15+ Little-Known Ways to Target Facebook Audiences Effectively

How to target Facebook audiences effectively is something not everyone knows when running ads, because with the right targeting, your ads reach your potential customers. So let’s explore effective targeting methods with The7 in this article!

What Is Facebook Audience Targeting?

Facebook customer targeting is how marketers choose potential audiences that fit their products/services and start advertising to them. In short, think of your customers as the targets in archery, with your products/services and Facebook Ads as the arrow and the bow, respectively.

Your main job is to draw the bow and aim so that you hit these targets. On top of that, you need to keep searching for new target customer groups so you can apply effective targeting.

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15+ Most Effective Ways to Target Audiences for Facebook Ads

Here are effective ways to target Facebook customers that marketers can refer to when building their own ad campaigns.

Target Based on Interests

An effective way to target Facebook audiences is to understand your customers inside and out. Put simply, you need to research which audience groups your product/service is aimed at. For example: their age and gender, whether women or men make up the majority, what jobs they have, whether their income is low or high, and which blogs, websites or e-commerce platforms your customers already take part in.

However, you should break each ad campaign down into smaller pieces. Splitting into ad groups and campaigns, and then splitting each group even further, will deliver the best results. The more detailed each ad group is, the easier it is to classify behavior and psychology and to get more accurate results.

Target Audiences by Age Group

Targeting ages 18-22

Young people aged 18-22 are mostly students with no income, or they work part-time but earn only enough to cover part of their living expenses. The rest have started working, but their income is still not stable. This age group usually likes browsing the web, commenting, liking, sharing, tagging… Their engagement is very high, but because their finances are still very limited, buying is still difficult for them.

Targeting ages 23-25

The 23-25 group is made up of recent graduates who are starting to become independent by working as interns or in a new work environment. The average income of this age group today only ranges around 5-6 million VND.

Even though they have an income, it is not truly high enough to spend freely. Generally, women in this age group tend to focus on beauty, so cosmetics and fashion are the products that will attract them. There are also snacks, mid-priced accessories, and so on.

Targeting ages 26-30

This group has an income and somewhat more stable jobs, with a stronger standard of living and spending power, and a more mature mindset. Some even hold good positions in society and at work.

Men aged 26-30 have started looking for a partner to build a family with, so they tend to buy valuable gifts for their spouse or girlfriend. They may also need to buy more valuable clothing. For women, this is the age that usually focuses on children, so mother-and-baby products are the ones you should emphasize.

Targeting ages 31-40

These people have a high standard of living and income, so their shopping demands also rise. They pay little attention to price, so premium products with dependable quality suit them.

Targeting ages 40 and over

This potential customer group not only has an impressive standard of living but also has its own assets and savings. Their children have mostly grown up, so they have few worries. Their engagement on Facebook may not be high, but their purchasing demand is still very stable.

Target Audiences by Geographic Area

Targeting audiences by location is absolutely an effective way to target Facebook audiences. Simply put, for each Facebook Ads campaign you can set the locations where your ads are shown, and your ads will appear to customers who live there. For example, you can set locations such as an entire country, a city, a district, or even the area around a specific spot.

Targeting by location keeps your ads focused on the areas where you will find the right audience and helps you increase profit and revenue. Below are the main methods for choosing locations:

Enter a location

Enter the location where you most want to run Facebook Ads, and a list of specific locations will appear for you to choose from. You can also choose the targets that Facebook suggests for you.

Country: The countries, grouped by continent, that you can choose from to run ads.

Region:

• Free trade areas: Target the countries in this region, for example the “North American Free Trade Agreement”
• App store regions: Target all countries that have the iTunes and Android app stores (paid and free).
• Emerging markets: Countries including Egypt, India, Poland, Saudi Arabia, Chile,…
• Europe: Target the countries that use the euro as their common currency.

Drop a pin

Use the +/- options to navigate the map, then drag the map to the spot where you want to drop a pin => Click the “Drop Pin” button.

When you click to drop the pin => The map automatically updates the GPS coordinates of the location you chose. If you want to adjust it, you can slide the bar to the position you want or enter the radius you need.

Add locations in bulk

Step 1: In location targeting => Click “Add Locations in Bulk”

Step 2: Choose the locations you want. Depending on your product and the area where you want to run ads, select the appropriate format

Step 3: Enter the provinces and cities you want to target for your Facebook Ads into the box.

Step 4: When a message confirms the locations were added successfully, the bulk-add process is complete.

In addition, instead of targeting a location, you can use the tool to exclude specific locations from your targeting.

Target Audiences Who Have Searched for Products

Research shows that 73% of consumers search online for a product first before deciding to buy it. Based on customers having searched for similar products, Facebook can identify the ideal audience and immediately show your ads to them.

That means even if they have only just researched similar products from your competitors on a website and know nothing about your brand, your business still has a chance to convert them into customers.

In addition, whether customers choose to buy also depends on price. That is why Facebook Ads need to offer suitable promotions and incentives to persuade consumers to order your product instead of buying from a competitor.

Target Audiences by Income Level

Determine the income level of your customers: are they university students, office workers earning under 10 million VND a month, or people earning 100,000 USD a year, and so on? Then, when you set up Facebook Ads, target your product/service to the income level of the audience you are aiming for.

Facebook lets you target 30 different financial behaviors of users. In other words, Facebook will show your ads to customers who are ready to buy your service/product.

You can target customers’ net worth and liquid assets on Facebook in the “Demographics” section. Although this data is not completely accurate, it still helps you remove low-potential audiences from your ad targeting list.

Target Audiences by Home Ownership

If you are in the real estate business, Facebook also lets your Facebook ads appear to people who rent or own their homes. This is a very useful option if you want to reach the right potential audience for your business.

