How Will the Discontinuation of Facebook Partner Categories Affect Car Dealers?

As of May 25, Facebook’s Partner Categories targeting options are unavailable in the EU, meaning that the way businesses advertise on the social media platform has changed. If your dealership advertises on Facebook or is considering doing so, here is what you need to know about this recent change.

With Partner Categories, advertisers would be able to use third-party data to target users. In the wake of the new GDPR regulations, along with the Cambridge Analytica scandal, Facebook has made the decision to remove this feature, in an attempt to better protect people’s privacy on the social media site.

What were Partner Categories?

When you create an ad set on Facebook, you are given ‘Detailed Targeting’ options. Here, you can choose which users will you’re your advert, filtering them by demographics, interests and behaviours.

A lot of this personal user information used to be provided by third-party companies, and the targeting options were referred to as ‘Partner Categories’. The data provided by Facebook’s partners could be very thorough, revealing things like whether or not a user was a homeowner, a parent, a credit card holder, a business traveller. This information was useful for helping advertisers to ensure that their adverts were only being shown to consumers that their product or service was relevant to.

What is the Point of Targeting?

Traditional forms of advertising, such as television, radio and billboard adverts, involve broadcasting promotional material to the masses, in the hopes that consumers who are interested will get in touch, whereas Facebook adverts use a Pay-Per-Click (PPC) model.

This means that businesses will only pay when someone takes action on their adverts that appear on the site. If everyone sees an ad, it is likely that a number of people will click on it, even if they are not open to making a purchase because the product or service is unsuited to them. Advertisers will have to a pay a fee for these clicks, which is a waste of money.

This is where targeting is useful, because it allows you to refine your audience so that your adverts are only seen by people for whom they are relevant. For example, if an estate agency wanted to advertise a particular new listing for sale on Facebook that was well-suited to new buyers, they would be able to select ‘first-time homeowners’ as a Partner Category.

What has Changed?

Facebook has officially stopped delivering to Partner Categories formed on audiences from the UK and these targeting options are no longer available. This aims to better protect peoples’ privacy on the social media site and results from the new GDPR regulations and the recent Cambridge Analytica scandal.

How is this Change Relevant to Car Dealers?

Another target audience which could have been specified from data provided by Facebook’s partners, is people in the market for a car. If you were selling a prestige saloon, you could have targeted a corporate executive audience, if you were selling an MPV, you could have specified users who were parents, if you specialise in a particular make, you could have filtered users who had owned a car from the that make. This is no longer the case.

What Should You Do if Your Dealership is Affected?

It is easy to get caught up in Facebook’s intelligent targeting software and overlook the simplest way to attract the right audience, which is to create a tailored advert to begin with! To do this, you will need to think about who will be interested in what you are selling.

Use your common knowledge, existing customer data, and information from studies to create a buyer persona, listing the demographics and psychographic attributes of your average customer. Keep this persona in mind when you create your advert and this should help you gain interest from people who are likely to convert. For example, if you are creating an advert for a Rolls Royce, your target audience is likely to be wealthy, and may also be interested in yachting, art and brands like Louis Vuitton and Rolex.

Using Facebook’s split testing feature is a great way to create an effective advert. This allows you to run different versions of your adverts, so that you can measure the number of clicks and conversions they receive and determine which strategies produce the best results.

Retargeting is also a great option. This involves setting your ads to appear to users who have previously visited your website. This method of advertising has excellent rates of success, due to the fact that the people being targeted have already expressed interest in your product and brand.

To speak to Joe about running your dealership’s Facebook account or for more information on how Click Dealer’s team of in-house social media specialists can help you with social media marketing, get in touch today via marketing@clickdealer.co.uk, 01782 478220 or through our contact page!