Audience targeting is the Golden Goose of Facebook. 

Salon owners, here’s a wakeup call… there are salons mastering customers targeting right now.

They are using Facebook and Instagram ads to target potential new customers… and their existing customers. 

Which salon is a potential customer going to choose?

  • The one that keeps popping up on social media with great ads and offers to entice them in?
  • The salon that through well constructed and strategic targeting delivers potential customers exactly what they want to know more about?
  • The salon that offers value and wants to build a relationship?

This is what using targeting correctly can achieve. It’s called retargeting and is the best place to start when you want to throw some money at Facebook. Because it can be scary, right? … pushing the button to start paying to advertise your business. Hairdressing college never taught us how to market our business. Just how to do great hair.

But, it is the salons that are using this strategy that are killing it these days.

Let me ask you… how do your existing customers feel when ads are coming up on their feed luring them to a bright, beautiful salon with an irresistible offer?

It’s time to learn some ninja tips so you can play wisely with your social media marketing too!

Facebook audience targeting gives businesses, like salons, the ability to target ads and posts to people they want to see them based on their behaviour with their page or website. 

Now, there are also targeting options for finding new people who do not know about you, but in this blog, we are paying attention to creating audiences from people’s behaviour with your social pages or your website.

Even if you are just posting and boosting posts, you can now choose audiences to see them that have shown some type of previous engagement with your pages or website.

If you are using Ads Manager, and we strongly recommend that you do, the possibilities are limitless for really delivering the right message to the right customer at the right time, and that means getting your message to the people that matter most… qualified potential customers.

Facebook has made targeting relevant audiences easy with Audiences

This means you can create audiences to target from…

  • People who have watched one of your videos
  • People who have seen your Lead Ads 
  • People who have engaged somehow by commenting, sharing or clicking a CTA (Call to Action) on your ads or posts
  • People who have messaged or visited your page

This is an incredible tool for salon businesses. We can create Facebook and Instagram audiences, plus create Website Custom Audiences to use for our targeting.

If you want to get down to attracting customers with Facebook and Instagram posts, then our Facebook Post/Ad Templates is for you. Join the Social Hub and get your copy here…

Setting up Facebook Ads Manager

Once you have done that, follow along step-by-step to create some audience targeting magic.

  • Go to Business or Ads Manager
  • Click ‘Audiences’
  • Click ‘Create Audience’
  • Select ‘Custom Audience’
  • A lightbox will appear. Click ‘Engagement’
  • Then, another lightbox will show. Here, you choose the engagement that you would like to make an audience from.

Some points to consider when creating audiences

When you create these audiences, you can choose the time frame that is suited to your promotion. Page Views has a maximum of 365 days, Video Views has a maximum of 180 days.

Say you want to target people that have liked, commented or shared a post from a 14-day window when you bosted a post or ran an ad for a particular offer.

Make an audience with that time frame and run a follow-up offer showing it only to that ‘warmer audience’ so that they can see more details on the offer.

They engaged with you once, so we know that they have shown interest and might like some more exposure to you before making a commitment to buy. Currently, you cannot choose a specific post to create an audience from. However, you can choose specific videos to create audiences.

PRO TIP #1: If you have collected the emails of people who have successfully taken an offer, you can also make a Custom Audience excluding them from seeing it again in saved audiences.

Creating fantastic retargeting audiences

  • Choose the audience you want to select from the drop-down menu.
  • Then, select the time frame you want to target.

You can now also refine further by adding exclusions and refinements of other actions taken. You can get very granular with this and a get a bunch of very, very hot prospects.

  • Name the audience something that reflects the characteristics, then click ‘Create Audience’.

Video Views Audiences

Create audiences for how long a specific video or group of videos was viewed. This gives you audiences of the least and most engaged people.

  • Choose the % or seconds viewed.
  • Next, select the video or group of videos you want to measure.
  • Click ‘Choose Videos’.
  • A box will appear where you can check one or a group of videos.
  • Click ‘Confirm’ and a thumbnail will show for the selected video. 
  • Select the days. 
  • Name the audience so you can identify the video(s) you selected and the days. 

Boom. You have an audience of people who have watched a % of a promotional video and now you can send them another post or ad that they are very likely to watch.

The possibilities are endless…

  • To get the right copy and image to the people who watched more of your video
  • To develop relationships with enagaging, relevant content
  • To showcase your business to prospective customers. 

You can choose retargeting ads that represent the quality of their interest.

  • 75% – 95% Video Views could be ready to seen an offer
  • 50% Video Views could respond better to another video or a boosted post about your salon or spa’s work
  • 25% – 50% Video Views might engage again with more content or another video similar to the one they originally watched. 

Think about what the content was that you boosted, or the video ad you created in the first instance.

There are so many options and scenarios here. Just try to think of how your Facebook posts and ads are viewed and by who, and then what you would like them to see next.

Website Custom Audiences

You can segment by how much content is consumed, or how much time is spent on your site. These audiences are excellent targeting options.

It requires you to have the Facebook Pixel installed on your site. If you can’t do this yourself, get someone to do it for you and start collecting these audiences now.

Imagine if you could send a colour post to all the people that went your colour pricing page, or wedding photos to people who looked up your wedding prices.

The thing is, salons are doing this now and you know which business the customer is going to choose? The one that stays at the top of their mind.

Let’s see how these work so you can create audiences for your targeting today.

Just posting and boosting without targeting really is just throwing something at the wall and hoping it will stick.

When boosting from your page…

  • Click the ‘Boost’ button
  • The audience will show up under audience
  • Choose the audience you created
  • Choose your budget and duration
  • Then click ‘Submit’

When using Ads Manager…

  • Create a Campaign
  • Choose a Campaign Objective
  • In the Ad Set level, you will find the audience you created. 
  • Select and continue to create your ad.

Over to you

Targeting Engagement Audiences on Facebook is very exciting if you want to engage relevant audiences that are likely to become your customers.

But remember, they came to see your posts originally, so retargeting them with more relevant engaging content that they like will help build the relationship online and encourage them to take you up on your offers.

Don’t be shy in showcasing your salon, team and work so they get to know you better.

Website Custom Audiences require you to have the Facebook Pixel installed on your website. This is well worth doing as the optjons become so much better when you can exclude, include and layer in these audiences with your Engagement Audiences too.

PRO TIP #2: Use these Engagement Audiences to create ‘Lookalike’ Audiences. 

Send ads and posts to them. Then make Engagement Audiences and off you go again with another more engaged, relevant audience. 

Create Custom Audiences for your salon database so you can exclude them the paid advertising if the content is not suited to them. This will keep your costs down and keep your audiences purer.

If you want to Build an Online Presence That Gets Your Salon Noticed

Join the Social Hub

There are Blogging & Branding Checklists so you can craft your salon’s brand for success, Facebook Post/Ad Templates to take the hassle out of your social media posts this week, and an Ideal Customer Worksheet to help you uncover who you want to notice your salon online.

Click here to learn more…