Facebook unveils visual search, location-based ad tools (FB)

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Facebook built on its existing location-based and Canvas advertising offerings by introducing two ad tools that should help marketers reach their intended audience and drive e-commerce sales.

The location-based ad tool allows advertisers to target users based on their offline activities including visits to brick-and-mortar stores, in-store purchases, and calls to businesses. These build on Facebook tools that let advertisers measure offline conversion — that's vital data, given that e-commerce represented just 8.5% of retail sales in Q1 2017.

This allows Facebook to capitalize on the growth of location-based advertising,which is projected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 40% from 2016 to 2021, according to Technavio.
The release of the tool also reflects the growing number of companies emphasizing location based-advertising services. Snap acquired Placed, whose technology tracks how effective digital ads were in driving consumers to stores, while Yelp recently made location data available to advertisers to create targeted audiences, for example.

The visual search tool is designed to help turn Facebook into more of a product-discovery platform. It's a new Canvas “Collection” ad template — canvas ads are full-screen ads that can contain videos and calls to action — that features a collection of images with tagged products available for purchase. Facebook plans on building out its marketplace section, which would also help its goal of becoming a product discovery platform.

Shoppable photo tags are becoming increasingly popular among digital platforms. For example, Pinterest rolled out a feature that tags products within photos to allow for user purchasing, which is, in essence, the same as Facebook’s new Canvas ad template offering. Additionally, Instagram started testing shoppable photo tags with certain brands in November 2016. Shoppable photo tags will likely become more prominent as users increasingly post and engage with photo posts on Facebook, and as the camera becomes an increasingly prominent factor of social platforms.

Kevin Gallagher, research analyst for BI Intelligence, Business Insider's premium research service, has compiled a detailed report on ad tech that:

Forecasts US programmatic revenue through 2020.
Highlights the factors driving consolidation, and identifies new acquirers and attractive targets.
Explores the challenges ad tech companies face including the dominance of walled gardens, ad blocking and measurement.
Outlines emerging technologies that will help propel ad growth in the next decade.

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