Facebook Ads - Online Academy

When you use dynamic ads, people may automatically see the products or similar products to what they saw previously. You can use retargeting with dynamic ads to remind people about products that they’ve previously browsed or purchased on your website, mobile app, Marketplace and Instagram Shopping.

Note: Due to Apple’s iOS 14 policy updates, as more people adopt iOS 14.5+, the size of your retargeting audiences may decrease.

Requirements for retargeting

Facebook pixel/app events: You need a Facebook pixel implemented on your website, and you will need to use standard events to report which product IDs from your catalogue are being viewed, added to basket and purchased. If you want to retarget your ads to people on a mobile app, you can set up app events. If you’re not sure how to set up a pixel or app events, consider contacting a website or app developer..
Catalogue: You need a catalogue to use dynamic ads. If supported, you can use an existing data feed from one of Facebook’s integrations (e.g. Shopify). If you don’t have a catalogue, learn how to create a catalogue.

How to retarget an audience

To retarget an audience with dynamic ads:

Go to Ads Manager and create your dynamic ad or open an existing one.
In your ad set, find the Audience section and choose Retarget ads to people who interacted with your products on and off Facebook.
Select a retargeting option, update the corresponding number of days and choose the products to include.

Note: If you choose Custom combination, you can specify which audience interactions to include or exclude. For example, you could include people who added products to their basket in the last 45 days and exclude people who purchased products in the last 45 days.

Expand your retargeting reach

You can reach more people when you use a larger audience. To include prospective customers in your retargeting campaign, you can use automated Lookalike Audiences in addition to your retargeting audience. When you turn on the automated Lookalike Audience option, we automatically create a Lookalike Audience based on your retargeting selections. If you choose to not use the automated Lookalike Audience, you may see a decrease in your audience size.

To create an automated Lookalike Audience:

Define your retargeting audience, then go to the Automated Lookalike Audience option.
Select the switch to turn it on.
Ensure that your Custom Audience is set to Expand.
Find your newly created automated Lookalike Audience under Lookalike.
Note: You can’t make edits to the automated Lookalike Audience that we create.
To use this audience, continue creating your ad set. (To remove this audience, either close it or select the automated Lookalike Audience switch to turn it off.)

Note: Your estimated audience size range may vary depending on your audience selections. It may also update once you’ve updated your campaign.

Automated Lookalike Audiences may not be available if:

Your source audience is too small to use for a Lookalike Audience.
You turn it on and then disable it. (Turn it back on to automatically recreate it.)
You turn it on then make changes to your audience or location. (This turns it off. Once you have made your changes, turn on automated Lookalike Audiences again to use it.)
You change the Custom Audienceexpand option to Narrow. (Selecting Narrow disables automated Lookalike Audiences)

5 Simple Steps to Create a Facebook Retargeting Campaign

When you’re ready to set up your Facebook retargeting campaign, just follow these five simple steps. Note that these instructions assume that you already have a Facebook account for business ads.

1. Log in to your Facebook Ads Manager and select Audiences

You’ll find Audiences in the dropdown menu when you click on Business Manager at the top left-hand side of the screen.

2. Click on Create Audience and select Custom Audiences

Again, you’ll find Create Audience at the top left on your screen. For retargeting, we’re going to select Custom Audience, which will allow us to set up a campaign that reaches people who visited a website.

3. Select Website Traffic

You have some options here, but for retargeting, we’re going to focus on website traffic so that we’re reaching the people who got to your site.

4. Select your target audience from the dropdown menu

You’ll be taken to a screen, as seen below, that allows you to create your audience. You have the option of targeting the following:

Anyone who visits your website
People who visit specific pages
People visiting specific web pages but not others
People who haven’t visited in a certain amount of time
Custom combination

Just to show you how it looks, we set up a custom audience targeting people who visit our blog. As you can see above, you can target a date range, give it a name, and you’re ready to get started.

5. Get your pixel code and place it on your website

If you don’t already have pixel (tracking) code on your website, you’ll need it in order to start retargeting.

What is pixel code? It’s the code that you’ll need to put on your website to track visitors. Why is it called pixel code? The code will place a tiny 1×1 pixel on your website that is transparent and can’t be seen. It allows the visitors to your site to be tracked. By knowing they’ve seen the pixel, you know they’ve been to a particular page of your website or have taken a particular action.

Here’s how to get the code: In your Audiences section of Ads Manager, you’ll find your new retargeting campaign. Select it, and then click on Actions and click View Panel in the dropdown menu, as you see below.

You’ll then get your pixel base code (we’ve blurred ours in the image below, but this is where you’ll get it), which you can place on your website if you’re capable, or have your developer put it in there.

And now you’re ready to go!

Making your retargeting campaigns successful

In order to get the most out of your retargeting campaigns you’ll have to make sure that you’re getting your audience’s attention, and giving them a good reason to get back into your purchase funnel.

Start by planning your campaign! What is it that you want to do? Do you want to retarget those who got to the purchase page, but didn’t go any further? Maybe someone checked out a certain pair of shoes on your website, but didn’t make a purchase. You could retarget these folks with an ad offering a discount, or free shipping.

Once you know what to do, create an ad that will catch the eye of your audience and get their attention.

These are just the basics, but you’ve got a great spot to get started from. Once you start running your ads, make sure that you’re A/B testing to find which ads work the best, and keep testing, testing, testing