Facebook Offers, a way for brands to share discounts and promotions on Facebook, received a significant update on Aug. 30, according to a company blog post. The social behemoth optimized the service for mobile, while expanding tracking abilities and giving brands more ways to promote their coupons.
Facebook now lets organizations create Offers that can be redeemed online or through an in-store purchase. Before the update, Facebook struggled to connect coupons and ads posted on the platform to real-world store visits. By making the experience more mobile friendly, customers can easily pull up a barcode or QR code, which can be tracked directly back to Facebook.
This update also allows brands to post Offers as ads, which means users can see the latest deals in their newsfeeds and share them with friends. When posting an Offer as an ad on Facebook, companies will have the same creative flexibility they’ve come to expect from the ad suite, like posting an Offer as a carousel ad.
Brands will also be able to post Offers to their business pages, making them available to anyone visiting the page. Users will even be able to take a look at every Offer posted by an organization through a new, dedicated Offers tab.
At the moment, the service is only useful for those who want their coupons to reach the widest possible audience. Each Offer on Facebook currently supports one code, which is why it’s so easy for users to share Offers across the platform. But Facebook is working on a feature that will allow brands to target specific discounts to small audiences, giving brands the capability to give a unique coupon to a highly engaged individual, for example.
Facebook says that at the moment, only online Offer ads are available, but the in-store version will be rolling out in the coming weeks.
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