MAU [Talk]
MAU [Talk]
Ep. 008 Facebook Marketing Partners
Late last year in December 2020, Adam sat down with Liron Wand, Director Marketing Partnerships, North America, to discuss how strategic partnerships are helping commerce brands future-proof their businesses. To learn more about how strategic partnerships are enabling brands to champion the future of commerce, visit Facebook’s partner directory at www.facebook.com/business/partner-directory.
Hey guys! Welcome to MAU [Talk]. An new podcast from MAU Vegas, the premier mobile acquisition and retention summit. Today, Adam sits down with Liron Wand, Director of Marketing Partnerships, North America at Facebook, to discuss how strategic partnerships are helping commerce brands future proof their businesses. Take it away, Adam.
Adam Lovallo:Okay, welcome to the podcast. Liron from Facebook is here. Another one of the Facebook mini series of MAU[Talk], excited to have her. So yeah, please introduce yourself, and we'll get right into it.
Liron Wand:Great. Well, thanks, Adam. I'm really excited to be here. Thank you so much for having me. So, a little bit about myself. I am part of Facebook's marketing partnerships organization, and I lead the teams in North America and Latin America. We support third party platforms across ad tech, creative, signals, messaging, and commerce. Prior to Facebook, I worked at Kenshoo, Google, and Ruelala. And I'd say that what really kind of is a common thread in my career has been helping retailers and brands succeed online. So really excited to be here today. I know we have a lot to cover. Some of the areas that I would love to dive into, are really about the future of commerce. And more specifically, with the pandemic and the shift to online how shopping has changed, how strategic partnerships are really crucial to navigating these changes. And lastly, would love to share with your listeners how they can future proof their business with some of our commerce solutions.
Adam Lovallo:I love it. Okay, well, yeah, I mean, I am. I can't keep track of the stats, but it's you know, e-commerce growth is not 20%. It's 40%. Whatever. Like half of my LinkedIn feed at the moment. But it's real. I mean, that's for real. I've been in a store and forever here in Brooklyn. Um, so it's perfect timing. Okay. All right. So let's start there. So COVID, you know, obviously has accelerated e-commerce growth, not just in the US, but globally. So completely changed the way I shop personally. Like, 100% of my purchases are now online, even groceries. So what's your, like, some collective organizational take on what that means, you know, for especially e-commerce companies, but I guess just just businesses in general.
Liron Wand:Yeah, so you're not alone. Many of us have not stepped in a store for a few months now. And we've certainly seen shopping behaviors change for many years, this is not new. But what is really interesting is the massive behavioral shift that has really been accelerated dramatically in the last eight months as a result of the pandemic. And just to kind of put this in a little bit of perspective. In the US, for example, shelter in place measures have accelerated e-commerce adoption, to the point, Adam, where we saw 10 years worth of growth in just two months.
Adam Lovallo:There you go! That's the stat. That's the LinkedIn feed stat.
Liron Wand:Well, there we go. Let's break it down further. Let's break this down. Let's really understand, you know, beyond the stat, what does this mean for people, and more importantly, for businesses as they shift--as they're required to make this shift online. So this shift is really required businesses to rethink their business models and to move quickly to this online world. And many of these businesses, Adam did not even have an online presence prior to the pandemic, let alone a sophisticated digital marketing strategy, which I know a lot of your listeners do. But if you think about the small, medium businesses that were struggling with the online shift, they have had to relearn how they run their business in a really short amount of time. So today, businesses really need to have a wide range of specialized knowledge and skills and to be able to touch the user journey across the entire experience. You know, we talked about this a lot of Facebook, but we say that yesterday's fortune 500 companies would be you know, completely astounded by the sophisticated tools and audiences that even the smallest of businesses today have access to. And the future we know, holds even more opportunity and with it complexity as more technology, more channels, more data are needed to help the you know, to help the industry evolve and keep up with the consumer demands. And what this there's a lot of complexity competition, and really pressure for businesses small and large to keep up.
