Facebook’s targeted ads just got smarter
Targeted 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
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