Businesses want to promote their products to the right people; that’s a given. Certainly, you could create different ads for different buyers, but when you have an entire catalog of products, it can be a challenge. Facebook solves this with its Dynamic Product Ads, which give retailers a way to serve ads based on a specific product someone viewed on the advertiser’s website or app. Advertisers are able to upload their products and create a Dynamic Ad template within a Facebook ad account. The Facebook pixel can capture when specific product IDs from a catalog are viewed, added to a cart or purchased. Then the specific ad is served.

“The top feedback and most common type of feedback that we hear is, “Hey, can you help me drive sales beyond people visiting my website and app, including new customers?” said Maz Sharafi, director of product marketing at Facebook. “What we can now do is say, “Who else is potentially in-market for these products?” Dynamic Ads are becoming even more powerful for retailers as Facebook expands the targeting to other brands’ websites and apps. For example, someone who has been looking for a new pair of boots on one website could be served an ad from a competing website that sells boots. This means that Dynamic Ads are no longer just a retargeting tactic but an acquisition tool that allows brands to automatically serve a product ad to shoppers based on their behaviors and interests.

Is Facebook’s Dynamic Ad offering creating an unfair advantage for larger retailers? Not necessarily. Facebook’s algorithm will use signals to find a larger audience for each brand’s products and optimize for people who are likely to buy their product. It is automating a process to reach a larger pool of interested shoppers with one Dynamic Ad instead of manually creating hundreds of ads for each product. This creates an advantage for all retailers looking to reach new customers beyond their own prospects.