Geo-Targeting
How Country, Region and City targeting work in the generator, what each level costs you in pool size, and how to confirm the exit location you got.
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Geo-targeting decides where your requests appear to come from. It is the difference between a price check that reflects a real market and one that does not.
The three levels
| Field | Narrows to | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Country | A country | Poland |
| Region | A state, province or region inside it | Masovia |
| City | A city inside that region | Warsaw |
Leave a field blank to not constrain at that level. Blank Country means anywhere; a Country with a blank Region means anywhere in that country.
The trade-off
Each level down narrows the pool of addresses that match.
| Target | Availability | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Country only | Broadest | Rarely any difficulty |
| Country and Region | Narrower | Usually fine |
| Country, Region and City | Narrowest | Can be slower, and fewer addresses match |
If a city-level request is struggling, widening to region or country is the first thing to try. A country-level address in the right country is often enough for a task that was specified at city level for no strong reason.
When narrow targeting matters
Three cases where it is worth the narrower pool.
Localised pricing and availability. Retailers vary price and stock by region, sometimes by city. Checking the wrong location gives you another market's answer.
Local search results. Rankings and local results are relative to a place, so a check from the wrong place measures the wrong thing.
Ad verification. Confirming that a campaign renders in its intended market requires looking from that market.
If your task is none of those, country-level targeting is usually sufficient and more reliable.
Confirming the location you received
Targeting expresses an intent. Confirming what you actually got is a separate step.
- Generate an endpoint with your targeting set.
- Select Check proxy on its row.
- Read the Exit IP.
- Look that address up with the IP Lookup tool to see the country, city and timezone it resolves to.
The check reports the address; the lookup tells you where that address sits. Comparing the two to your intent is the only way to know the targeting worked.
Targeting is per endpoint
Each endpoint in a set carries its own targeting and its own session. Replacing one endpoint replaces only that one, so a set generated for one city stays in that city. If you need two different locations, generate two sets rather than regenerating one back and forth.