Adam Lovallo:Okay, so I'll give you a specific anecdote. I work with you know, now my day job, all kinds of companies and if you are like using something like Shopify, and the Facebook, Shopify integration out of a box, in some cases, it's like a more sophisticated like tracking setup that like many massive companies that I talked to have, and it costs like, you know, $25 a month or whatever Shopify costs. I think that is like, that is beyond true. like years ago at LivingSocial. We had a team of 100 plus engineers rebuilding what is essentially lesser functionality than Shopify provides out of the box. Like that's pretty, like incredible. And that's just one piece of the overall marketing. Yeah, I think that's beyond Yeah. Okay. So um, the, like, partnership ecosystem around like Facebook and Instagram, I actually remember when it first started, because now this like, totally, like, massive thing. So maybe you could just tell us a little bit more about that. Yeah. Like, what? Yeah, what are maybe the pieces of that puzzle that exists now?
Liron Wand:For sure. Yeah, so you called out a few of the partners that we work with. But when we think about the Facebook marketing partner ecosystem, or we call it the FMP ecosystem, we're really talking about 1000s, of partners, Adam that we work with. Now, in the past, a lot of people have thought about this ecosystem is really focused on ad tech. But we've seen it evolve, and are really working with strategic partners that help clients solve nearly any challenge that they have. So to give you a few examples, right, to really put this into concrete examples. A business today has to manage an increased volume of customer inquiries about their inventory, or shipping, or any support questions, as we've seen in e-commerce, and we're seeing that only grow as the shift to online becomes real. So we have a set of messaging partners and community management partners who can help businesses stay on top of that, and really do low cost, easy customer support over messaging apps and over our community management tools. We also know that, you know, as businesses shift online, a lot comes into that, right, it's not simple for a retail store to move online; they need to set up a feed, they need to set up a website. So we have a vast variety of partners who can help with all of that with feed, website, technical services, to really help businesses get up and running quickly online, or even to set up a Facebook shop, which is a new product, which I'm sure we'll talk about in a little bit. Creative for example, with a shelter in place, people can go out and take new creative assets and take pictures. But so we have a whole group of creative partners who have really helped businesses meet these challenges, and to really help them evolve their creative effectively, because we know that good, fresh, relevant creative is really key to driving ROI for your media campaigns. And I know, I know, you know that as well as listeners
Adam Lovallo:Oh, yes.
Liron Wand:Maybe just to ground this around an example that is really relevant for the pandemics. So there was a partnership between Kirkland's home decor and AdParlor, which is one of our FMP partners. Kirkland's home decor already had an online business as do many large brands. But with the hit of the pandemic, they had to close down their brick and mortar store. This all took place in April 2021 when shelter in place first took order, they had to really shift their business model quickly. So what they did is they worked with AdParlor to implement a curbside pickup service to help make the shopping experience more convenient for the customers. In order to do that they had to boost awareness and sales. And so in partnership with AdParlor, they really built a Facebook campaign that was optimized for online purchase with curbside pickup. And this is just one example. And what was really key here was not just about finding the right partner, but AdParlor was really able to help Kirkland move quickly and effectively, as many it's just demanded by a lot. But for a lot of brands to be able to do that in order to stay in business and continue to thrive in this new reality.
Adam Lovallo:I love it. Okay, a couple things. One, the AdParlor, probably that's a great pull, because they've been around for forever, like, I mean, as an AdParlor client like a decade ago. So that's awesome Yeah. I'm sure yes, bigger. Okay, spectacular. Number two. This is an unsolicited host anecdote, but just in my day to day and I'm sure a lot of people on this podcast will agreelike the creative piece in terms of the partner ecosystem. That is like grown so much, and it is so so so helpful when you know, you can't get to your studio, you're not in your up office. It's a really problematic time to be generating any creative asset, doesn't matter what they are. Yeah, I totally cosign or buy that. That is that's everyone I talked to is like wondering, like, Oh, you know, how can I go about that? Whether it's agencies or, you know, individuals or like, whatever, because it's like, really tricky. And not just performance, like, basically anybody needs assets. So that's a great one. Okay. Um, so, a really, really, really common arguably kind of like lame. Um, like once a year advertising industry article title is like, You know, in-housing, like, there's some stat somebody pulls it, it's like everybody's in-housing. And then there's this like big, sort of back and forth in our little ecosystem of like well is in-housing or not in-housing. And I find it you know, that conversation sometimes is like actually talking about a particular type of media and then gets applied to everything like programmatic display is a great example. Um, so I'm just curious, like, what is your--since you're doing this partnership partner ecosystem? And evidently the ecosystem has grown dramatically? Like, what's your read, not not so much about in housing. But like, Where did the partners fit in? Like, how commonplace is it for companies like to be leveraging people like any, any thoughts on that?
