Facebook is making it easier for marketers to engage with offline audiences after rolling out new features on Thursday. Brands will now be able to build custom audiences and re-target customers who have interacted with them in some form in physical stores, call centres and via other offline channels.
Facebook said that its offline conversion tool has been popular with enterprises since it was launched in 2016. It allows marketers to measure how their creative videos and ad campaigns impact on purchases made offline. There will now be a new custom audience option so that marketers can attempt to engage with people who have, for example, made a call to a business’ office or completed an in-store product purchase.
Facebook revealed in an official blog post that two thirds of people now prefer to shop with retailers that have a history of their previous interactions and purchases, so the latest changes should increase customer retention and loyalty while empowering brands to deliver content to consumers whom they may have previously been unable to reach consistently.
“Facebook’s store visits reporting helped us show an increase in restaurant traffic and higher sales during our Facebook campaign,” KFC’s US Director of Media and Digital, Steve Kelly, said. “Some campaigns have shown a cost per store visit ranging from $0.50-$2.00. Understanding the impact of our Facebook ads on foot traffic is putting us ahead of the curve from others in the industry in terms of proving ROI.”
Marketers can also use the new tools to create “lookalike” audiences who share similar habits and characteristics with their most prolific offline customers. Advertisers eligible for reporting about recent offline store visits can use the data to attempt to re-engage with audiences through content campaigns as well. Facebook said that “most sales” still happen offline, so it’s important that brands know how to engage with consumers effectively.
Dick’s Sporting Goods’ Vice President of Media, Tom Hassett, added: “Now, with store visits custom audiences, we re-engaged customers who had visited one of our stores with a targeted Facebook ad at a profitable Omni-ROAS. And, using lookalike audiences created from people similar to those who visited our store, opened up a broader audience of new customers for us to reach, driving incremental foot traffic and sales.”
