UPDATED 09:15 EDT / FEBRUARY 18 2015

Facebook’s targeted ads just got smarter

facebook cash moneyTargeted advertising is the bread and butter of Facebook Inc., and now the social network’s ads will be able to show users specific products with pinpoint accuracy.

“Many businesses sell more than one product,” Facebook said in a statement. “But if your business has lots and lots of products to advertise, all that variety can present some challenges. How do you highlight more of your products? How do you advertise the right products to the right people?”

Facebook’s new “Product Ads” gives businesses the ability to show some or all of their merchandise catalog. The ads can be updated dynamically depending on intended audience, how the ads are being viewed, whether or not a user has visited a business’s site or page, and more. Product Ads also uses browser history to find relevant items for users. For example, a user who looked at an umbrella on a company’s website might see ads for other umbrellas.

The ads can even hide products that are currently out of stock, saving time for both users and merchants, and businesses can choose whether they want to display single or multiple product ads at once. Once a user buys a product from a company, the ads for that product can be automatically switched off, ensuring that customers will not see products they no longer need and, therefore, are unlikely to buy again.

Target and Shutterfly, who tested the new Product Ads feature before it was officially released, both stated that they received a 20 percent increase in conversion rate over other Facebook ads after using the new advertising format.

The new Product Ads feature is Facebook’s answer to a similar system currently in use by Google Inc. Like Facebook, Google earns a large portion of its revenue from advertising, and the search engine and technology giant has already been displaying dynamic ads based on users’ search and browser history for some time.

Businesses can start using the Product Ads API through Facebook Marketing Partners, and the feature will be rolled out to the Power Editor within the next few weeks.

photo credit: clasesdeperiodismo via photopin cc

A message from John Furrier, co-founder of SiliconANGLE:

Your vote of support is important to us and it helps us keep the content FREE.

One click below supports our mission to provide free, deep, and relevant content.  

Join our community on YouTube

Join the community that includes more than 15,000 #CubeAlumni experts, including Amazon.com CEO Andy Jassy, Dell Technologies founder and CEO Michael Dell, Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger, and many more luminaries and experts.

“TheCUBE is an important partner to the industry. You guys really are a part of our events and we really appreciate you coming and I know people appreciate the content you create as well” – Andy Jassy

THANK YOU