The days of Facebook being limited to a cool place to hang out online and catch up with old friends are long gone. Today, Facebook has a dual purpose, and it can provide a hugely influential platform for businesses looking to promote their products and services to a captive audience. If you’re planning to capitalise on the popularity of Facebook to increase sales, it pays to be aware of the importance and value of targeting the right users.
Interest targeting lets you advertise to specific audiences by reaching people based on their interests, activities, Pages and posts they like, posts and comments they make, and closely related topics. Peoples interests include those on Facebook, as well as though off-Facebook across the internet. Here’s a helpful guide to Facebook interest targeting.
How to target the right audience on Facebook
Facebook has more than 3 billion registered users in countries all over the world. If you’re looking to harness the power of this social network to increase customer numbers, it’s crucial to target the right people. It’s not possible to reach everyone, and many people who use Facebook won’t be looking for the products or services that you offer. To make Facebook marketing work for you, you need to focus on finding users that are likely to take an interest in your brand, so how do you go about doing this?
Perhaps the most important step is defining your target market. Once you have an idea of the type of person you’re looking for, you can set about trying to find them in the Facebook ether. There are several important factors that influence how you target your market on Facebook. Examples include:
- Demographics audiences (e.g. Location, Age, job title, eduction)
- Interests audiences
- Behaviour audiences
When you post Facebook ads, you want to make sure that they are visible to people who could become genuine leads, and managing your settings can help you narrow down the pool of users and connect with your ideal client.
What exactly is Facebook interest targeting?
Facebook offers you a platform to reach out to potential customers, followers, friends, and subscribers that match various elements of your ideal buyer persona. You can place adverts according to location or to try and target a specific demographic, for example. With Facebook interests targeting, you’re looking to attract people who have interests that are in some way connected or related to your business. By using this strategy, you can ensure that your ads are aimed at web users who are more likely to be interested in the advert, and subsequently, more likely to want to know more about your brand or to buy from you. This is a means of creating a targeted approach to Facebook marketing and increasing your chances of success. You can control your audience settings by entering different interests and choosing which interests to target.
Effective interest targeting with Facebook
If your Facebook campaign is focused on attracting members who have interests that are relevant to your business, you can use targeting techniques that will connect your adverts with that specific type of user. If you’re selling golf products, for example, you want to target people who are genuine fans of golf, rather than those who have liked the odd article about Tiger Woods or the Ryder Cup in the past. You can use in-depth research techniques and tools like Audience Insight to gain an accurate idea of what people are interested in, what they like, and how close the affinity between the user and interest actually is.
As an advertiser, you can specify precise interests, which gives you the chance to try and reach out to people who have expressed an interest in subjects, products, or topics related to your business. Using the Interests tab in your Facebook Ad settings, you can enter terms and words, and Facebook will give you lists of matching search terms that correlate with the information provided by users on their profiles. You can enhance and maximise the chances of capturing the right audience by combining interest targeting with analysis of behaviours. This gives you an additional insight into how people use Facebook, what purchases they have made, and their intent when they look at adverts or like pages. If you’re selling excursions, or you’re a travel company, for example, you can target not only those who have an interest in travelling and holidays, and people who have searched or liked travel pages, but also those who have expressed an interest in booking their next trip soon.
Facebook interest targeting tips
If you’re not aware of all the targeting options that Facebook offers, you could be missing out on the potential to create high-quality leads. To improve your strategy, here are some handy Facebook interest targeting tips:
- Get to know your customers’ interests: this is not the same as looking at what people have liked. It offers a more specific insight into how people spend their time on Facebook and what kinds of pages, posts and adverts pique their interest. Use the Audience Insights tool to look at interests and identify the level of affinity with the general topic. This gives you an idea of how likely the individual is to like pages and posts that are similar to the specific interest in comparison to the average Facebook user.
- Find people who are looking to buy something you sell or offer: online behaviours can provide valuable information about consumer habits and buying intentions. You can utilise Facebook settings and combine interest targeting and behaviour analysis to seek out subscribers who have an active intent to buy.
- Combine different search criteria: if you’re targeting local customers on Facebook, it’s often wise to combine different search criteria, including the geographical area, demographic, and gender to narrow down the field. You can choose to go from a core audience to a broader audience or vice versa, by adjusting the settings. You could move from health and fitness to a niche interest of marathon running, for example.
Summary
Facebook interest targeting is a method businesses use to connect with customers who are likely to respond positively to their adverts. Based on the products or services you provide, you can adjust your settings and preferences to connect with Facebook users who have similar interests, enabling you to reach out to a captive audience, and hopefully, create and convert more leads.
1 thought on “Facebook Interest Targeting – Facebook Ads Interests A – Z”
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