Liron Wand:Yeah, great question. And we were actually curious about that, as well, because we were seeing a lot of activity. But we also wanted to get, you know, kind of a third party to really help us assess what is the value of partners, and how are brands and businesses using and leveraging the partners that we work so closely with. So we recently commissioned a study with BCG. This was done earlier this year. And it was really to understand how the marketing and advertising landscape is changing for businesses, and how they're leveraging partners to navigate this change. And what we saw Adam was really interesting. So we surveyed 200, Fortune 500 companies, this was done across North America and Europe. And what we found was that 99% of all businesses surveyed relied on an external partner for some service or solution. And what was even more interesting was that 98% of them said, they will lean more heavily on outside experts for technical assistance in the future. So yeah, so what this means when you know, when you think about the buy, build, you know, the kind of, you know, question that I'm sure is relevant for any brand, any company, any founder, is that it really does take a village, and that in some cases, partnering with the right partner, is the right thing to do. Especially with the speed of innovation, right? When we think about creative and marketing and commerce and signals and data, right, these things are moving really, really quickly. And when you're building a retail brand, that's not necessarily your core competency. So finding the right partner, and learning how to partner with them effectively, can really help kind of accelerate your business growth. But I do want to call out that we also saw a challenge in this whole partnership model. And almost everyone that was surveyed, didn't feel like they were getting it right. In the US just to put a number to this 88% believe that there was an improvement, for how they go about their partnerships, and how they go about managing these partners. So while businesses are really faced with the difficult task of deciding what technology and solutions to develop internally, and where to look for them, determining who to trust and who to go to, to provide you with the right services is really important. But even more important is also to or as important is to figure out how to best partner with them.
Adam Lovallo:Yeah, I love those stats, because like you, again, you always draw everything's being in-house. But then you take a step back, like, oh, who do you use for measurement? media mix modeling? Oh, but you use third party creative, right? And like, who buys all the all the? And it's like, wait a minute, you just told me you in house everything and you just listed like 20 companies that you work with? I love those conversations. So yeah, buy that data. Um, but yeah, I mean, at the end of the day, we're really talking about well, both technical but also like, service enabled technologies in a lot of cases, you know, but yeah, I love. I love that stat. Because it's, I think the narrative around in-housing is such a gross oversimplification that it like it obfuscates the fact that, like you said, all this technical things, you need third parties, in most cases to do anything really. Okay. All right. So let's say I'm lacking any kind of brand really doesn't matter. And, you know, I've got access to you guys have that massive directory, there's all this stuff. Maybe I've got a Facebook, like, Okay, so how I want to I want to leverage partners, because I recognize that that that is like a probably rational thing to do. What What is your sense you deal with all these partner people like what's, what's your advice? How do I how do I do that?
Liron Wand:Yeah, so I think it really, you can really break it down into three key things that you need to keep in mind kind of three main takeaways. Okay. The first is really embracing that you can't build or do everything in-house. And the stats have shown that many businesses are already embracing that and it's really about the accessing of building in house relative to external solutions and determining what you can manage long term. BCG's research study found that partners are most often tapped and you know, you just don't alluded to this as well, but are most often tapped for creative production and design, marketing and advertising technology and media buying capabilities. So that's, the most common, it's not to say that there aren't other solutions. And we work with a lot of different solutions. But those tend to be the ones that are most common. And again, just to ground this in an example of what a strong and collaborative partnership looks like, so Chameleon Cold-Brew, which I don't know if you're familiar with them, but they're one of my favorite local Austin brands, had recently partnered with Tongal. They were able to use existing assets from Chameleon and repurpose them into Instagram video ads, for example. Rather than having to produce new assets that use polling stickers, so adding a more interactive, fun, engaged aspect to it, to really drive an interactive experience for their customers. So by understanding you know, that Chameleon is targeting a younger, you know, very active on Instagram audience, their partnership with Tongal really allowed them to effectively, you know, drive that engagement leading to increase in engagement and sales,
Adam Lovallo:I got a Google,Tongal. I've never heard of Tongal.
