The Ultimate 2025 Meta Ads Targeting Strategy

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With the platform handling over 1000+ clients, we've witnessed firsthand how targeting strategies have evolved, and what actually works in today's environment.

The Three Core Targeting Approaches

Meta advertising now operates on three distinct targeting frameworks, each serving different business needs and maturity levels.

1. Advantage+ Shopping Campaigns: Maximum Automation

This is where Meta has the most control. You select your location targeting, and that's essentially it. The platform handles everything else, audience selection, optimization, and scaling.

Why it works: Meta's algorithm has become remarkably sophisticated at identifying potential customers. The system analyzes user behavior both on and off platform, using real-time feedback loops to continuously refine who sees your ads. When someone engages or converts, Meta immediately identifies similar users and adjusts delivery accordingly.

Best for: Established ad accounts with substantial conversion data. The more purchase history your account contains, the better Meta can predict future buyers.

2. Advantage+ Audience with Manual Campaigns: The Hybrid Approach

This strategy offers a middle ground. You provide suggestions, but Meta maintains flexibility to expand beyond them.

You can suggest:

• Age ranges (25-55, for example)

• Gender preferences

• Interest targeting

• Custom audiences (website visitors, email lists)

The key difference? These are suggestions, not hard constraints. If Meta identifies promising prospects outside your parameters, it'll test them.

Best for: Newer advertisers or accounts without extensive conversion data. You guide Meta's learning while avoiding overly restrictive targeting that limits potential.

3. Original Audience Options: Maximum Control

This legacy approach gives you complete control, Meta strongly discourages it. You set hard boundaries for age, interests, custom audiences, and locations. Meta won't venture beyond these parameters.

Best for: Highly specific scenarios only, targeting particular funnel stages, exclusive customer offers, or when you need absolute certainty about who sees your ads.

The Targeting Philosophy That Changed Everything

Here's what separates current best practices from outdated approaches: combining warm and cold audiences in single campaigns.

This contradicts traditional wisdom, but it works because Meta advertises to your warm audiences regardless of your targeting setup. The platform knows warm audiences convert better, so it naturally prioritizes them. By including custom audiences as suggestions rather than creating separate warm/cold campaigns, you give Meta the flexibility to optimize across your entire potential audience.

This consolidation delivers multiple benefits:

Simplified management: Fewer campaigns and ad sets mean deeper insights into performance.

Better optimization: Higher budget concentration in single ad sets accelerates Meta's learning and your testing cycles.

Larger audience pools: More potential customers mean more opportunities for Meta's algorithm to find winning combinations.

When to Use What

Start with Advantage+ Shopping if:

• You have 50+ conversions in your ad account.

• Your pixel has been tracking for several months.

• You're comfortable letting Meta optimize independently.

Use Advantage+ Audience Manual campaigns if:

• You're relatively new to Meta advertising.

• Your ad account lacks substantial conversion data.

• You want to guide Meta's learning with targeting suggestions.

• You're testing new products or markets.

Consider Original Audiences only if:

• You need to target specific funnel stages exclusively

• You're running offers only for existing customers

• You have compelling legal or business reasons for strict targeting

The Open Targeting Question

Open targeting, aka removing all audience specifications except location, has emerged as a powerful strategy, particularly for e-commerce businesses optimizing for purchases.

It works best when:

• Your account contains robust conversion data

• You're optimizing for sales rather than leads

• You're ready to scale beyond current audience sizes

For newer accounts or lead generation, the Advantage+ Audience approach with targeting suggestions typically performs better.

Critical Reminders

Avoid over-segmentation: The days of testing one interest per ad set are over. Audience overlap renders such tests meaningless when targeting acts as suggestions.

Trust Meta's intelligence: The platform knows a two-day-old website visitor converts better than a five-month-old one. You don't need to manually create recency-based audiences.

Test consistently: What works today may not work in six months. Run quarterly tests comparing Advantage+ Shopping against Advantage+ Audience manual campaigns.

Focus on creative: As Meta handles more targeting responsibility, your competitive advantage shifts to ad creative, offers, and landing page optimization.

Detail Targeting: Interests, Demographics, Behaviors

When using Advantage+ Audience suggestions, you can add detail targeting—specific interests, demographics, or behaviors.

For newer advertisers and accounts: Adding 1-5 relevant targeting options helps guide Meta's learning. Search for or browse options related to your products or services. For a marketing agency, that might include "social media marketing" or "small business owners."

Don't overthink this. These are suggestions Meta can follow or ignore. You won't "mess up" by selecting imperfect interests. Meta uses them as directional signals, not rigid rules.

For established accounts: Detail targeting becomes less critical as conversion data accumulates. You might skip it entirely (open targeting) or add a few broad suggestions.

Avoid excessive segmentation. The old practice of testing one interest per ad set is obsolete. With suggestion-based targeting, audience overlap makes such tests meaningless.

Testing Strategy and Timeline

What works today may not work in six months. The platform evolves continuously.

Recommended testing cadence:

• Run quarterly tests comparing Advantage+ Shopping against Advantage+ Audience manual campaigns

• Use identical creative across both to isolate the targeting variable

• Let tests run long enough to accumulate meaningful conversion data (typically 1-2 weeks minimum)

• Be willing to switch strategies based on results, not assumptions

As accounts mature: Reassess every 3-6 months. Accounts with growing conversion data often see improving performance from Advantage+ Shopping campaigns over time.

📅 Next in the BFCM Academy

• Today: The Ultimate 2025 Meta Ads Targeting Strategy

• 11/25: The Ultimate 2025 BFCM Last-Minute Klaviyo Segmentation

• 11/26: The Ultimate 2025 Expert Advice – Tactical BFCM Insights from Operators

• 12/03: 2025 BFCM Hot Takes & Founder Social Highlights

📚 Other helpful resources from the Aimerce team: