Remarketing is all about staying in front of warm prospects.

We’ve all experienced it: we browse a pair of shoes, or car, close the tab, and move on with our lives. Then — not by coincidence — ads those same shoe or car  follow us across the websites we visit for the next month. Is it slightly annoying? Maybe. Is it effective? Yep.

That’s what remarketing (sometimes called “retargeting”) is, and for businesses willing to use it, it’s one of the highest-ROI tools in digital advertising. Essentially, remarketing allows you to put your ads in front of people who have either:

• Been to your website,
• Been to your competitors websites, or even
• Searched the keywords built into your website.

Steps to take before you start on a remarketing effort:

• Keyword research is the first step you take before considering remarketing,
• Building an SEO-optimized website that incorporates keywords throughout. See what goes into a an SEO-optimized page here, and
• Creating a series of engaging display ads that get noticed. Multiple ads, addressing the different benefits you offer is important.

Remarketing and SEO are complex eco-systems unto themselves, so it’s best to have someone with experience manage this process.

A more detailed look into remarketing.

SEO and SEM are critical to incorporate into your website before starting a remarketing effort. A quick overview of the main benefits are:

1. Reaching a “warm” audience.

Reaching people who have not yet heard of your company is expensive, though that’s what SEO is all about. So to get people to your website, SEO needs to be part of the equation, but there’s also GEO  and AEO, which you can learn about here.)

Remarketing reaches people who have already shown interest by visiting your site, viewing a product, even if they leave your site before they fill out your Contact form. Those folks are significantly more likely to be future clients than someone seeing your information for the first time. Research shows that remarketing ads can achieve click-through rates up to 10x higher than standard display ads.

See the difference between Search and Display ads here. (Display ads are an integral part of remarketing.)

2. Your ad spend goes further.

Because remarketing targets people already familiar with your brand, your “cost-per-acquisition” tends to be much lower than running broad display ads based on keywords. Remarketing is the opposite of the “shotgun” approach (trying to reach people who’ve not heard of your company). You’re targeting a defined group of people with genuine interest in what you’re offering. That makes your advertising investment work harder.

3. It keeps your name in front of people.

Not everyone who comes to your website buys on the first visit. In fact, most don’t. Remarketing keeps your company top-of-mind during their “consideration” phase. And over time, it builds familiarity and trust. So whenever someone is finally ready to make a decision, your brand will be one they remember, because you’re keeping your name in front of them.

4. Customizable and measurable.

Remarketing campaigns are very flexible because you can segment audiences by the pages on your website they visited, how long they stayed, or what page they left your website. You can serve tailored messages to each group. And because everything is digitally tracked, you can measure the performance of your remarketing efforts with precision. (This is where having that experienced person really comes in handy!)

5. Dramatically reduces the dreaded “cart abandonment.”

Statistics show most online shoppers abandon their carts before completing a purchase. That’s an big pool of potential revenue going unfulfilled. Remarketing lets you follow up with these visitors, by reminding them what they left behind. You can even offer a discount or incentive to bring them back. Even recovering a small percentage of those abandoned carts can translate into decent revenue.

Remarketing isn’t about being pushy. It’s about being in front of your prospect at the right moment.

Most people need multiple touchpoints before committing to a purchase, and remarketing gives them a gentle reminder that you’re there whenever they’re ready. If you’re already spending on SEO and Google Ads to drive traffic to your website, but not following up with those visitors, adding remarketing to the mix could get you more clients or customers through this process.

Contact us if you’d like to look into remarketing for your business. If not, you might be seeing ads from us following you around the web!  😉