How to Upload Custom Audiences to Meta

Creating a custom audience from your list of existing customers is a great way to supercharge the targeting of your Meta ads. After creating a custom audience, you’ll be able to create lookalike audiences to find people similar to your existing customers and you’ll be able to use this audience in ad targeting. 

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This step-by-step guide will walk you through how to upload your list of customer audiences to Meta. 

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Step 1: sign in 

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Go to https://business.facebook.com and sign into your Meta Business Centre account. 

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Step 2: navigate to your custom audiences

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Once you’re in your account, go to the left-hand menu, then click “Audiences”.

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Click "Create a Custom Audience".

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You can create a custom audience from many sources like your website, app activity, your catalogue, your Instagram account, your Facebook page, and more! Today, we’ll focus on creating a custom audience from a customer list. 

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Select "Customer list," then "Next".

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Step 2: set up your email list

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If your customer list is stored on Mailchimp, select "Import from Mailchimp". If not, you will need to upload your customer list from your CRM software or from a list of your customers. Click "See formatting guidelines" and "Download file template" to understand how to format your customer list. Once you have a properly formatted file, click next.

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Indicate whether or not your customer list contains a column that represents how much a customer has spent with your business. If your list does, select "Yes". If it doesn't, select "No" and check the tick box that appears at the bottom to continue. After you made your selection, click "Next".

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Upload your customer list. 

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If you have customer values (i.e., how much money they spent) in your sheet, select it from the drop down menu. If your customer list doesn't have customer values, skip this step.

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Give your custom audience a descriptive name, then click "Next" at the bottom right (not pictured).

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Now, let's check if the columns in your customer list successfully mapped onto Meta's identifiers. The rows in the "Mapped" section represent columns in your list recognized by Meta. You don't need to make changes.

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Click on "Action needed". These are the values that Meta doesn't recognize from your list. If you recognize the information on the left (circled), select it from the identifier list on the right. If your information doesn't fall into any category of identifiers in the drop down list, select "Do not upload".

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Once you're done mapping your identifiers, click "Import and create".

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Now, your custom audience is ready for you to use!

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