Thanks to its treasure trove of data, in little more than a decade, Facebook has fast become one of the most important marketing channels for many businesses.
But for many marketers, Facebook’s most productive targeting functionality is Custom Audiences, which allows marketers to deliver Facebook ads to users they’re already interacting with.
By some estimates, upwards of 85 cents of every new dollar spent on digital ads today is going to Google or Facebook.
That’s not just a result of the fact that both companies have massive audiences, but also a result of the fact that both companies continue to offer marketers more and more options for targeting those audiences.
‘Data-driven’ is one of those terms which seems unnecessary for marketing. Surely all marketing uses data to some extent, so why does there need to be a distinction?
As marketing increasingly moves to digital platforms, however, the concepts behind the term ‘data-driven marketing’ have become distinguished from more traditional marketing and even have their own vocabulary.
Pharma companies are not doing a great job at reaching physicians through social, and their ability to advertise to consumers could be eliminated in the US if the American Medical Association (AMA) has its way.
But the pharmaceutical industry’s largest trade group, the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA), isn’t targeting physicians or consumers in what could be its most important ad campaign.
As rumored earlier this year, Google has announced Customer Match, a new ad targeting product that gives AdWords advertisers the ability to target their customers through Google Search, YouTube, and Gmail.
Facebook’s Custom Audience targeting feature is one of the social network’s most potent.
Now that Twitter has rolled out functionality which is a lot like Facebook’s Lookalike Audiences, it’s time to take a closer look at what lookalike audiences are, how to use them and why you would.
Previously I’ve written about Facebook Custom Audiences, which create an advertising audience out of an email list. And I’ve also included ‘lookalike audiences’ as one of the key features that makes Facebook such a compelling place to advertise.
So far, though, I have avoided going into too much detail about lookalikes as they were somewhat unique to Facebook and required specialist knowledge.
But with Twitter’s recent announcement that they, too, will support lookalike audiences, it’s time to cover them in greater detail.
That is, there is now some agreement among the social media powerhouses that lookalike audiences are an effective strategy for reaching people on social media who may be interested in your product or service – so they are certainly worth learning more about.