How much is a Like, comment, or emoji really worth?

A new update from Facebook may finally be able to answer that most vexing question.

Cash it up

Facebook announced a revamp to its Local Awareness feature in a blog post, explaining the update will give retailers more insights into the effectiveness of their Facebook campaigns.

"A fundamental challenge for brick-and-mortar businesses today is measuring the impact of their advertising campaigns on shop visits and sales.

"Today, we're announcing new solutions for businesses to drive people to their shops and measure the amount of shop visits and in-store sales following their Facebook mobile advertising campaigns."

Mobile meets in-store

Now retailers can see how many people visit their store after viewing a Facebook ad campaign. Data is pulled from users with location services activated on their smartphone.

Significantly, Facebook now lets retailers tweak their ad creative in real-time, based on user activity.

For example, a retailer might change their ad creative for Sydney stores, based on what's working in Melbourne or Wellington.

Offline

Facebook is also giving retailers a more holistic approach to campaign analytics. Retailers can now plug offline transactions, such as in-store or phone sales, into an Offline Conversions API to get a better picture of their customers.

Early reports of the Local Awareness update look promising. French retailer E.Leclerc reached 1.5 million people within 10km of their stores, and discovered 12% of clicks on their Facebook ads resulted in a shop visit within a week.

To find out more visit facebook.com.