Take FB Ads Targeting With a grain of salt (or ten)

This is a cautionary tale about how wrong Facebook Ads targeting can be sometimes. Everything, and I mean everything you do with FB ads demographic targeting should be taken with a grain of salt. Make that 200,000 grains of salt. Here’s why!
So I have a client. That client wanted me to advertise to US students between the ages of 17–22, with an interest in college. When I was setting up the ad, I was a little surprised that Facebook Ads Manager indicated there were only 220,000 17–22-year-olds in the US in the estimated potential reach. I hadn’t yet got to the detailed targeting part of filtering to people with an interest in college.
What I didn’t realize is that I still had a previously selected “detailed target” demographic in the “Narrow Audience” field, from a previously saved audience, of “Parents (with children aged 18–26).”
Say what?? So Facebook seems to think there are 220,000 17–22-year-olds in the US who are also “Parents with children aged between 18–26.” hmmm. Don’t believe me, go into FB Ads Manager and do the same demographic settings I just mentioned. Or just check out this screen-shot below:






​​Once I got rid of this erroneous narrowing. Added in the “interested in college” narrowing — the actual estimated potential reach was more like 4,800,000. Whew, wouldn’t wanna target any college age kids with college aged kids now would I!

Ever had a weird FB Ads targeting blooper? Share below.

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