Liron Wand:We have somet that have been with us for many years, but we're also seeing new partners. And it's really a thriving ecosystem where we're seeing, you know, companies over time, evolve, and then new and up and coming partners up as well. So definitely, definitely Google them. But that's the first takeaway. So really embrace that you can't do everything in house and be very strategic on what you're going to build, and what you're going to partner. The second takeaway, and you know, sounds probably pretty obvious, but we tend to forget it sometimes in the day to day grind is to treat your external partners as extensions of your team. Right. And in the survey, one of the creative VP's that took part in the survey noted that the most effective teams are the ones in which you can tell who works for the brand, and who works for the partner. And so viewing your external partners, not as vendors but really is a central components of the execution of your strategy is really key. And you know, with Facebook, we say it's it's about alignment, not about assignment. Right. And, you know, I do they work at Facebook, but I've worked with Kenshoo before, which is a leading FMP. So really value that, you know, from my Facebook, seat today that we're really driving for this collaborative kind of one team approach when we consult to our clients and brands and but also to our partners. So that's the second takeaway. The third and also obvious, but one that we tend to forget sometimes is that you need to measure success with concrete metrics that resonate across the organization, but also resonate with the partners that you're working with. So having successful teams align around common goals, prioritizing consistent metrics that drive business impact, and really be transparent about it with your partners as well. Now, we know that every good partnership gets better when there's a little bit of push and pull. And I think that there's a really big opportunity to push partnerships further based on joint capabilities from both parties, and what you bring to end gain from a partnership should really evolve over time, right? It's not static, the industry is evolving, your brand is evolving, the solutions and products and channels are evolving. And it really needs to be the partnership needs to evolve together with that. So you know this, and you know, you've been in the space for a while. But the good news is, is that, you know, advertisers and agencies have decades of experience with the ecosystem. And I think we're really, really set up for success. So it's really exciting to see how marketers today are, you know, adapting and adopting and working with our partner ecosystem.
Adam Lovallo:I love it. And as someone who runs an agency, I wish I'd been you to talk to some of my clients, especially on what bullet two
Liron Wand:Yeah, yeah. It's hard one.
Adam Lovallo:You might have 50 partners and 50 clients with each partner and every, you know, you're not gonna hit a homerun every single time At least, that's my, in my experience. Um, okay. All right. Cool. So that's great. So I feel like we've covered the partnership ecosystem quite comprehensively, which I like, so you alluded to Facebook shops as a big one. I know for a lot of people. So like, maybe say a little bit more about that. Anything else that that you think people, especially in the commerce vertical should be like, you know, staying on top of or at least aware of, if not actually doing?
Liron Wand:Yeah, yeah. So you know, we've talked about this already. And we've all seen the stats on LinkedIn, and so forth. But we know that how people shop is changing, and therefore businesses need to have additional channels by which they sell things and reach their consumers. So Facebook shops is probably the biggest step was taken yet to enable e commerce across Facebook's apps. We give businesses the ability, essentially in one go to upload a catalog, open a storefront on Facebook and Instagram, and we give them the ability to complete transactions and have it all be integrated with ads. This Adam, is also a better experience for consumers, which is really important to us as we think about building new products because it really provides an integrated and native experience for consumers, but
Adam Lovallo:Especially in the mobile app, mobile web context. So many, I mean, even our clients, sophisticated companies, even with you know, even the quote--unquote, smart advertisers. The number of times, you know, this, the checkout flows don't work on like a large number of a handset. It's like it's like really a common problem. So yeah, I yeah, I totally buy that. Okay,
Liron Wand:Yeah, really simplifying it making it easy for you to not only discover the products that you like, but really go through to acquisition, and then also through our messaging apps to really be able to follow up if you have any questions, or support inquiries. So really want to call out some important features as we think about jobs. The first as a brand, any change that you make to your collection and catalog in your Facebook shop goes live across all of our apps. So it's really seamless kind of one stop, you're able to update and keep up with kind of your presence on on our on our Facebook apps. As I mentioned, customers can message a business through our three messaging apps, we have WhatsApp, Messenger, and Instagram Direct, to get quick answers to any questions, follow ups, shipment questions or returns. And then the future, we're going to take that one step further and really enable customers to view the business's shop and even make purchases right there in the messaging chat. So if you think about it, it's taking the experience of walking into a store and talking to a sales agent onto your mobile phone. Um, and you know, we've seen it, we're seeing it start to kind of evolve and in certain parts of the world, and are looking to kind of productize it and make it available to any brand and retailer. A couple other things just to call out on Facebook Shops, and it is a new product. And I want to make sure your listeners kind of really understand how, how powerful and easy it is for for them to use. So you can curate products for your customers by organizing groups of products into collections to help them find the right products for them. And you can customize your brand, right we talk a lot about creative, and your brand, and really being consistent across all the different channels, websites that you're present in. So you're able to customize your brand through visual merchandising. And you're able to add a cover image and really kind of pick and choose the color scheme and brand that you want to get across on Facebook Apps to make sure that it's consistent with your other channels. We talked about partners. Partners are key for this as well. And to really help businesses build and grow online through shops, we're partnering even more closely with some of the companies who are doing some great work in the space, you call that Shopify earlier. We're working closely with them. We're also working with BigCommerce, WooCommerce (who's based in Europe), ChannelAdvisor, cafe24. So really ensuring that we have global coverage of partners to help businesses get up and running as quickly and effectively on Shops as well. The value of doing it with a partner is that they can really help you set up with your rich catalogs, create jobs, test checkout, and run ads kind of all seamlessly through their platform. And you know, as we look to make it easier for anyone to start a business online. It's really about helping small businesses who are facing a lot of challenges right now, right? If we look at who's struggling the most, it's really the small businesses who are not able or don't have a lot of experience in driving their online presence and driving user acquisition and driving for conversions and follow up. It's really about helping them but essentially, businesses of all sizes, being prepared for the uture of e-commerce has just eally been accelerated through he pandemic, but we knew it was oming and it will come as we now, yeah.
