Starting January 2022, Facebook Advertising Will Change

Facebook Advertising

Social media managers will be anxious after reading the title! But, nothing much to worry, only some targeting options in Facebook advertising will change starting January 19th, 2022.

In the words of Facebook –

“Starting January 19, 2022 we will remove Detailed Targeting options that relate to topics people may perceive as sensitive, such as options referencing causes, organizations, or public figures that relate to health, race or ethnicity, political affiliation, religion, or sexual orientation.”

What are the changes in Facebook advertising?

In simple words, starting January 2022, you won’t be able to target people based on sensitive topics like health, race, etc.

For example, now when you do facebook advertising and choose detailed targeting options, you see something like this –

Facebook advertising

In the picture above, just by typing Politics, you can see that Facebook advertising shows you a lot of detailed targeting options. This is going to change. You won’t be able to niche or general targeting on these topics.

Further, facebook advertising will not allow you to target a specific niche related to any of the above categories. Means, while doing Facebook advertising, you cannot target your ads based on topics like ‘ World Diabetes Day’

Well, this surely means that thousands of detailed targeting options will be removed!

Why such change in Facebook advertising?

Under the EU’s more stringent consumer data protection laws (GDPR), Facebook technically can’t legally target users based on these parameters without explicit consent from each individual. That law came into effect in 2018, and Facebook has been battling it ever since, but with the broader, global shift towards more privacy, and more data control for users, it seems Facebook has now opted to concede the point, and align with the more specific regulations on such.

Facebook says that existing ad sets with impacted targeting options will continue to run until Mar 17, 2022, though you may need to update your targeting selections at some stage. Facebook also says that it will provide alternative targeting recommendations within Ads Manager where possible. 


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