Introducing Intent-Based Topics and Audiences in Untitled
Most advertisers still leverage third-party cookie audiences or targeting parameters based entirely on assumptions. Assumptions that are based on who they are, what they want, and what they did after they already found you.
The problem is that real buying intent shows up much earlier than that.
By the time someone visits your website, fills out a form, or lands in a retargeting pool, they are already deep into their decision process. In competitive categories, they have likely researched multiple options, compared pricing, and seen ads from your competitors.
That timing gap is where most performance breaks down.
Today, we’re announcing Intent-Based Audiences in Untitled, a new way to reach buyers while they are actively researching products in your category, before they ever visit your site.
What Intent-Based Audiences Actually Represent
Intent data is not a demographic signal. It is not a lookalike model. It is not a proxy for interest.
Intent data reflects real behavior that signals purchase research (or what we like to call, true intent). That behavior can include things like:
- Searching for category or keyword-specific terms across the internet
- Consuming product comparison content on different websites
- Engaging with topics that correlate strongly with buying decisions
- Repeated research patterns over time
The key difference is timing. Intent surfaces before conversion actions like site visits, form fills, or cart additions. It shows you who is actively evaluating a purchase, not who already chose a brand.
That distinction matters, because most advertising today is still optimized around being late.
Why Traditional Targeting Is Breaking Down
If you haven’t noticed yet, the majority of “audiences” that platforms like Facebook and Google provide are not working as well as they once did. As more human beings opt out of third-party cookie tracking, targeting parameters and third-party cookie audiences begin to decay. This is due to fewer signals and less data being collected.
For everyday people, this may not be a bad thing. But for advertisers, this presents a major challenge.
Most performance marketing teams rely on some combination of:
- Broad interest or demographic targeting (i.e. targeting parameters in Facebook Ads)
- Lookalikes built from past converters
- Retargeting people after they interact with your brand
None of these approaches are wrong. They are just incomplete.
Retargeting only works after someone has already found you. Lookalikes assume future buyers look like past buyers, or that you even have buyers. Demographic targeting guesses intent based on identity, not behavior.
In competitive categories, this leads to the same outcome every time.
Everyone fights over the same users, at the same stage, with rising costs and shrinking returns. Intent flips that model by focusing on observed research behavior, not inferred interest.
Introducing Untitled’s Intent-Based Audiences
Intent-Based Audiences are now available inside Untitled. They allow you to build and activate audiences made up of people who are actively researching topics, competitors, or products in your category, even if they have never interacted with your brand.
These audiences are built from:
- Real-time behavioral signals happening across the web
- A topic graph spanning more than 36,000 keyword-driven research categories
- Identity-resolved profiles that make activation possible across paid channels
Instead of waiting for demand to show up on your site, you can now reach it where it actually starts.
How Untitled’s Intent Audiences Work
At a high level, the system works like this:
Step 1: Intent Topics are generated
Untitled is indexing copy from over 300,000+ publisher websites, or in simple terms, sites that serve ads. On pages that serve ads, we scrape the content and begin grouping these into Intent Topics based on the semantics and content seen. Currently, we have over 33,000+ standard topics.
Step 2: Intent Audiences are generated
From these publisher pages, Untitled buckets Ad-IDs that were seen reading or engaging with the content. These Ad-IDs are run through our identity graph and connected back to an Intent-Topic. In simple terms, we are grouping real human beings behind topics they are engaging with.
Step 3: Users now select topics and deploy audiences
From your Untitled account, you can now find and select topics that are relevant to your business and save them to your Audience Library. Once the Intent Audience has been built, you can push directly to your Facebook Ads account as a custom audience, or the Untitled DSP.
There is no manual list building. No spreadsheet uploads. No extra lift required from your team.
Untitled handles the translation from intent signal to usable audience.
Intent-Audiences explained like you're in high school
Think of the internet like a giant library where millions of people are reading articles every day.