Adam Lovallo:You you've inspired me to we spoke the other day, I did not get a chance to go to one of my client's Facebook shop. I promise I will. Yeah. All right. Cool. So awesome. So the shots that I totally get, like the seamless etc, etc. But I know that discovery in and of itself, and distribution, like from an advertiser standpoint is like, yeah, I mean, the main reason why people would listen to podcasts why they advertise it Facebook and Instagram. Like that's a big driver. So, um, what's the deal and discovery like, I know, there's like tagging stuff and like, yeah, so any, any new discovery thing?
Liron Wand:Yeah. So there's some really cool things here that we're doing and testing out and the really cool thing Adam that we're seeing is that a lot we're seeing a lot of behaviors happening on our platform's even before we kind of build products around them, and really seeing kind of brands really pushed the envelope in terms of how they're using our products, collectively, to really engage with their customers. So I'll give a couple of examples. But the essence of shops from a consumer perspective and discoverability perspective is really meeting consumers where they are, right. It's really meeting them as they're browsing as they're getting inspiration on Facebook, and Instagram. And they're a couple ways for businesses to really leverage that. So on Instagram, businesses can use our shopping tags, which is a way to highlight products from their catalogue so people can easily learn more about them and take action. This is live across stories, Facebook Live, and your Instagram feed. So you know, as someone is scrolling through their feed, and they see a story or a post that a brand has put up there, they can click on it and get information right there and then on the products that are being showcased. Another interesting thing that we did was that we launched Shopping From Creators, right. And this really allows people to shop directly from creators or influencers, because we know that's where a lot of the inspiration and engagement is coming from. So we're allowing consumers to shop directly from creators or influencers that they love without really leaving their feed or the Instagram app. And with the ability to tag products in their posts, people can easily shop from from whatever it is that they're that they're showcasing. But yeah, so shopping tags is something that we've rolled out and are starting to see a lot of engagement there. But we're seeing some other really cool you know, ways that brands are using Facebook to really create buzz around their brand and their products. So let's talk about Instagram product launches. And Adam you may have heard of being referred to as drops. And it's a it's a cool way to drive you know, anticipation, FOMO I like to call it you know, drive kind of that fear of missing out and creating a lot of hype and buzz and people signing up and kind of that cool factor of being included in something that is limited and maybe even secretive. So it's a way for for brands to create buzz, but then also allow customers to buy the product directly from their Instagram. So let me give you an example just to kind of help the listeners understand what this means. So let's take Addidas, the you know, the fitness brand. They partnered with Childish Gambino, who I don't know if you're familiar with him, but his name is Donald Glover. Yep. And they wanted to build anticipation around the Donald Glover Lycos sneaker drop. So they dropped an exclusive product during Coachella to promote the Adidas Donald Glover collaboration. And it really started with an airdrop request to accept a photo from an account claiming to be Donald Glover. And what they did was the boldest festival attendees who welcomed the picture, were treated to the shoes. So it was really kind of creating hype around it, if you get it if you accept it, kind of really building that hype around it. And after that, they complimented kind of that stunt, as they call it with five videos that Glover released with the#DonaldGloverPresents, which really leveraged his brand to increase awareness around the drop. And the result of this was that the shoe launched exclusively on Instagram with shoppable tags and sold out within eight hours. So that's really the power of social media, together with e-commerce on one platform.
