Facebook Monday unveiled a new creative format for the Collection ad format it debuted in March.
Collection is aimed at using video to help retailers drive sales, with the ad units consisting of a video on top and four recommended products below.
Facebook said its new lifestyle templates for Collection ads are aimed at helping print catalog marketers with “bringing the richness of their catalog creative to mobile,” and it described the new features as follows:
- The lifestyle template enables print catalog marketers to use a full-screen template and leverage their existing creative assets, along with products from the social network.
- Brands can tag products directly in lifestyle images to boost product discovery.
- Retailers can help guide users to the nearest brick-and-mortar locations with store locator cards that can be added to the lifestyle template.
- Custom audiences can be created to re-engage “high-intent consumers” who have engaged with retail catalogs on Facebook.
- Facebook will serve product categories to users who are most likely to be interested of them, saying in an email to Social Pro Daily, “For example, if I’ve expressed interest on Facebook about backyard furniture, then I could potentially see a lifestyle template filled with deck chairs and waterproof tables from a home goods retailer.”
The social network added that it has been testing lifestyle templates for Collection ads with about one-dozen retailers, including J. Crew and West Elm, with an eye toward rolling the feature out globally in October.
