two reasons:

• When this error message is returned, “(#368) The action attempted has been deemed abusive or is otherwise disallowed”, Facebook blocked the content you are attempting to post. This may occur when you send a large number of similar private messages.
• Facebook is currently unable to accept your message due to technical difficulties. Please attempt your message again in five minutes.

Facebook blocking content or marking link as spam, the URL you supplied is invalid

Error: Facebook is blocking content you're sharing or marking it as spam or stating a URL is invalid.

Troubleshooting Steps: 

Unfortunately, if enough people mark a post as spam or block a post from their News Feed, and that post contains a link like the one you've sent, Facebook blocks third-party applications from sending posts containing that link or anything similar.

Post the message to Facebook directly since Sprout can't send the message once the restriction is imposed. You can also try un-shortening the link in Compose.

Password change

Error Message: A Facebook admin on this page has changed the password to this Page. 

Troubleshooting Steps:

When a Page's password is changed, Facebook requires Sprout Social to reverify your status as a Facebook admin of the page. Reconnect your Facebook page following this helpful how to.

Scheduled messages won't go out until this reconnection is established. If you try reconnecting your page with the link in the email and still find that your posts will not go through, contact Sprout Support.

Note: You can only reconnect a page if you are a Content Creator or Manager on the Facebook page in question.

No Facebook Page Found in Sprout

Error: I have confirmed in my Meta Business Account that I am an admin on Facebook Pages I intend to connect in Sprout Social. However, I encounter a "No Facebook Page Found" error in Sprout.

Troubleshooting Steps:

This could indicate that your permission settings within your Sprout Social Facebook Business Integration have not been configured to allow access to that specific Facebook page our Meta Business Account. You can check these settings within the Sprout Profile Connection flow using the steps depicted in the video below: 

If you are still seeing that no pages are available to connect after checking these settings are attempting in a private browser, this error could indicate that you are an admin on a high volume of Pages within your Business Account, causing a timeout within Meta's API when attempting to connect in Sprout. 

If possible, limit the number of profiles per user to around 300. You can distribute account ownership to several users to avoid this API limitation.

Contact Sprout Support if you continue to experience this issue.

FAQs

When I attempt to connect my Facebook pages, the connection flow in Sprout doesn't pull up all of the pages I have access to. How do I fix this?

To manage connections for Facebook Pages in Sprout, you will need to have been assigned “Full Control” Page Access, ideally through Facebook Business Manager. You can check this by visiting your Page Settings or Business Manager Settings on Facebook. You can read more about checking your Full Control access in our What do I need to know before connecting my Facebook Page? article.

If you are seeing you have the Full Control access, required you want to make sure that your Sprout Social Business Integration on Facebook is allowed to see and access all the Facebook pages you need to connect. You can read more about this in our How do I troubleshoot common Facebook errors? article.

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