I just read the article Facebook to allow ad targeting by email, user ID and phone number and a few questions came to my mind:

Would you like to be advertised to just because your e-mail address is included in some list? Uploading an e-mail list on FB doesn’t mean you ever opted in to any newsletter or similar. The address could just as well just be taken from the yellow pages, for example. But then again, will users actually ever know based on which information they see the ad. Is it displayed because their user characteristics correspond to some targeting selection or is the ad displayed because someone has used their e-mail address?

Would the majority of FB users see this as additional spam or would they be glad about the hint that they might have missed an interesting FB page?

What will FB do with the e-mail addresses (or phone numbers…) that have been uploaded? Just as they do with pictures etc, they could simply claim to ‘own’ the database as soon as you use it within their system.

I would totally be interested, if Facebook did it the other way round and offer me an e-mail list of all the users who liked my page!

What are your views? What opportunities do you see? What could be the downside of this tool?

@claudiapoeckl

You target the users from information they already gave you.  For instance, you have an email sign-up form on your website and have a list of 3000 subscribers.  You would upload that file to Facebook and (if they used the same email address to sign-up with Facebook as they did with your email subscribe list) you could target the user. 

It would just be another way to reach your audience where they are, which is what marketing is all about.  They already have shown interest in your company so I don’t see any it leading to any spam issues.  

I’d personally use it sorta like email marketing (long term lead nurturing) in that you could segment your lists, upload them into Facebook and target them by what they shown interest in.  For example, with Amazon and other ecom sites, you see sections of the page that say “Items you recently viewed”, say they didn’t purchase the item for whatever reason.  You could target your prospects that showed interest but didn’t purchase.

I think it’s a super cool change.

@claudiapoeckl

That’s true but I don’t think it really matters.  If you look at how Facebook ads or any type of internet ads work right now, targeting methods are used to narrow down the parameters to reach your target audience.  No one signs-up to see those ads and no one makes you click on those ads.  You won’t be able to directly message any of these people, they’re just ads in the sidebar like all of the other ads.  If you’re targeted from one of these types of campaigns, its likely you won’t even know it.