Study: Target outside North America to engage Facebook users

The big takeaway from a new study looking at advertising and Facebook: brands are staying too close to home with their targeting. According to new data out from Marin Software brands should consider thinking more globally when it comes to Facebook targeting - since a growing number of the social networks users are outside the US, Mexico and Canada.

by Kristina Knight

Marin Software researchers studied how advertisers are using Facebook to engage with - and advertise - to consumers. Their findings: while about 85% of Facebookers are living outside North America barely half of the ad dollars are targeted outside the region.

"The increasing competition to reach Facebook's North American users has driven CPMs for these ads dramatically higher - yet the cost of ads targeting the 'other 85%' of Facebook users remains quite low," said Matt Ackley, Chief Marketing Officer at Marin Software. "Now is a golden opportunity for brands to launch impactful, cost-effective campaigns internationally - before competition and CPMs rise."

Other interesting findings from the report include:

• Asia-Pacific has the highest volume of Facebookers but only receives 11% of ad dollars
• Latin American Facebookers show the highest rates of ad engagement around the globe
• 66% of Latin Americans are online
• Latin American click-thru rates are 33% higher than North American and 54% higher than Western European

According to data from comScore, mobile is driving much of the social network growth; their data shows that social networking increased 43% for EU5 countries (March 2011 vs. March 2012) with Facebook seeing 51% growth. Their statistics also show a whopping 94% of New Zealanders are accessing social media while about 90% of Danes are doing the same.

Image via Shutterstock

Tags: comScore, facebook ads, facebook targeting, Marin Software, social ads, social marketing