Best Practices of Retargeting, Part 1

How many times have you found yourself searching for something you need online, but get distracted — the dog barks, the baby’s crying, maybe even a random thought pops into your head and you no longer have time for, or remember, your product search. Whatever it is that distracts you, you abandon that shopping page and forget about it. But then a few days later, you see that same exact item pop up around the web — a social media ad on your Instagram feed, a display ad on your favorite news site as you read an article, even a commercial when you’re streaming videos on YouTube. 

These are retargeting ads. The brand has seen that you were interested in the product and sent targeted ads to encourage you to go back to your cart and complete the purchase. Retargeting ads can be extremely effective, on average, website visitors that see retargeted ads are 43% more likely to convert. 

They currently work by placing a code on the brand’s website. When a new web visitor visits the site, this code shares a web cookie on the user’s browser. It then follows the user around in the browsing session, showing relevant advertising to that user about your products and services. However, cookies are on their way out, which may actually be a great thing for marketers. Instead, a unique identifier will track the user’s browsing history and data will be gathered around that identifier — enabling easier data collection across devices, channels, and time. 

Marketers have to be careful with retargeted ads though. The data that they utilize must be precise. Retargeted ads can come off as invasive or annoying if the customer isn’t interested, already purchased, or they’re served the ad too often that it’s uber clear that the brand is tracking them. 

But with the right strategies, retargeting offers ample benefits to both customers and brands. For customers, it can provide helpful suggestions and reminders to complete purchases they forgot to complete. More surveyed consumers were found to enjoy retargeted ads than those who disliked them. For brands, retargeted ads offer higher KPI metrics such as click-through-rate, conversion, and brand recognition. 

Leverage Advanced Retargeting Techniques

Developing a best-in-class retargeting campaign in partnership with an advertising agency can assist brands looking to reach their customers who’ve abandoned their cart. By leveraging advanced retargeting techniques across all their ad platforms, brands can reach consumers anywhere they are on the web. Some of these strategies include: 

• Retargeting across channels — paid search, web, native, social media, CTV, earned media, and any channel you advertise on can be utilized for retargeting.

• Cap the frequency you send out your ads to customers to avoid coming off as annoying. 

• Bid higher on better-converting pages and less on homepages and non-converting web pages.

• Exclude, exclude, exclude — don’t send out retargeted ads to just anyone (and especially those who have already converted). You can further customize the list by only retargeting customers who spend a certain amount of time on a page or have visited a minimum number of times. 

• Segment your campaigns by category leveraging personalization

• Utilize sequential messaging, or a sequence of ads that tell a story, to drive customers down the funnel 

The strategies above are just the beginning. With the right plan of action, brands can turn traditionally top of the funnel tactics into bottom of the funnel conversion drivers. Save your prospecting ads for the top of the funnel and utilize retargeting ads to drive conversions. Recapture your customers who bounced just before converting and remind them why they were interested in the first place.