Adam Lovallo:I love it. That's awesome.
Liron Wand:Yeah, yeah. And I'd like to call out another really interesting phenomenon that we're seeing, driven mostly in APAC at the moment, but it's called Live shopping. So remember those days of QVC when you're watching, you know, you are watching someone present a product and you can buy it right then and there and it was limited edition. So we're taking that--we're seeing people take that actually, and adopt it to Facebook applications. So it's really around a way to enable brands to sell on Facebook and Instagram Live video. So I'll give you an example. There's a Taiwanese brand called Lulus, who ran their campaign through a Facebook Live Event featuring fashion influencers with targeted mobile first video ads on Facebook and Instagram. And the combination of those two together they saw a 1.6 x return on spend for mobile purchases. So while we're still in early days of this, our live shopping solutions across Facebook and Instagram will enable people to connect with sellers in a really easy, seamless way when they see something they like during a live video. The sellers brands and creators similar to the shoppable Instagram tags that we've talked about will be able to tag products. From their shop and catalog before going live, and these products will be shown at the bottom of the video. So people can easily tap through, learn more about the product and purchase them, while continuing to watch the live stream.
Adam Lovallo:That's great.
Liron Wand:So it's really taking this integrated, social, you know, commerce experience, into kind of one and making it really integrated. And a really fun experience for consumers and a great way for brands to drive engagement.
Adam Lovallo:I'll give you one one little anecdote, just the day to day because this is, I think you'll like this. So we have clients who do Facebook Lives, like normal, like the normal, you know, accessible to anybody, Facebook Live stuff on their pages, to just their organic followers, they record those sessions, and then they cut them later into video ads to use in-paid. And so it's not like, if you're watching live, like, you know, you can still go to the site, and they like say promo codes. It's not integrated, like what you're describing.
Liron Wand:Yeah, yeah.
Adam Lovallo:And then they also do the app part. Like, it is like the exact behavior that you you know, you're essentially productizing. And I've seen like little inklings of it. And the data point that I could share with everybody is like, some of those creatives lo and behold, performed really well. Because, you know, it was like the founder, and she was showing you the makeup, and it was like, extremely authentic. Like, it was very, like, yeah, it was very personal. Yeah, that's awesome.
Liron Wand:No, yeah. And that's exactly that, it's really, you know, letting a lot of you know, a lot of this is just seeing what brands are doing out there, and then productizing it and making it easier for others to leverage that as well. But it's just been so exciting to see how people and brands are creating new ways to engage and drive, you know, that level of excitement and engagement and discoverability on our platforms. And then it's really about how do we build that? Or how do we work with partners who can help us build these products and solutions, and make it available to a wider set of brands. Um, so we talked about some things that are earlier kind of in the process, and really areas that we're exploring, um, we did actually have one of our largest updates to our Instagram app. I don't know if you've, if you saw that. But yeah, I just wanted to call this out. Because while we don't take changes lightly. Because we really want to make sure that everything we do kind of put the consumer experience in the middle of everything, we did actually make a pretty big change where we added two new tabs to Instagram's homepage. The first is reels, which is our short form video. And the second, you know, related to our conversation is around the shopping tab. And really allowing users to navigate to the products that they love, and to interact with the brands on our platform.
Adam Lovallo:And at the risk of asking a question to which there is no answer. If you create a Facebook Shop, does that mean by definition that you're eligible as a brand to appear like an Instagram shop, universe? Are those things somehow separate?
Liron Wand:No. So you are so if you're setting up a shop, you are eligible to show up on Instagram, Facebook, and in the future, you know?
Adam Lovallo:Yeah. Okay. All right. Awesome. Yeah. Um, yeah, that was that was like an announcement. I feel like I read about that, like this week or something that's like, super. Okay, last maybe question or two, you know, holiday season. I mean, it's already super picked up. Like, that's funny as reading a blog posts, like a Facebook advertiser group thing. I was like, when should you start running your black friday campaign? It was like start running it three weeks before Black Friday. And it's like, the words have no meaning anymore. Like you know what, what happened to Black Friday like that? It's just like so okay, holiday, like what what do you guys sort of calling out? Again, especially e commerce focused around holiday stuff?
