Tell me what I want to hear...

I filled in my profile information on Facebook the other day. I sign up on so many social networks that I want to see how they work and what they have to offer before I invest time in such things.

Anyways, it was worth it. I immediately noticed a change in the ads delivered to me. I almost exclusively get Ads from Sandles now, you know the beach resort people. I don't have 'travel' in my profile but I must fit their age category or education profile. Who knows, but I dig it.

I also get adds for Hampton Inns, Citi Bank, Monster.com, and Tivo.

We have been talking about targeting ads based on self-maintained user profiles for years. It is just nice to see it finally here and working. And, it really is almost all I'd hoped for.

I actually care now. Yes, I'm in the biz and probably not typical about these matters but I do find myself checking the ads out much more. They are relevant to ME. It's not about some keyword I'm searching Google for. It's not about some demo or pyschographic data Nielsen or comScore said depicts the "typical" visitor to the site. IT IS ACTUALLY ME!

I told Facebook what I'm in to and Facebook listened and is hooking me up with people promoting stuff that makes since and that I care about.

And you have got to check out Facebook Insights. You can setup a completely targeted campaign in literally two minutes.

Comments

[Joe Cox]

Hey, thanks for this submission. I know that I will for sure be paying a lot more attention to how I'm being advertised to inside my social networks.