Target Audiences by Workplace

Beyond interests and income, you should also ask yourself which industries and professions your service/product suits and appeals to. Then, in the “Demographics” section, you can narrow down the target customer group for your business’s Facebook Ads by selecting specific jobs.

Target Audiences by Education Level

Once you have identified the education level of your target audience, you need to adjust the language and writing style of your Facebook Ads to match. However, this effective way to target Facebook audiences only suits products/services aimed at customers with a certain level of education. On top of that, you can target in Facebook Ads based on specific schools, fields of study, and so on.

Target Audiences Who Use Mobile Devices

If you are an electronics business selling tablets and mobile phones, targeting phone users is an effective way to target Facebook audiences. What’s more, 90% of people keep using their old iOS or Android operating system even after switching to a new phone.

So if you sell mobile devices that run Android, exclude iOS from your targeting. In addition, you need to optimize your Facebook ads so that they are compatible with this audience’s mobile devices.

Target Audiences Who Love to Travel

Based on travel behavior, you can target your product/service ads on Facebook to:

• People who frequently travel domestically
• People who frequently travel abroad
• People who often travel with monthly passes
• People who just traveled and returned 1 week ago
• People who just traveled and returned 2 weeks ago

Target Couples with Upcoming Anniversaries

You can target your business’s Facebook ads to people whose anniversary falls within the next 30 days or in 31-60 days. If your business sells souvenirs, this will be one of the most effective ways to target Facebook audiences.

Target Audiences by Political Views

Facebook lets businesses set up target audiences for Facebook ads based on their political views. However, Facebook can only target users who have voluntarily filled in their political views in the About section of their profile.

Target Audiences in Long-Distance Relationships

Another option in the “life events” section is people in long-distance relationships. An effective way to target Facebook audiences is to sell flowers or souvenirs combined with express delivery and target these couples. Compared with other couples, they spend more on these products on anniversaries and holidays.

Target Audiences Who Recently Changed Jobs

You can also target people who have just started a new job to show your business’s Facebook Ads. For example, when they are promoted or change jobs, they will need to take advanced professional courses or buy new clothes to change their fashion style, and so on.

Target Buyer Profiles

Using the “Buyer Profile” option lets you apply an effective way to target Facebook audiences to promote your business’s products/services. You can find this item in the “Behaviors” options.

Target Like You’re Not… Targeting

When you run ads with no targeting, Facebook automatically distributes your ad content at random, based on users’ psychology and interests drawn from the data it already has.

However, this approach is extremely costly. To reduce the cost somewhat, you should test gradually and narrow your target audience range to avoid wasting budget.

Example: You set no targeting, and Facebook automatically aims at audience groups A and B. After a period of time, you find that group A has a higher purchase rate than group B, so you remove group B and focus only on group A. As you narrow the targeted audience, Facebook will automatically distribute your ads to the right potential customer audience you are aiming for.

Tools That Help You Target on Facebook Effectively and Quickly

Use Facebook Audience Insights

Facebook Audience Insights is a tool that supports effective Facebook audience targeting. Because it is Facebook’s own “official” software, you can use it on the tool platform Facebook already provides. However, you should also do outside research and qualitative thinking through other channels such as Google search, and learn about the lifestyle, behavior and interests of the user group you want to target. Then bring everything together into Audience Insights to analyze and check it.

Use Target Generator Software

Target Generator is paid software, typically used by businesses that specialize in keyword research, to find Facebook Pages with related audiences and many likes. Pages with a large number of likes can reach more related audiences more easily.

Use Google Analytics

Once set up, Google Analytics helps your website research traffic and the “keywords” your users care about. Analyzing this user behavior helps your Facebook ads show to the right audience of people interested in your service/product.

Use the Facebook Pixel

The Facebook Pixel tracks user cookies on your brand’s website to identify the target audience group. That means the Pixel tracks every user who visits the website and records their behavior. This helps you analyze traffic to support your Facebook Ads work later on.

Use Stalkscan

Stalkscan is a tool that helps users collect information and activity from any Facebook account. It also helps you analyze the results of each data group in a systematic way, such as behavior, interests, demographics,… so you can apply them to Facebook audience targeting.

3.6 Use Lookalike Audience (LAL)

Lookalike Audience helps businesses identify the potential audience they created earlier, so they can show ads to audiences with similar demographics, interests and behavior.

Mistakes to Avoid When Targeting Facebook Ads Audiences

Targeting the Entire Customer Audience

Detailed targeting only helps deliver your ads to potential audiences at a rate of under 20%. So focusing only on targeting the entire customer audience is not an effective way to target Facebook audiences. The remaining 80%, whether customers decide to buy your product/service, depends on content and images. This method is called Content Targeting.

Targeting an Audience That Is Too Narrow

Deep targeting / hyper-targeting / super targeting / laser targeting is an ineffective way to target. When you do this, CPM becomes extremely high and frequency rises quickly because the audience is small. On top of that, you will miss countless potential customers because the ads are targeted too narrowly.

Underestimating the Facebook Ads Algorithm

Facebook is very smart: when you look up a product on Lazada, a little later Shopee shows ads for that product or similar ones on your Facebook. So underestimating the Facebook Ads algorithm will get in the way of optimizing and delivering your ads to customers. The key is to provide exactly what Facebook needs, and the platform will automatically identify the customer audience for you.

In this article, The7 has rounded up the effective ways to target Facebook audiences. We hope this information helps you become an expert in Facebook Ads, and build a truly engaging campaign that boosts revenue for your business or yourself.

>>> You can also read more articles on the same topic:

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• A guide to choosing a Facebook ad objective