Facebook To Allow Advertisers To Target Users By Their Location

Facebook will soon allow advertisers to target users based on their most recent location, the social networking giant announced Tuesday. The new service, dubbed “local awareness ads,” is expected to make advertising for local businesses easier and more effective.

The ads, which will target Facebook users within a mile from a particular advertiser, will be targeted at users who have allowed the Facebook mobile application to access their location, the company said in a blog post. According to Facebook, the company's system will use data about users' location to help businesses reach out to people who are located nearby or were recently near a particular business. Advertisers will also be able to see the kind of reach their ads will have.

“With local awareness ads, businesses can quickly and easily find new customers by showing ads to groups of people who are near that business’s neighborhood,” Facebook said in the blog post.

Facebook has introduced several products this year designed to help marketers target consumers more effectively. Last week, the company unveiled a people-based marketing service, which allows advertisers to know if a user has seen their ad, Bloomberg reported.

Facebook also assured users that their private information will remain safe and will not be misused.

“Facebook does not tell advertisers which specific people are in any audience and, as with our other advertising products, all audiences must meet a minimum required size,” the company said in the blog post. “People have control over the recent location information they share with Facebook and will only see ads based on their location if location services are enabled on their phone.”

The social networking giant was recently rumored to unveil a new advertising platform to improve the way marketers target users on its social networking website. The new platform, dubbed “Atlas,” was expected to help marketers track Facebook users who have seen, interacted or acted upon ads found on the social network as well as on third-party websites and apps, the Wall Street Journal reported.