Image courtesy of Facebook

The platform works by allowing stores to enter their address details and the radius that they want their advertising to reach, as well as other details such as age and gender of their target audience. It is due to roll out in the US in the coming weeks, and globally in the coming months.

In the announcement of the new feature on its blog, Facebook alluded to the potential privacy concerns raised by the new functionality: “Local awareness ads were built with privacy in mind. Advertisers select locations, not specific individuals, for local awareness ads. Facebook does not tell advertisers which specific people are in any audience and, as with our other advertising products, all audiences must meet a minimum required size.

“People have control over the recent location information they share with Facebook and will only see ads based on their recent location if location services are enabled on their phone.”