In the current golden era of marketing, there’s a lot of technology designed to build new audiences or reconnect with existing audiences. Whether it’s via an online form, clicking on a cost per click (CPC) ad or ad visibility in the cyber world, there’s so much potential to market to consumers who are already engaged with your brand, product or service.
So what’s the secret? To establish a relationship further with the people who have already come in contact with your brand, it’s all about remarketing and retargeting.
Time to break it down
Remarketing and retargeting both refer to advertising to the same person more than once. The key difference really lies in where these two terms function; retargeting describes the process of using targeted online ads for the same audiences multiple times. In contrast, remarketing exists predominantly within the realm of email marketing.
Let’s look at an example: you know those emails you sometimes receive after leaving a website that either prompt you to purchase your abandoned shopping cart or act as upselling/cross-selling emails? Or those emails that offer you a discount if you don’t follow through with your purchase? That’s remarketing at work. These tools are all about re-engaging customers that have already interacted with your brand, but can also be used to target your competitor’s customer base too.
So how do I identify my existing audience?
Let’s begin by establishing that there are two key consumer bases you want to target. Firstly, there are those who have been to your site. These people have already interacted with you in some way, such as clicking on your Google Adwords ad, but may not have taken action such as purchasing a product or signing up for your mailing list.
Then there are the people who have engaged with your competitors. Sure, they haven’t come across you yet, but they’re already interested in your niche- and that’s something.
Social media remarketing
When it comes to social media, what sets remarketing apart from good, ol’ regular marketing is that it’s used to speak to your engaged audience. The key here is to get people involved with your brand, time and time again. One of the best ways to do this is by simply asking questions. This prompts your audience to share their thoughts, feelings or experiences- all the while strengthening their brand loyalty.
Competitions and contests are another great way to engage your audiences more than once, and can also be used to cross-promote with other social media channels as well. Best of all, contests are a way to encourage participation that’s actually fun. What better way to get them coming back for more?
Now, let’s look at retargeting
Like we spoke about before, retargeting is all about using technology to target the same audience, multiple times. Did you know that around 98% of web traffic doesn’t translate to actionable conversion? Nearly all of your audience is leaving your website without leaving contact details, making a purchase or following you on social media. That’s why retargeting is so important!
Retargeting involves placing a software on your website, which places a cookie inside the visitor’s browser to save their information in your account- whether that’s with Google Analytics, Facebook or Twitter. The retargeting pixel is invisible, but this small snippet of code makes a big difference. It allows you to create and display ads that are specific to those who have visited your website before, which is what makes this practice so successful.
Okay, that’s enough talk! Here are the cold, hard facts:
- Website visitors who are retargeted are 70% more likely to convert on your site
- Retargeted ads led to a 1064% increase in branded search (showing a massive increase in brand recall and awareness)
- Following remarketing, 26% of consumers who abandoned their shopping cart returned to purchase
Remarketing and retargeting work so that you’re no longer a stranger to your consumer base- you’re a friendly face among the whirlwind that is the internet. As one of the most underused marketing strategies out there, the question isn’t- what’s there to lose? Rather, let’s focus on what there is to gain.
