Why am I seeing ads from an advertiser on Facebook?
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We want the ads you see on Facebook to be personalized to your interests and to introduce you to new things. Here are some of the factors we might consider to show you ads.
Your activity on Meta technologies
Some of your activity across the Meta Products
may help us show you ads that we think you might be interested in. Your activity on Meta technologies might include:
Pages on Facebook you've liked.
Ads you’ve clicked on.
Content you create or interact with across Facebook and Instagram.
Places you’ve checked in to using Facebook.
Liking a post.
Your activity off Meta technologies
Your activity off Meta technologies is based on activity that businesses and organizations share with us about your interactions with them, such as visiting their apps or websites. This information is then shared with us via our Business Tools
. We then use this information to do things like give you a more personalized experience on Facebook.
You can review and manage this information in your activity off Meta technologies
. And, you can choose whether we use this information to show you ads in your activity information from ad partners setting
.
Advertiser choices
Advertisers want to connect with people they think will enjoy their products, so they make choices about who to show their ads to. The information about who an advertiser chooses to show their ads to can be found in the "Advertiser choices" section of “Why am I seeing this ad?”
.
A few things advertisers could use that help them show you more personalized ads:
Profile information
. Your age, location or other information you provide on your profile. If you haven’t selected a gender, we may show you ads associated with a gender. Gender may be based on inferences from your profile and activity. We limit the options advertisers can use to show ads to teens
.
Interests and categories.
Some information you provide us, combined with your activity on or off Meta technologies, may help us think you’re interested in something, like cooking or fitness, or that you might be part of a larger group (called a category), like a mobile user. We can use your interests and categories to connect you with businesses who we think you might be interested in and advertisers can choose to include people with specific interests or who belong to certain categories of people in their audiences.
Lookalike audiences.
A lookalike audience is a way for advertisers to use Facebook to reach people that may be similar to people that have already shown an interest in their business. We use some of the things you do or information you give us to help create lookalike audiences.
For example, an advertiser might tell us they’d like to show ads to people who may be similar to people who are already interested in their business (such as people who’ve liked their Page or visited their website). We match things like the interests or demographics (example: your city) of the people who are already interested in the business to help show ads to other people that we think might be interested in the advertiser’s business or products.
Custom audiences
. Custom audiences are a way for advertisers to show their ads to a group of people who may have already interacted with their business. A few ways we help advertisers make Custom audiences:
Your activity on a business’s website or app. Advertisers can choose to add our Business Tools, like the Meta Pixel
or Facebook SDK
, to their website or app. These tools allow the advertiser to send information about people's interactions on their website or app to Facebook, such as when someone makes a purchase or opens their app. This helps us show you ads that we think may be interesting to you.
Lists from a business. Advertisers may get information from you (like your email address) when you interact with them outside of Facebook, like if you make a purchase in their store or create an account for a rewards program. They can create a hashed list
with that information and upload it to Facebook. We can match users using the list to help the advertiser reach people who may be interested in their business and without Facebook learning any new identifying information about you. If you see another company using a list for an advertiser, it's likely because the advertiser is working with an advertising agency. For example, if Company X hires Agency Y to run its ads, Agency Y would upload its own list to Facebook and Company X would use that list to show you ads.
Offline activity
. Offline activity is activity you may do in a store, like make a purchase. If a business gives us this information, we can use it to help show their ads to people who may be interested in their business. We can also help businesses reach the right people by letting them know if their customers have engaged with their ads on Facebook or other Meta technologies.
Location information:
We may use your location information to show you ads from advertisers trying to reach people in or near a specific place. We get this information from things such as:
Where you connect to the internet.
Where you use your phone.
Your location from your Facebook and Instagram profile.
How machine learning helps us provide insight into why you saw an ad
We use machine learning models
that mirror our ads delivery models to provide the insights found in “Why am I seeing this ad?” These models create and surface how certain activity both on and off Meta technologies contributed to Facebook showing you a particular ad.
For example, activities such as liking a post, clicking on an ad, or activity on websites, apps and products sent to us from advertisers can all contribute to why you’re seeing an ad. Meta’s use of your activity off Meta technologies depends on your ad settings. While these insights don’t represent all the factors contributing to delivering an ad, we use them to provide you with an informative and understandable view into some of the factors that contributed to why you saw an ad.
Ways to review and manage your information:
Customize your Ad preferences
to see ads that are more relevant to you. From there, you can update your ad settings
to control things like if we show you ads based on your use of apps and websites off Meta technologies. You can also update your ad preferences from Accounts Center
.
Hide an ad
that isn't interesting or useful to you or review why you're seeing a particular ad
.
Update your profile settings
and walk through Privacy Checkup
to make sure you're sharing your information with who you want.
Visit Access your information
to see and manage your Facebook information, or learn how to download your Facebook information for review
.
To learn more about the information we receive and how we use it, visit our Privacy Policy
and Cookies Policy
.
