April 15, 2021
Remarketing offers a unique opportunity to target previous visitors to your site. These users are of high value as they have expressed an interested in the product or service you have to offer by visiting the site.
The reasons for not purchasing could be to research, compare prices or they simply got distracted. By offering a gentle reminder in the form of banner ads we can ensure to remain in the decision process, build brand recognition and create the illusion the business is much larger by advertising on other sites they visit. This can also build the confidence and trust needed for new customers to provide payment details.
Some groups of visitors may be of higher value to our remarketing campaigns when they are more likely to make a purchase. For example if a user has added an item to the shopping cart we can assume they have made a decision on a product and are close the purchase. By remarketing to basket visitors who didn’t complete a purchase we can entice them back to complete the transaction.
With this in mind it’s also important to recognise why the user left. If shipping costs are too high or the checkout process is poor they are unlikely to return and buy from a competitor instead. If this form of remarketing performs poorly over extended periods it could highlight some conversion rate issues.
Many remarketing strategies will be focused around securing new customers and disregard previous buyers. Remarketing can be used to get the message out about new ranges, offers or promotions and if the customer had a good experience they are likely to consider purchasing again.
If products are consumable, remarketing lists can be set up to target past customers when they are likely to make another purchase. For example, if an office stationary supplier finds many customers place repeat orders each month they can be targeted between 25 and 35 days after their last purchase by creating a list for both time frames and excluding all members in the 25 list.
Image ads offer many advantages over text ads – after all a picture tells a thousand words! A company logo can be made focus of banner ads, building brand recognition and the illusion of being much larger that is appearing ‘everywhere’.
Ads should promote the key selling points and reasons to buy, such as discounts, unique lines or P&P promotions. Adding a time frame such as “50% Off Today” can also push a sense of urgency in finalising the transaction. By running a common promotion strong multi-channel campaigns can be built, giving a coherent marketing message and associating it with our brand.
Using buttons has been proven to effectively improve click through rates of image ads. Buttons call out to be clicked, giving a clear indication of what we expect a user to do after seeing the ad. Combining this with a strong call to action such as ‘Buy Now’ will promote conversions once the click is made and deter users who are still in the browsing stage.
Bombarding users with ads on every site they visit is very quickly going to drive them away. By setting daily impression limits it can ensured ads don’t become too pushy. This limit will vary from industry to industry and it’s best to experiment, taking note of CTR and other KPIs to find the sweet spot.
The display network offers a huge range of sites ranging in interests and quality. By monitoring where ads are appearing under the display network tab of adwords poor placements can be excluded. This offers the benefit of being able to weed out poor sites and protect your brand image from content you don’t want to be associate with.
While direct conversions may be the main goal for any sales driven campaign, it is also important to monitor how remarketing fits with to overall strategy. Banners can be a catalyst in driving traffic through other sources without a click being made.
Someone may see banner, and without making a click, return to the site directly later in the day to make a purchase. This will be recorded as a view-through conversion and is another main KPI to evaluate the performance of both remarketing and any other display network campaigns.