Dive Brief:

• IBM Commerce announced it is helping clients improve customer targeting on Facebook using Silverpop and its other marketing and analytics tools. 
• The initiative will use IBM’s information to improve targeting in Facebook’s Custom Audience and Lookalike Audience tools. 
• Facebook will also now participate in IBM’s ThinkLab, a forum in which brands can work with the software and social giants to develop solutions for their specific needs.

Dive Insight:

IBM has launched an initiative that promises to help brand advertisers target customers more effectively on Facebook by combining IBM’s information on consumer purchase histories, locations, and brand attitudes with Facebook information on users’ likes and interests. The effort will improve targeting for the social net’s Custom Audience (which segments customers according to known target behaviors) and Lookalike Audience tools (which finds users similar to those in the Custom Audiences).

A second initiative will bring together IBM researchers, designers, and Facebook officials in IBM’s ThinkLab to develop solutions that address marketers’ specific needs. The first company outside IBM to participate in the ThinkLab, Facebook will use it to help marketers better leverage the network’s advertising formats.