How to use Facebook to target niche groups
Benjamin Mullin, Poynter Institute,For its popular Best College lists, U.S. News wanted to reach college alumni who identified strongly with their natural audience. So the company’s social media editor turned to Facebook to target the lists to the followers of the top five schools on the list, and for different lists and colleges. The efforts resulted in higher referrals and engagement than usual, according to this piece that examined how publishers were using Facebook’s interest targeting tool.
Facebook’s internal numbers point to a higher rate of engagement for posts that are interest targeted, too. Data provided by Facebook at the time pointed to interest targeted posts receiving about 290 percent more likes per impression, 79 percent more comments per impression and 54 percent more shares per impression than non-targeted posts.