Step 1: Untitled figures out what the articles are about
Untitled looks at hundreds of thousands of websites that show ads. These websites have articles about things like:
- Cooking
- Fitness
- Cars
- Marketing
- Travel
- Your competitors
…and everything in between.
Untitled reads the words on those pages and groups similar articles together into topics.
So instead of one article about grills and another about outdoor kitchens, Untitled says:
“These are all about outdoor cooking.”
Those groups are called Intent Topics. Right now, there are 33,000+ topics.
Step 2: Untitled notices who is reading what
When someone visits one of these pages, an Ad-ID (basically a device ID that belongs to a human) shows up.
Untitled:
- Sees that ad ID on the page
- Notes what topic that page belongs to
- Connects that ad ID to a real person using its identity system
In simple terms: Untitled connects people to the topics they’re actually reading about.
So if someone keeps reading articles about grills, they get grouped into an “outdoor grilling” Intent Audience.
Step 3: You choose the topics you care about
Inside your Untitled account, you:
- Search for topics related to your business
- Pick the ones that make sense
- Save them as Intent Audiences
Untitled automatically groups together all the people interested in those topics. That group of people is your Intent Audience.
Step 4: You run ads to those people
Once the audience is built, Untitled can send it straight to:
- Facebook Ads
- Streaming TV and other ads through the Untitled DSP
You don’t have to:
- Build lists by hand
- Upload spreadsheets
- Do any extra work
Consumer Use Case: B2C Brand Example
Example: Cookware Brand
Let’s dive into a real use case. For this example, let’s pretend we are an eCommerce brand that sells Cookware. Our brand is looking to attract new customers who are actively researching kitchen products.
- Search for keywords related to your business, such as:
- “nonstick cookware”
- “stainless steel pots and pans”
- or just “cookware”
- Review the Intent Topics returned from your search
- Select the topics that align with your products and target customers
- Save the Intent Topics
From here, your Intent Audience will begin building and you will be notified once it has been built. These can take a few hours to build, depending on the audience size. You will find these in your existing Audience Library. Once ready, you can activate it in Facebook Ads as a custom audience, or push the audience to the Untitled DSP to reach consumers who are already showing purchase intent before they ever visit your site.
Business Use Case: B2B & Competitive Targeting
Example: Targeting Competitor Demand
Let’s pretend we are a B2B SaaS company looking to capture demand already flowing to our competitors. In this example, we will utilize Untitled’s URL topic search and leverage our LLM.
- Enter a competitor’s website URL into the search box
- Our LLM analyzes the content and identifies relevant Intent-Topics tied to that business
- Review and select the Intent-Topics that are most relevant to your offering
- Save the audience
Your Intent Audience will be built using people who are actively researching solutions in your category, often comparing vendors or evaluating alternatives.
Intent Audiences can take a few hours to build, depending on the audience size.
You will find these in your existing Audience Library. Once ready, you can activate it in Facebook Ads as a custom audience, or push the audience to the Untitled DSP to reach consumers who are already showing purchase intent before they ever visit your site.
What Intent Audiences Unlock for Marketers
Intent-Based Audiences change how early you can enter the buying journey. With this approach, teams can:
- Reach buyers earlier, before brand preference is set
- Focus spend on people showing real purchase research behavior
- Reduce waste from broad targeting and late-stage bidding wars
- Activate demand where and when it actually matters
Instead of fighting over the last click, you influence the decision upstream. Some teams already have access to intent data in some form. The problem is that most intent data lives in reports, dashboards, or enrichment tools. It tells you what is happening, but it does not help you act on it.
Untitled’s approach is different in three ways.
First, it is identity-forward. Intent signals are tied to resolved profiles, not anonymous buckets.
Second, it is activation-ready. Audiences move directly into paid channels without additional processing or manual work.
Third, it is integrated. Intent Audiences sit alongside Untitled’s broader identity, enrichment, and audience tooling, so they can be combined with site data, CRM data, and downstream performance measurement.
