Meta hasn’t given up on B2B marketing budgets
When it comes to B2B advertising, the first platform that probably comes to mind is LinkedIn, and that makes sense. None of the other platforms provides as many targeting possibilities as LinkedIn, when it comes to reaching key decision makers in a professional setting. But Meta wants this to change.
Even though B2B ad budgets typically account for less than 10% of the total media spend in any country, the value of B2B advertising in the US alone is estimated to reach $15 billion in 2023. With the mission of providing B2B marketers more attractive options to drive business-to-business engagement, and establish a connection with their clients, Meta recently released a new set of B2B audience segments for targeting.
Now, when creating a campaign, you can access the following targeting options on Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, and WhatsApp to drive meaningful outcomes:
- IT decision-makers: a B2B audience segment that targets ads to people who are IT decision makers, based on their job titles.
- Business decision-maker titles and interests: a B2B audience segment that targets ads to people who are business decision-makers, based on their job titles and interests.
- Business decision-makers: a B2B audience segment that targets ads to people who are business decision-makers in engineering/IT, operations, HR, strategy or marketing, based on their job titles.
- New active business: admins of engaged businesses that were created in the last 6, 12 or 24 months. (Note: This reflects 3 segments, with one for each timeframe.)
B2B advertisers have long suffered LinkedIn’s typically high CPCs. Many of these businesses opt for SEO instead, but organic search traffic isn’t always accountable and reliable. If Meta can provide higher quality B2B audiences at lower prices, they could pose a serious threat to LinkedIn, since user activity on Facebook & Instagram is much higher than on LinkedIn. However, professional audience quality has been a challenge for Meta, since users often lie or just don’t provide accurate professional qualifications and details on the network.
If Meta’s algorithms can accurately identify the above target audiences, they could provide a much-needed alternative to LinkedIn advertising for B2B.
