Latest Updates on Facebook Custom Audiences

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this picture shows the interface of facebook custom audiences feature

Last month, we wrote about the Custom Audiences feature. It is Facebook’s paid feature which enables marketers to target their prospects based on Facebook ID, phone number or email address. Recently, this feature was expanded with “Look-alike Audiences” query, which enables marketers to find segments that generally match specific Custom Audiences on Facebook.

Facebook also announces that information from third party data vendors will become incorporated into targeting and segmentation capabilities into Custom Audiences databases. These third party vendors are Datalogix, Epsilon, Acxiom and BlueKai .

This also means that advertisers (or “managed advertisers,” for now) will be able to target market segments offered by Epsilon and the other providers mentioned earlier. This change dramatically enhances Facebook’s targeting capabilities. It also brings targeting capabilities that exist for direct mail and email marketing into Facebook.

For example, if a car maker or dealer is looking for people who are categorized as “prospective car buyers”, data from the vendors above can be used to find these people on Facebook. Facebook explains that businesses which already work with these selected third party vendors can now use the same information they have used elsewhere to create campaigns on Facebook. Moreover, Facebook will work with these select third parties to create pre-defined targeting categories on Facebook. Businesses of all sizes will now be able to target categories like “beauty parlors” or “real estate.”

The truth is there will be a new pre-defined audience segments. And since Facebook built the databases using third party data, marketers will get a lot more reach on prospects. They’ll also be able to layer existing Facebook targeting and tools on top of those segments as well.

However, we can assume that Facebook seems sincere in its desire to give users ultimate control and choice over this process. From marketing’s point of view, these new enhancements improve the capabilities of audience targeting that Custom Audiences offers. We are expecting more refinery in this compelling feature.

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