Combined with our Identity Resolution Tag, leveraging Intent Audiences produces incredible top-of-funnel audiences that can be identified with our website visitor identification software.
Early Success Stories
We are already seeing strong early signals from teams testing intent-based audiences. In practice, this shows up as:
- Incredible ROAS in paid media channels
- More efficient top-of-funnel performance
- Stronger performance when paired with Streaming TV
- Clearer visibility into where demand originates
As we continue to roll this out, we’ll share more concrete benchmarks and category-level learnings.
INTENT-AUDIENCES IN ACTION
Hestan Drives 5.5X ROAS with Streaming TV & Intent Audiences from Untitled.
Hestan Culinary is a luxury, Italian-handcrafted cookware brand designed for both professional chefs and passionate home cooks. By leveraging Intent Audiences from Untitled and Streaming TV buys as the channel, Hestan achieved a 5.5X ROAS through Q4 2025.
Intent Audiences FAQ
Intent Audiences help you reach in-market buyers while they’re actively researching—before they ever visit your site.
What is an Intent Audience?
An Intent Audience is a group of people built from real research behavior happening across the web—like reading comparison content, engaging with buying-related topics, and showing repeated patterns of interest over time. Intent is about behavior and timing, not demographics or broad interests.
How is intent different from lookalikes or demographic targeting?
Lookalikes and demographics are based on assumptions (who someone is or who they resemble). Intent is based on observed behavior—people actively researching products or solutions right now. That means you can reach buyers earlier in the decision process, before brand preference is set.
How does Untitled generate Intent Topics?
Untitled indexes and groups web content into standardized Intent Topics based on what people are reading and engaging with. In simple terms: we organize the internet’s “research content” into topic buckets, so you can target the categories that matter most to your business.
How does Untitled turn those topics into usable audiences?
As people engage with content tied to Intent Topics, Untitled associates that activity with hashed consumer profiles and identity-resolved profiles—so the audience can be activated across paid channels. You select topics, and Untitled handles the translation from intent signal to activation-ready audience.
Where can I activate Intent Audiences?
Once your audience is built, you can push it directly into channels like Streaming TV, Meta, Google, and email or other downstream platforms— without manual list building.
Do I need to upload lists or spreadsheets?
No. There’s no manual list building, no spreadsheet uploads, and no extra lift required from your team. You simply select the Intent Topics you want, save them, and activate.
What does intent data actually represent?
Intent data reflects real behavior that signals purchase research—like searching category terms, consuming product comparison content, and engaging with topics that correlate with buying decisions. The key difference is that intent shows up earlier than site visits, form fills, or cart actions.
Who are Intent Audiences built for?
They’re built for teams that want to reach people actively researching products or solutions, build awareness with high-affinity audiences, and influence consideration earlier—across ecommerce, B2C, and B2B use cases.
What kind of results should I expect?
Early tests have shown stronger top-of-funnel efficiency, especially when paired with Streaming TV, along with clearer visibility into where demand originates. As the rollout continues, more benchmarks and category learnings can be shared.
How do we get started?
The fastest next step is an intent walkthrough. That session focuses on your category and buying behavior, where intent appears before site visits, and how an intent-driven campaign would be structured. Schedule time with our team here.
Start Building Intent-Audiences with Untitled Now
Intent-Based Audiences are available inside your Untitled account now as a Beta feature! If you want to see how intent signals show up in your category, or how they could be activated across your existing channels, log in to your account and navigate to the “Intent” tab from the menu.
If you don’t have an Untitled account, you can set up a free 14-day trial here.
If you’re not ready to start a trial, no worries. Set up a demo with our team here. Our demo and session focus on:
- Your category and buying behavior
- Where intent appears before site visits
- How an intent-driven campaign would be structured
Reaching buyers earlier is not a theory. It is already happening. This launch is about making that advantage usable!
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