Liron Wand:Yeah, it's funny that you're calling out Black Friday because I really feel the holidays came really early this year because I started seeing Black Friday campaigns and discounts you know a couple of weeks ago but yes, no holidays are here November 13th. We're like holiday, holiday season. And this year is going to be a very different holiday season right everything that we talked about COVID, pandemic, Shelter in Place, the move to online. Um, you know, in Facebook we love data. So one more piece of data to share with your audience here. A global survey of Gen X and Boomers show that 50% care more about online shopping and picking up in store during this holiday season. Not a surprise people are not hurrying to go back into the store. What is interesting, you know, maybe 50% sounds like a lot or not a lot. But that's a 32% year over year growth. So expecting people to shop online is real. And we want to make sure that brands and businesses are ready for that. So a couple things that we're doing. And some of these will be I know you have a very sophisticated audience of listeners. So some of this will be familiar to your listeners, but with more focus kind of around what we're doing in commerce, on our product. So we got three things that I want to call out, that will help businesses get more distribution and targeting during the holiday. The first is ads with product tags. The second is shopping engagement, custom audiences, and the third is shopping look alike audiences. So let me break this down. Um, ads with product tags on Instagram really allows businesses to boost shoppable posts or create new shoppable ads in Ads Manager. The ads with the product tags maximize the reach of your product sending users directly to a product details page. And this enables the users to more quickly discover any information that they need, such as price, discount product name, and make the purchase in a more convenient and seamless way. So that's one thing that we've launched to help with the holiday season. The second is identifying your customers, right and identifying who are your most engaged shoppers. So shopping engagement, custom audiences helps you sort your shoppers based on how they engage with your shoppable content that we just talked about. So you can target those shoppers with any type of ad on Instagram and Facebook. You can choose to target based on all sorts of engagements with your shoppable content, you can have people who have tapped on your product saved your products visited your website, for more details from a product details page, and many others. And lastly, we have look alike audiences for a while at Facebook. But now we have shopping look alike audiences which will also give you the ability to reach new customers that are likely to have interest in your brand. These are audiences that are most similar to your current shoppers on Instagram. Shopping engagement, custom audiences will give you the ability to create a look alike audience based on those who have given you signal of shopping intent. And those actions include both the activity that people have taken with your organic shopping content, but also with your ad content. So really enabling you to reach your most valuable users. But then also discover others in a world where you know that people are not going in the store, where you know that people are inundated with a lot of you know, digital marketing content, to really be able to target your right users and drive them to your store. These are just a few of the changes. But you know, the holidays are here. Um, you know, Facebook and through our partners, we're here to help all businesses and all of you know all of our clients to really succeed and this unique and slightly different or very different holiday season.
Adam Lovallo:I love it. Yeah, the shop stuff is cool. Like you could you could imagine a world well, I guess we'll see where, you know, you have a subset of people who want to engage with shop content, and through Facebook and Instagram shop, and you still have a legacy subset of people who, for whatever reason are accustomed to, you know, going to the site and going directly or whatever. And you maybe even end up in a point where you've got Yeah, like different look alikes running different creators like, it's kind of like, potentially, like a new channel. And the same way that you know, you have the app experience. You have mobile web, you have desktop web, and different people gravitate to each. That's cool. Yeah, that's that's, that's awesome. Um, okay, great. Well, I think that's yeah, that's, that's perfect amount of time. That was awesome. Thank you. Thanks for doing all of this. And especially thanks for sharing on the tagging stuff and the drop stuff and a lot like live stuff. Like that's all. That's awesome. So be cool. It'll be cool to see which of that sticks, you know, and becomes ike a broader, full platform thing. Yeah, appreciate the time. And no doubt you've inspired many more people to hire agencies like mine. And for that I approve harder.
Liron Wand:There you go.
Adam Lovallo:Thank you, again.
Liron Wand:There you go. Well, yeah, Enjoy. Thank you so much for having me, first of all, and we are in the holiday season, as we said so happy holidays, you know, happy shopping. And thank you so much for having me on your podcast.
Adam Lovallo:My pleasure. Happy Holidays.
MAU[Talk]:Thanks for joining us. To learn more about how strategic partnerships are enabling brands to champion the future of commerce, visit Facebook's partner directory at www.facebook.com/business/partner-directory. And we'll catch on the next episode of MAU [Talk].