3 Ways to Use First Party Data in Paid Social

With the deprecation of 3rd party cookies and other tracking technologies, marketers are looking more toward their first party data to optimize ads and create more efficient spend. When it comes to Facebook, here are three ways you can leverage your first party data.

Please consult your legal counsel before you use any first party data in marketing. This is not an article recommending how you should use first party data, rather it is an article outlining the ways that you could use first party data.

Offline Conversions

Offline Conversions for Facebook was a feature released in 2016 as ‘Offline Events’ that allows you to better measure the impact of your Facebook campaigns by importing – you guessed it – offline conversions. 

There are two ways to take advantage of offline conversions. First, you can manually upload your first party data as a new data source in the Events Manager section of Facebook. 

The second way to employ Offline Conversions is to automate your Offline Conversions through the use of an API or by using a partner integration, such as Square, LiveRamp, Marketo, and Segment/Twilio, among many others. Originally the Offline Conversions API was recommended, however now Facebook recommends using the Conversions API.

Facebook provides slightly more transparency than Google’s Offline Conversions in that Facebook allows you to see the split between online and offline conversions generated by your campaign. In contrast, Google groups both sets of conversions into one bucket.

First Party Data You Can Use: 

  • Email
  • Phone
  • First Name
  • Last Name
  • External ID
  • Gender
  • Birthdate
  • Geo Information (City, State, Zip Code) 

Examples of How to Use This Data: 

  • Understand Offline ROAS
  • Use data with audience targeting to expand your reach
  • Use data with audience targeting to exclude existing customers from your campaigns
  • Use data with audience targeting to upsell or cross-sell existing customers
  • Optimize ads and campaigns

Source: https://www.facebook.com/business/learn/facebook-offline-conversions

Advanced Matching

In 2016 Facebook released Advanced Matching, a new way to better understand the customers you’re reaching with your Facebook ads. Facebook’s Advanced Matching has some overlap with Offline Conversions in that they both work off first party data to better identify which users converted from your ads, but it’s important to note that they’re not dependent on each other. Whereas offline conversions are additional events you send to Facebook, advanced matching simply augments the events you already send with first party data. 

There are two ways to implement Advanced Matching. The first option is manual. This doesn’t require you to adjust any settings in Facebook, rather you modify the pixel itself. When you modify the pixel, you can include any one of Facebook’s first party fields, such as email or phone number, and map user inputs from forms to automatically populate these fields with those values. Manual Advanced Matching is appealing to some marketers because it doesn’t come with the same industry restrictions as Automatic Advanced Matching.

Much like Offline Conversions, you’ll control Automatic Advanced Matching by going into Facebook’s Events Manager. Since you’re not adding additional data sources, you’ll click on the name and ID of your existing data sources. Name and ID often refer to the Name and ID of your pixel, since that’s the primary data source your Facebook business account has. From there, visit the settings tab (again, because this is just an additional feature of already collected events) and turn on Automatic Advanced Matching.

Automatic Advanced Matching is appealing to some advertisers because it doesn’t require any code modification. Instead, Facebook automatically detects form fields on your website, such as those associated with log-in, registration, or purchase activity. From there, Facebook collects the field inputs and includes them with the events you’re already sending to Facebook. Facebook promises to not collect sensitive information, such as passwords or health data.

Ultimately Facebook recommends utilizing both methods of advanced matching, as Automatic Advanced Matching can collect more data, but Manual Advanced Matching doesn’t encounter the same limitations with technology (pixels deployed in an iframe or via an IMG pixel) or industries.

First Party Data You Can Use: 

  • Email
  • Phone
  • First Name
  • Last Name
  • External ID
  • Gender
  • Birthdate
  • Geo Information (City, State, Zip Code) 

Examples of How to Use This Data: 

  • Better understand cross-device conversions (if someone sees your ad on one device and fills out a form from another)
  • Better understand user behavior even when said user is logged out on Facebook.
  • Optimize ads and campaigns
  • More accurate targeting – increase your Custom Audience size by matching website visitors to Meta users

Source: https://www.facebook.com/business/help/611774685654668?id=1205376682832142

Audiences

In order to improve targeting, since 2012 Facebook has allowed advertisers to create audiences. Facebook offers three types of audiences: Custom Audiences, Lookalike Audiences, and a Saved Audience. 

Custom Audiences include people who have previously interacted with your business in one of many ways. The most common sources of Custom Audiences are below:

  1. Website: People who have interacted with your website, as determined by the Meta pixel installed on your website.
  2. Customer List: A list of your existing customers; this can include first party data as listed below.
  3. Offline Activity: A list of people who have interacted with your business through offline channels (this was mentioned in the above section).
  4. App Activity: People who have interacted with your app
  5. Meta Activity: People who have interacted with your assets on Meta, such as videos, Facebook or Instagram pages, or lead forms.

From any of those Custom Audiences, you can build a Lookalike Audience. Unlike Custom Audiences, Lookalike Audiences include people who aren’t yet your customer, but you want them to be. By mirroring the interests, demographics, and behaviors of people uploaded with your Custom Audience, Facebook can find you people who are more likely to convert. This feature can be amplified with Facebook’s new “Advantage Custom Audience,” “Advantage Lookalikes,” and “Advantage Detailed Targeting.”

Please note, Facebook has contradictory information on which Custom Audiences can be used as source audiences for Lookalike Audiences. In the instructions for creating a Lookalike Audience in Ads Manager, they mention that a Lookalike Audience cannot be created with pixel, app, or Meta engagement data: https://www.facebook.com/business/help/465262276878947?id=401668390442328. In their article detailing what a Source Audience is, they list no such limitation: https://www.facebook.com/business/help/475669712534537.

As with any advertising platform, the more first party data you upload, the better your targeting will be. Facebook mentions that the source audience must contain at least 100 people, but 1,000 to 50,000 is recommended. People in these lists are excluded from being targeted in your Lookalike Audiences.

First Party Data You Can Use: 

  • Email
  • Phone
  • Mobile App Identifier (IDFA, AAID)
  • First Name
  • Last Name
  • External ID
  • Gender
  • Birthdate
  • Geo Information (City, State, Zip Code) 

Examples of How to Use This Data: 

  • Expand your reach with Lookalike Audiences
  • Exclude existing customers from your campaigns
  • Upsell or cross-sell existing customers

Summary

If you’re considering using first party data with Facebook Ads, you can take advantage of Facebook’s Advanced Matching, Offline Conversions, and Audience features.