A lookalike audience is a targeting option in digital advertising platforms such as Google Ads and Meta (Facebook) Advertising that creates a new audience based on an existing list provided by the advertiser. (Note that LinkedIn has discontinued traditional lookalike audiences; it offers a comparable approach through its Matched Audiences feature).
The platforms analyze the characteristics of the original audience—such as demographics, interests, and online behaviors—to find users who closely resemble them. To be effective, the seed audience should be high quality, such as current customers or users who have already converted. This allows advertisers to scale campaigns by reaching more people who are likely to perform similarly.
