From your point of view, is it better to target people based on who they are i.e. Facebook ads or on what they search for i.e. Google Ads?

It's depended on what is my customer personaو his social media 

Preferences and his personalty type .

Maybe it looks different between different industry if we are toys seller  not te same if we selling  laptop.

I would suggest to target users what they search for because in this case, you can target the audience with the right intent and know what your audience is looking for. For instance, if some come to your ads after searching "where to buy iphone pro in dubai", then by looking at this search term you come to know that this user is looking for iPhone or interested in buying in it which is not the case on Facebook. 

Whereas, on Facebook, you don't get any idea what your audience is looking for when they click on the ad because they are shown ads based on their interest and behaviours no based on their need.

I hope this helps :)

Thanks,

Wasim Momin

In my humble opinion, What they search for is part of what they are. 

If you are targeting music fans, you can find them on facebook following music pages and have discussions using music hashtag. or you can target them through search keywords of music.

To be effective, you need to have both on your plan. Facebook and Google ads if you combined them in one plan, and address it effectively. you will get better results than addressing only one channel of them. 

i think what they search for and keywords is better, when you search for something you tend to have interest in it or wants to know more about it, while in social media it is rarely that you show interest in something that you just passed by while scrolling your page.